Towards a Testable Model of the Impact of Specific Entrepreneurial Networks on the Success of Businesses in the Pietermaritzburg Region

Entrepreneurial networking has been a relatively under-researched area in the field of entrepreneurship. The apparent avoidance of this topic by researchers could be attributed to a multitude of speculative reasons, such as the multi-disciplinary nature of the topic; uncertainty with regard t o the nature and operation of entrepreneurial networking; disagreement among scholars on critical success factors of businesses and the difficulty in obtaining reliable quantifiable data from businesses to enable researchers to determine their level of success. A testable model t o determine the impact of specific networks on the success of businesses could contribute substantially to the base of knowledge in the field of entrepreneurial networking research. In this paper, a literature review of entrepreneurial networking and critical success factors of businesses was initially conducted in order to establish a conceptual base for the exploratory research that followed. The exploratory empirical study was based on a non-probability sample of small businesses in the Pietermaritzburg region. The objective of this paper is to establish ... Impact of ... Entrepreneurial Networks on the Success of Businesses ... 9 criteria towards the development of a testable model of specific entrepreneurial networks on the success of businesses. In this regard the issues, challenges, limitations of this approach and suggestions for further research are clearly identified in the paper.