Entrepreneurial career persistence of hybrid entrepreneurs: The opposing moderating roles of wage work-to-entrepreneurship enrichment and entrepreneurship-to-wage work enrichment

Hybrid entrepreneurs are individuals who are employees and entrepreneurs at the same time. In their quest to make their businesses successful, they commonly encounter challenges and adversities. This makes entrepreneurial persistence a key factor in the success of hybrid entrepreneurs. Drawing on social cognitive theory, the hybrid entrepreneurship context, and the perspective of person–environment fit, we developed a moderated mediation model in which person–venture fit, needs–venture supplies fit, and venture demands–abilities fit are associated with entrepreneurial persistence through entrepreneurial self-efficacy. We proposed that these indirect effects are conditional on wage work-to-entrepreneurship enrichment (WE enrichment) (the skills and experiences transferred to entrepreneurial work from wage work) and its converse, i.e., entrepreneurship-to-wage work enrichment (EW enrichment). Based on a sample of 279 hybrid entrepreneurs, we found support for the moderated mediation model, in which the positive effects of fit perceptions on entrepreneurial persistence via entrepreneurial self-efficacy were stronger for hybrid entrepreneurs reporting higher levels of WE enrichment. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. • Entrepreneurial self-efficacy mediated the relationships between fit perceptions and entrepreneurial persistence. • These indirect effects depend on the direction of acquired enrichment between wage work and entrepreneurship work. • The mediated relationships are stronger when wage work-to-entrepreneurship (WE) enrichment is high. • However, the mediated relationships are weaker when entrepreneurship-to-wage work (EW) enrichment is high.