Tough Love: How Communal Schemas and Contracting Practices Build Relational Capital in Entrepreneurial Teams

Entrepreneurial teams often operate under conditions of novelty—the lack of familiarity. Novelty can undermine team members' ability to develop the relational capital (trust, identification, and mutual obligation) needed for a venture to succeed. Building on research on relational schemas and the governance of interfirm relations, I argue that entrepreneurial teams can counteract the challenges of novelty by adopting communal relational schemas (caring about one another' s needs) and contracting practices (making expectations explicit and transparent).