Context and contingency; the act of entrepreneurship

This paper examines the role of context and contingency in the entrepreneurial process in the context of the creative economy in the UK. The music industry in Glasgow is taken as its exemplar, drawing upon primary evidence to provide an empirical account of how music entrepreneurship is expressed in a series of acts (projects), and that the entrepreneurial process is ongoing, with each act informing how the next is undertaken in a contingent manner.
Empirical data were collected via in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 15 music-entrepreneurs working within Glasgow’s independent rock music sector, and 7 industry experts. Hence, the study is embedded within a unique creative and entrepreneurial context, with multiple perspectives provided by the 21 respondents. The findings suggest that the entrepreneurial process is ongoing, with each act informing how the next is undertaken. Specifically, how entrepreneurs act in each of the three stages that make up this process, i.e. how they identify opportunities, acquire resources and manage uncertainty. The study highlights how entrepreneurs in such uncertain situations base their decisions on who they are, what they know, and who they know “to make the rules less uncertain”.
The conclusions drawn from the study are placed within the context of the wider debate about creative entrepreneurship. This paper contributes to emerging discourses exploring the nature of the entrepreneurial process as well as adding to the sparse empirical analyses on how entrepreneurial acts are undertaken, how certain projects are constructed and deconstructed, as well as who gets involved and why.