Developing Entrepreneurial Talent for Competitive Start-Ups: A Systematic Literature Review
Abstract
Entrepreneurial talent is increasingly treated as a developable resource for start-up formation and competitiveness, but evidence remains fragmented across entrepreneurship education, founder competence, human capital, digital entrepreneurship, team composition, and entrepreneurial ecosystems. This systematic literature review examines how entrepreneurial talent is conceptualized, developed, activated, and associated with start-up outcomes. A PRISMA-guided, Scopus-bounded search of titles, abstracts, and keywords was completed on 30 June 2026. The search identified 346 records; after the publication-period, document-type, language, and scope criteria were applied, 125 English-language journal articles published from 2020 onward formed the formal review corpus. Quantitative, qualitative, mixed-method, conceptual, bibliometric, review, case-study, and experimental designs were synthesized narratively. Because these designs and outcomes were heterogeneous, quality was interpreted descriptively and claims were calibrated to evidence maturity rather than combined into a single cross-design score. Four domains emerged: entrepreneurial-talent conceptualization; education and talent development; start-up outcomes; and ecosystem, digital, and contextual enablement. The synthesis defines entrepreneurial talent at the individual level as a developable portfolio of knowledge, skills, abilities, experience, motivation, self-efficacy, resilience, and digital fluency, while distinguishing founding-team competence, venture-level dynamic capability, and ecosystem enablement as analytically separate but interacting levels. Evidence supports a stage-contingent pattern from opportunity recognition and experimentation to commercialization, survival, and scaling, but many studies remain cross-sectional or rely on intention and readiness measures. The review therefore proposes, rather than validates, a multilevel framework linking development, activation, team complementarity, resource orchestration, ecosystem conditions, and objective venture outcomes. Findings should be interpreted as Scopus-bounded and call for longitudinal, multilevel, and outcome-based research.