4. Including 5 sections addressing the following issues:

   1. Motivations for involvement in small business ventures

      1. Psychological and family reasons

      2. Monetary and charitable driving forces

   2. Problems and obstacles that small business owners and managers face in starting and running their businesses

      1. Difficulties in finding information on registration

      2. High taxation

      3. Addressing managerial and personnel issues.

   3. Entrepreneurs’ training and assistance needs

      1. Business venture start-ups

      2. Transactions and management

      3. Sources of training and consulting assistance

      4. Methods of service delivery

   4. Traits of successful entrepreneurs

      1. Personal health and energy to creativity

      2. Technical and managerial knowledge

   5. Data reflecting respondents’ personal and business profiles

1. Limitations to the Surveys (1994 & 2008)

   1. A limited sample size in this research does not allow for comprehensive generalisations, conclusions, and broad policy recommendations. This is because of the following.

      1. Russia’s immense geographic and economic size

         1. The current survey was conducted in the capital city of Moscow that is in many ways significantly different from the rest of Russia. (Limiting application of the results toward Russia as a whole)

   2. Broad variation in the sample composition between the 1994 and 2008 studies

   3. Inconsistencies in the sample at these two stages contribute to incongruence in analysis and comparisons.

      1. 1994 --- Russian economy and small business entrepreneurship have been under the early stage of the market transition.

      2. 2008 --- Russian economy was fuelled by high prices for oil, gas, metals, and other mineral resources and commodities in which Russia’s strategic positions were exceptionally strong.

   4. Logistical challenges and respondents’ reservations in sharing information in the Russian transitional environment

      1. The survey has been administered through a training program.  Lead to the skewed research findings not matched to small business entrepreneurship environment in the Real World.

   5. Longitudinal studies is not effective in international collaborative research.

      1. Complexities (a number of technical and other reasons,) in ensuring data consistency at different stages of the survey

      2. This method seems to be effective on the same object at different developmental stages.

   6. Mid-term and long-term ramifications for Russian small business entrepreneurship remain to be seen as the crisis. The key problems are related to the following.

      1. Weakened purchasing power among general population

      2. Unemployment increasing

      3. Inflation (around 13% yearly)

      4. Malfunctioning banking system

      5. Lack of government attention and support

      6. Dependency on one or a few large enterprises, often operating under government orders (Soviet Cultural Legacy)

2. Findings: 2008 vs. 1994

   1. Russia currently enjoys stronger political stability, economic resurgence, and robust economic growth that have propelled the nation as one of the world’s important emerging markets.

      1. Political economic reforms in Russia, along with favourable global trends and developments, have brought about significant changes in the environment for SMEs and entrepreneurship.

      2. However, the number of SMEs in Russia per 1,000 of population was a lot lower than other developed countries and not distributive enough throughout the territory. (Most of the SMEs are in Moscow and Russia’s Central and North-Western federal districts while the rest are still underdeveloped.)

   2. Actions during Putin’s first presidential term

      1. Economic reforms

      2. Introduction of the flat tax system

      3. Strengthening of the banking sector

      4. Improvements in the SME registration

      5. Reporting procedures

      6. Other measures

   3. Significant impact from Putin on motivations, obstacles, and other parameters of starting and operating small ventures

      1. Wider and simplified access to loans and other sources of financing despite scarcity of venture capital

3. Personal and Business Profiles

   1. Two main differences in comparative demographic trends between the respondents representing SMEs in 1994 and 2008

      1. Percentage by age of entrepreneurs

         1. Percentage of those 21 to 30 years of age increased a lot from 1994.

         2. While the share of those 31 to 50 years of age dropped a lot in 2008.

         3. This significant shift to younger age may be explained by the increased ease of registering new businesses owing to changes in legislation in early 2000s.

      2. Male-female ratio

         1. Changed from 70:30 in 1994 to 49.6:51.4 in 2008.

            1. Objectively the number of female entrepreneurs in Russia tends to be increasing nationwide, especially in the service sector and particularly in professional services.

