Social Entrepreneurs' Perceptions of Experienced Failure in Finland : Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this study is to increace the knolewdge regarding failure within social entrepreneuship. We want to investigate the perception of failure of social entrepreneurs. To discover the experiences of the participants we have used the interpretative phenomenological analysis. We have conducted and analyzed three in-debth interviews. The data was collected from entrepreneurs/CEOs, who had experienced a failure within the social enterprise. Two of the failures were  financial  and one participant experienced a social mission drift. The participants were running i organizations that had the status of social enterprise. Based on literature search, we defined five elements of social entrepreneurship: individual, organization, environment, mission and learning. We aim to understand how the participants consider these elements in relation with failure, either social mission drift or financial failure.    The findings suggest that the elements of social enterpreneurship are in reciprocal relation to the failure. Accordingly, for example, the individual has an effect to the failure and failure has an effect to the individual. This has been analyzed with a framework created and we have discover how the elements contribute on failure and how the failure will affect the elements. The only element where the reciprocity was not visible was learning but we do not consider this to prove it since the study is not longitudinal.   There are several theoretical implications of the study. This study increases knowledge on the social entrepreneurs' perception of failure. The theory about social entrepreneurial failure is developed further in socioeconomic and geographic context of Finland, where the status of social enterprise is defined in legislation.  Since social entrepreneurship has different characteristics in different schools of thought divided geographically, the implication possibilities within the European school of thought is evident.  Practical implications of the study can be identified as development of knowledge of social entrepreneurship in Finland. We have identified several problems relating to the govenrnmant's mission to employ disabled and long-term unemployed. It is considered by the all the participants that the legislation does not serve the phenomenon and should accordingly be developed. The study contributes by displaying the experiences of the social entrepreneurs. In developing social entrepreneurship this is crucial, since improvement is difficult to achieve without understanding the faults. The study will pinpoint the problematic issues. By developing social entrepreneurship the study contributes improving the quality of life of disabled and long-term unemployed who the Finnish government tries to help through social enterprises. In addition to the development within governmental level, the study contributes to the individuals, who are planning to establish a social enterprise. The study helps them to consider the issues, which have been experienced by other social entrepreneurs.