Persistence over time of the determinants of SMEs’ growth
There is a plethoric literature on the determinants of SMEs’ growth. The main determining factors can be classified into characteristics of the environment, of the firm, of its strategy and of the entrepreneur. The idea behind this research is that the determinants’ influence on growth, and especially of the initial characteristics of the entrepreneur at the startup phase, will vary over time. To test this assumption, we measured the impact of several factors considered by the literature as influencing the growth of SMEs three and five years after their creation. Our sample consisted of 2 350 SMEs from various industries. Our results indicate that the determinants have a lower explanatory power of the growth of SMEs five years than three years after the creation. This decrease particularly affects the initial entrepreneurial characteristics, as well as the sector’s and the firm’s characteristics.