   2. Other differences

      1. Reduction in the share of minorities involved in small business (More in ethic majority)

      2. Changes in the results emerged from answers to the question ‘‘Knowing what you know now, if you had to do it over again, would you go into business for yourself?’’

         1. The number of “YES” answers is reduced in 2008.

            1. People are better educated and informed not only about the bright side of small business entrepreneurship but about its dark side and challenges resulting in lower commitment to repeat their entrepreneurial experience

            2. Another reason may be a greater availability of attractive non-entrepreneurial career alternatives in the corporate sector, government, non-profit organizations, and elsewhere.

      3. Significant changes in size of the businesses, especially among the ones under the category of small business

         1. The size (number of employees) is larger in 2008.

      4. Changes in annual sales (Generally larger in 2008)

   3. Very few difference (Almost not different)

      1. The number of businesses owned (In both 1994 and 2008 surveys, about 96% of the respondents owned no more than two businesses.)

      2. No significant changes between 1994 and 2008 were found in major sources of initial funding for small entrepreneurial ventures.

         1. Personal savings along with family and friends were given as major sources of financing.

   4. Analysis of the differences for Personal and Business Profiles

      1. Reflect some improvements in education and business training and respective shifts in cultural attitudes and life styles over the past few years as Russia evolves from its post-Soviet demise toward market economy.

      2. Obstacles in accessing start-up and working capital in Russia remain financial environment for Russian SMEs despite the improvement.

         1. Despite the fact that institutional sources of SME equity financing, such as venture capital and initial public offerings, their greater role in private capital for SME developments is encouraging.

4. Motivations

   1. No significant variations between the 2 study periods in major motivations towards entrepreneurship

1. Entrepreneurial motivations are often closely intertwined with the entrepreneur’s personal motivations and social networks that have no immediate relationship with his or her business enterprise.

2. Despite no significant differences, the top motivations toward small entrepreneurship are very individualistic by nature, ranging from individual “wealth creation” to maintaining a status of “own boss”.

3. External factors like bad boss, working with people one prefers, and desirable locations were not quite like motivators for entrepreneurship although the factors had their own dynamics and role in impacting Russia’s SME business. --- Why their ranks were low may be the following.

   1. More Short-term Orientation

      1. According to Hofstede’s result, Russia has long-term orientation.

      2. The individual wealth creation coupled with short-term orientation becomes the key self-serving strategic priority because people’s perspectives on entrepreneurship perception, compared to those during the post-Soviet transition in the 1990s, are more pragmatic

   2. Russian tradition of communal collectivism, national political-economic identity, and ideology seems becoming eroded by the values of capitalism, individualism, and competition.

   3. Increased freedom of movement, education, economic wealth, and job-professional mobility

1. Obstacles and Problems

   1. Differences in respondents’ perceptions of obstacles and problems for small business entrepreneurship between 1994 and 2008

Note: Sometimes, ranking does not show how better or worse the problem are. Mean value should be more focused. For example, difficulties in acquiring business knowledge and skills gained in 2008 much higher priority in the rank (rank 6) compared to 1994 (rank 16) with the means remaining in close range (4.78 in 2008 vs 4.91 in 1994). The list below only shows the problems whose ranks and mean values were correlated.

1. High taxes --- (No. 1, mean 6.84  No. 7, mean 4.64) reflecting recent tax reform and improvements in the tax environment for small business

2. Reliability of business partners --- (mean 5.64  mean 4.57) lesser problem in 2008

3. Unfair competition --- (mean 3.69  mean 3.83) reflecting more competitive markets in Russia

1. The table below mainly reflects improvements in Russia’s business climate and infrastructure over the past decade.

3. It is common for entrepreneurs across the world, especially in the SME sector, to experience numerous obstacles and problems in starting up, operating, and growing business enterprises.

4. Two observations should be made in this context.

   1. Severity for many of those typical entrepreneurial problems in Russia tends to diminish.

      1. Improvements in the business environment turn those problems into ‘‘normal’’ ones.

      2. The survey metrics reflecting entrepreneurial problems and obstacles for Russia tend to be in close proximity with the regional (Eastern Europe and Central Asia) averages, although the findings and outcomes across different studies in this vary.