FöRFATTARE
Matschiner, Markus

DATUM
2004-06-07

INSTITUTION
Industriell ekonomi och samhällsvetenskap / Industriell organisation

SAMMANFATTNING
This paper presents a theoretical research study, addressing issues on growth in SME’s. Barriers and obstacles to growth are first gathered and summarized from research literature. Considerable effort had to be made in order to categorize the vastly heterogenic research in terms of terminology, scope and depth of research and academic field in focus. Barriers to growth can generally be divided into external and internal aspects on one hand, and material and immaterial on the other. Furthermore, research seems to focus on entrepreneurial and resource based approaches. The two approaches seem to be closely interlinked, yet not much research has been dedicated to explaining this interaction deeper. The most important finding of this paper is that planning seems to be crucial for the entrepreneur to succeed in his objective of pursuing growth. New findings have also been made showing the intertwined nature of the process of gaining trust and acceptance from external stakeholders and its implications on time frame and planning of resource gathering. Lack of business planning and financial planning are the most severe pitfalls, leading to many difficulties and interlinked barriers to growth in different growth stages. Other major threats to growth is the founder’s exaggerated need of control, lack of market insight, lack of contacts for future resource and financial needs, and insufficient abilities to effectively communicate the company’s business idea and value proposition both to internal and external stakeholders.

ISSN 1404-5508 / ISRN LTU-SHU-EX--04/113--SE / NR 2004:113