IDENTIFYING HIGH POTENTIAL ENTREPRENEURS IN A DEVELOPING COUNTRY: A CLUSTER ANALYSIS OF UGANDAN ENTREPRENEURS

It has often been argued that entrepreneurs in developing countries can be classified as either "survival" or "growth-oriented." However, there is little systematic knowledge about classification of entrepreneurs in developing countries. We propose that what we call high potential entrepreneurs can be distinguished from low potential entrepreneurs, given that high potential entrepreneurs recognize and effectively exploit opportunities. In this paper we classify entrepreneurs using three core entrepreneurial activities; opportunity recognition, planning and innovativeness. A cluster analysis of about 700 Ugandan entrepreneurs yielded two natural, distinct and internally homogeneous groups of high potential and low potential entrepreneurship.