A review of the empirical literature on ‘engagement’ within the context of entrepreneurship and small business management

Abstract

Previous reviews on (work/job/employee) ‘engagement’ have neglected research within the context of entrepreneurship and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). We present a systematic narrative review of the empirical literature on ‘engagement’ within this industrial and employment context. Our aims are to a) determine the scope of research conducted, b) identify key insights, and c) uncover key gaps and problems. We searched four databases for material published between 2010 and 2023. From systematic sifting of 1155 items, 40 articles met our quality and relevance criteria. These articles derive from various disciplines, yet mainly adopt a psychological focus. However, the literature lacks methodological pluralism and cultural contextualization, and an underplaying of institutional/market factors. We find two distinct streams: i) studies focusing on employee engagement with SMEs, and ii) studies focusing on entrepreneurial engagement. There are opportunities to connect these streams in a more interdisciplinary way as well as to develop each in more meaningful ways.

Publication DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09585192.2025.2478853
Divisions: College of Business and Social Sciences > Aston Business School > Aston India Centre for Applied Research
College of Business and Social Sciences > Aston Business School
College of Business and Social Sciences > Aston Business School > Advanced Services Group
Aston University (General)
Funding Information: This work was supported by Economic and Social Research Council.
Additional Information: Copyright © 2025 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The terms on which this article has been published allow the posting of the Accepted Manuscript in a repository by the author(s) or with their consent.
Last Modified: 31 Mar 2025 07:27
Date Deposited: 18 Mar 2025 15:08
Full Text Link:
Related URLs: https://www.tan ... 92.2025.2478853 (Publisher URL)
PURE Output Type: Article
Published Date: 2025-03-17
Published Online Date: 2025-03-17
Accepted Date: 2025-03-08
Authors: Fletcher, Luke
Ram, Monder (ORCID Profile 0000-0003-1901-6654)
McCarthy, Imelda (ORCID Profile 0000-0002-4715-9831)

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