Abstract

"Founder Generation in Business Elite: Early Executive Education of the 20th Century Upper Echelon of the Finnish Society "

Juha Kansikas, University off Jyväskylä (juha.kansikas@jyu.fi)

This study focuses on the early executive education of 299 business founders. These founder-generation members have succeeded in their careers by creating a high-status business career and by achieving a high societal impact. Thus, based on their personal merits, they have been awarded the honorary title of Counsellor by the Government of Finland, signifying a position in the institutional business elite. Methodologically, a database was created based on prosopography, covering a review period from the end of the 19th century to the early 21st century.
By focusing on the 20th-century business elite, we show that early executive education after WWII was individual, non-organised, and resource-dependent. According to the upper echelon theory, we contribute to the business elite concept by demonstrating that, in the case of founder entrepreneurs, executive education has been influenced by pre-event experiences that have occurred throughout their careers. Simultaneously, executive education has influenced the first post-event experiences of founder generation entrepreneurs.