From Great Expectations to Hard Times A Longitudinal Study of Creative Sector Graduate New Ventures Richard Hanage

1. From Great Expectations to Hard Times A Longitudinal Study of Creative Sector Graduate New Ventures Richard Hanage Visiting Lecturer, Teesside University Business School Teesside University, Southfield Road, Middlesbrough, TS1 3BA richard@hanage.com www.tees.ac.uk/schools/tubs/ Dr Jonathan M. Scott Reader in Entrepreneurship, Teesside University Business School

2. Research Question and Approach What happens to graduates with a creative degree when they try to start a digital creative business on graduating. • Four year longitudinal study of 7 graduates, through 6-monthly in-depth semi-structured interviews and periodic questionnaires (eg GET test, Learning Styles) • A ‘convenience sample’ from my start-up workshops. • All had been independently assessed as having ‘promise of business success’, but were young and lacked business experience. • They had high levels of start-up support, eg DigitalCity Fellowships • Interviews recorded, videoed, transcribed, and analysed by topic. Also used business plans, tweets, Facebook, for some minor triangulation. No other contact. • Researcher tried to be a ‘disinterested observer’, but inevitably influenced the participants’ thoughts and actions, through the questions asked.

3. Creative Graduates:Stages of Business/Career Development Prior creative experience Creative development Creative development (if any) • Utilising ‘creative’ • experience • Utilising creative learning Priorpersonal experiences - school, Uni. Peer & family influences, etc. Personal development: learning, shifts in expectations, skills, identity, career etc • Their personal world and experience • Personal learning and events Personal development in new role(s) • Utilising business learning • Utilising business • experience Prior enterprise/ work experience Entrepreneurial/ employee development Entrepreneurial development Transition 1: from creative student to creative entrepreneur. Transition 2: to a viable career in line with new personal objectives. Phase 3: Sustaining a successful (entrepreneurial?) career. Phase 1: Life up to graduation and intent to start a business. Phase 2: Trying to be a successful creative entrepreneur.

4. Business/Career Routes Growth Business Owner Solo Freelancer Employee E: Animation business A: Website design A: Web-site designer Practice their art A: Website design F: Motion graphics F: Motion graphics C: Music design C: Music publishing & record labels C: Collate DJ music reviews Use their art B: Running creative workshops B: Designer goods E-commerce B: E-marketing Manager D: Animation sales D: Graphic design F: Betting Shop Mgr G: Retail e-commerce idea Abandon their art C: Shelf-stacker G: Sales lead generator idea D: Signage Manager G: Trainee chocolatier

5. £20k+ £10-20k £5-10K £0-5k £0k Varied Journeys Annual income Shelf-stacker job. Web-site design job. E-commerce marketing manager job. Record labels Free-lance work Other ideas Music publish-ing Other projects Freelance work in schools Music for computer games E-commerce web-site for designer products Web-site design business DJ-ing A: Linear C: Portfolio B: Serial

6. Business Thread • Financially, they all ‘failed’. None have paid themselves the minimum wage. • Starting a business did not necessarily equate with being entrepreneurial. Some were avoiding boring jobs (2) or could not get a creative sector job (4). • Selling skills were the main missing element of human capital. They all struggled to find customers, despite having good products. • Support cost about £20k each. Some thought it was too optimistic and generous. • Unknown unknowns: So much to discover and learn. • Time commitment: only one worked consistently more than a 40hr week. • Alternative income from family, state or other work reduced the pressure to succeed in the business. • A business team may be a key to success (1), but not if the team is too big (1), or combines social as well as business (1). • Tough industry. Are some sub-sectors especially tough – egmusic?

7. Personal/Creative Threads Personal Thread • School/Uni behaviours were good indicators of business behaviours. • Artist/Business identities. Most moved easily from an artistic identity to more of a business identity – as expected from their declared intent. • Developing their personal lives.All were exploring options in their personal lives, which influenced their businesses – eg forming/splitting social partnerships. • Personal issues were major determinants of career outcomes – eg financial pressures on acquiring a family, having to move location, loss of alternative income. • Learning: all believe that the experience was not wasted. • Serial Entrepreneurs? None of the six in employment expect to run a full-time business again, but some may do some freelance work Creative Thread • Practitioners? Three were very keen to continue as practicing creatives. Another three do it as a side-line or hobby.

8. Questions Arising from Insights • Excess graduates. Do Universities produce too many creative graduates? • Enterprise training. Do too few creative students get in-depth business experience and training? Especially about being ‘necessity entrepreneurs’. • Masters degrees. Do graduates do a Masters degree mainly to postpone the pain of entering the employment market? • Post-grad support. Are graduate start-up schemes too optimistic and too munificent? • Selling skills. Do start-up schemes give too little training in selling? • Teams. Should start-up programmes encourage team start-ups? • Getting experience. Is starting a graduate business a necessary step on the road to a ‘proper creative sector job’ rather than the first step in entrepreneurship? • Assessments & prior experience: are they good indicators of business success? • Personal weaknesses (eg confidence): how can we make sure we address these?

9. Next Steps: Focus on the Entrepreneur This is a very unusual longitudinal data-set: detailed real-time data from business birth to closure (and beyond). What other issues should be investigated?