The Effect of Prior Employer Firm Size on Entrepreneurs' Skills

Although the entrepreneurial performance has been the main subject in entrepreneurial studies, little research has been attempted on its link with the entrepreneur's prior employer firm. In this study, we examined a relationship between employer firm size and post-entry self-employment performances. In startups, entrepreneurs should be "jacks-of-all-trades". Less definite division of labor in small business allows potential entrepreneurs to be generalists, producing more productive entrepreneurs. If that is the case, in manufacturing, in which interdependencies between production factors are strong, the necessity for being generalists is greater than in other industries. Our empirical investigation employed a rich data set representing the entire Taiwanese labor market, and confirmed hypotheses.