Identifying sources of occupational stress in entrepreneurs for measurement

Although occupational stress has been identified as an important issue for entrepreneurs, systematic research on the sources of stress (‘stressors’) faced by this segment of the workforce is lacking, with the identification and measurement of occupational stressors among entrepreneurs receiving scant attention in both the entrepreneurship literature and the stress literature more generally. The current study combined deductive methods (literature searches) and inductive methods (focus groups and interviews with 45 entrepreneurs) to identify common and salient sources of occupational stress in entrepreneurs’ daily working lives. A content analysis of the data produced nine stressor categories and approximately 30 subcategories within these broader dimensions. These findings were used to generate an initial item pool for a new measure of occupational stressors, specific to entrepreneurs: the Sources of Entrepreneurial Stress Scale (SESS). It is argued that the development of valid measures of entrepreneurial stressors will assist progress in the literature on occupational stress and entrepreneurship.