Navigating Passion: How Entrepreneurs Experience and Regulate Emotion in High-Stakes Decision-Making
(2025) ENTN19 20251Department of Business Administration
- Abstract
- This thesis explores how entrepreneurs experience and regulate fluctuations in passion, and how these affect their decision-making in high-stakes contexts. While entrepreneurial passion has been widely recognised as a motivating force, little is known about how its intensity fluctuates over time and how such shifts influence strategic behaviour and decisions. Drawing on emotion regulation theory, cognitive style literature, and entrepreneurial decision-making research, this study investigates the nuanced interplay between affect and judgment in real-world venture contexts.
To address this gap, we conducted ten semi-structured interviews with entrepreneurs operating in diverse industries across Europe. Using a qualitative, inductive... (More) - This thesis explores how entrepreneurs experience and regulate fluctuations in passion, and how these affect their decision-making in high-stakes contexts. While entrepreneurial passion has been widely recognised as a motivating force, little is known about how its intensity fluctuates over time and how such shifts influence strategic behaviour and decisions. Drawing on emotion regulation theory, cognitive style literature, and entrepreneurial decision-making research, this study investigates the nuanced interplay between affect and judgment in real-world venture contexts.
To address this gap, we conducted ten semi-structured interviews with entrepreneurs operating in diverse industries across Europe. Using a qualitative, inductive approach based on the Gioia methodology, we identified four aggregate dimensions that reflect how passion evolves, is shaped by emotion, managed deliberately, and linked to cognitive strategies in high-pressure situations. A theoretical model is proposed to illustrate the connections between emotional influence, regulatory behaviour, and decision-making logic.
A key contribution of this study is the identification and proposal of the concept of emotional detachment as a strategic, context-sensitive form of emotion regulation. Unlike suppression, this concept reflects a temporary and deliberate withdrawal from emotional investment in order to enable clearer, more rational decision-making. Furthermore, the study highlights how entrepreneurs toggle between intuitive and analytical cognitive styles depending on emotional and environmental cues, particularly in moments of uncertainty. Passion is shown to be not only a driving force but also a variable state that can emerge or erode over time, and that entrepreneurs learn to modulate in relation to their evolving roles and business challenges.
The findings have both theoretical and practical implications. They call for more dynamic models of entrepreneurial affect that integrate emotion regulation and cognitive flexibility, and offer insight into how founders can better manage emotional influence in complex decisions. This research provides a nuanced understanding of how entrepreneurial emotion functions not as a constant trait, but as a flexible tool that shapes – and is shaped by – the decision-making context. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9209153
- author
- de Jesus, Francisco Pedro LU and School, Maurits LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- ENTN19 20251
- year
- 2025
- type
- H1 - Master's Degree (One Year)
- subject
- keywords
- Entrepreneurial passion, Passion regulation, Entrepreneurial decision-making, Emotional detachment, Passion fluctuation
- language
- English
- id
- 9209153
- date added to LUP
- 2025-08-05 13:23:02
- date last changed
- 2025-08-05 13:23:02
@misc{9209153,
abstract = {{This thesis explores how entrepreneurs experience and regulate fluctuations in passion, and how these affect their decision-making in high-stakes contexts. While entrepreneurial passion has been widely recognised as a motivating force, little is known about how its intensity fluctuates over time and how such shifts influence strategic behaviour and decisions. Drawing on emotion regulation theory, cognitive style literature, and entrepreneurial decision-making research, this study investigates the nuanced interplay between affect and judgment in real-world venture contexts.
To address this gap, we conducted ten semi-structured interviews with entrepreneurs operating in diverse industries across Europe. Using a qualitative, inductive approach based on the Gioia methodology, we identified four aggregate dimensions that reflect how passion evolves, is shaped by emotion, managed deliberately, and linked to cognitive strategies in high-pressure situations. A theoretical model is proposed to illustrate the connections between emotional influence, regulatory behaviour, and decision-making logic.
A key contribution of this study is the identification and proposal of the concept of emotional detachment as a strategic, context-sensitive form of emotion regulation. Unlike suppression, this concept reflects a temporary and deliberate withdrawal from emotional investment in order to enable clearer, more rational decision-making. Furthermore, the study highlights how entrepreneurs toggle between intuitive and analytical cognitive styles depending on emotional and environmental cues, particularly in moments of uncertainty. Passion is shown to be not only a driving force but also a variable state that can emerge or erode over time, and that entrepreneurs learn to modulate in relation to their evolving roles and business challenges.
The findings have both theoretical and practical implications. They call for more dynamic models of entrepreneurial affect that integrate emotion regulation and cognitive flexibility, and offer insight into how founders can better manage emotional influence in complex decisions. This research provides a nuanced understanding of how entrepreneurial emotion functions not as a constant trait, but as a flexible tool that shapes – and is shaped by – the decision-making context.}},
author = {{de Jesus, Francisco Pedro and School, Maurits}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Navigating Passion: How Entrepreneurs Experience and Regulate Emotion in High-Stakes Decision-Making}},
year = {{2025}},
}