Paper Title
Defining What it Means for firms to „Leverage Resources‟

Abstract
The transition of an entrepreneur’s initial ‘idea’ and surveillance of market opportunity to business formation and commercialization is a core aspect of entrepreneurship. However, the availability of firm resources has not been found to act as an impediment to firm formation and growth. This interesting dynamic has led many entrepreneurship researchers to attempt to explain how small firms with comparatively small resource availability not only survive, but can flourish compared to larger, resource-rich firms. ‘Resource leveraging’ has been described as the vital ingredient in explaining this phenomenon. The use of internal resources (those that are currently controlled by the firm) can be utilized to grow beyond the limitations set by these resources and acquire additional external resources (those that are not under the firms’ control). The management of internal resources and leveraging these to acquire external resources is essential for firm formation and growth and represents an important stage of the entrepreneurial process. However, the way in which firms go about this process of leverage is less clear. Through the use of the in-depth interview approach, 22 entrepreneurs were interviewed in the United States and Australia with regard to their use of resources and in what ways they managed them to either begin and/or grow their organizations. The results indicate several themes that emerge and a distinctive subset of variables that can create growth for new or emerging firms. Thus, the goal of this research is to develop a clearer understanding of the ‘resource leverage’ concept, and to generate a definitional framework where operationalization can occur to explore the construct through quantitative methods. Keywords - Resources, Leveraging, SMEs, Entrepreneurship, Qualitative, Interviews, Definition