Entrepreneurial alertness in the pursuit of new opportunities Jintong Tang a,1 , K. Michele (Micki) Kacmar b,2 , Lowell Busenitz c, ⁎ a Saint Louis University, John Cook School of Business, Department of Management, 3674 Lindell Blvd, Room 469A, St. Louis, MO, 63108, United States b University of Alabama, Management and Marketing Department, 135 Alston Hall, Box 870225, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, 35487, United States c University of Oklahoma, Price College of Business, Division of Management, 307 W. Brooks, Room 206, Norman, OK, 73019, United States article info abstract Article history: Received 16 February 2009 Received in revised form 16 July 2010 Accepted 19 July 2010 Available online 25 August 2010 Field Editor: D. Shepherd The recognition and development of new opportunities are at the heart of entrepreneurship. Building from Kirzner's (1973, 1999) work, cognition theory, and McMullen and Shepherd's (2006) recent development, we offer a model involving three distinct elements of alertness: scanning and search, association and connection, and evaluation and judgment. We then conduct multiple studies to develop and validate a 13-item alertness scale that captures these three dimensions. Results demonstrate appropriate dimensionality, strong reliability, and content, convergent, discriminant, and nomological validity. The resultant instrument provides researchers with a valuable tool for probing the entrepreneurial opportunity development process including antecedents and outcomes. © 2010 Published by Elsevier Inc. Keywords: Entrepreneurial alertness Opportunities Information Search Judgment Scale development 1. Executive summary Given the growth and role of entrepreneurship today, it is becoming increasingly important to understand how new entrepreneurial opportunities get developed. Discussions of the emergences of new entrepreneurial opportunities often include “eureka” moments, but our understanding of how new opportunities get brought forward is limited. One concept that is starting to gain some traction involves alertness, the assumption being that entrepreneurs tend to be more alert to possibilities for new entrepreneurial ventures. Alertness is a concept that has the potential to add substantially to our understanding of how new ideas get initiated and pursued. Despite its potential, alertness remains understudied due to an ambiguous understanding of the term and particularly because of major measurement issues. This study further specifies the meaning of alertness and how we can empirically measure this construct in a rigorous manner. Kirzner (1979) defined alertness as an individual's ability to identify opportunities which are overlooked by others. In further developing the boundaries of alertness, we argue that an important component of alertness is the aspect of judgment which focuses on evaluating the new changes, shifts, and information and deciding if they would reflect a business opportunity with profit potentials. We define alertness as consisting of three distinct elements: scanning and searching for information, connecting previously-disparate information, and making evaluations on the existence of profitable business opportunities. This article reports on three consecutive studies that together rigorously develop and validate a scale for alertness. Study 1 focuses on generating the original pool of items for alertness and assessing the content adequacy. Originally, 28 items were developed. After content validity test and Q-factor analysis, 15 items were retained. Study 2 presents initial evidence of the Journal of Business Venturing 27 (2012) 77–94 ⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 405 325 2653. E-mail addresses: jtang3@slu.edu (J. Tang), mkacmar@cba.ua.edu (K.M.(M.) Kacmar), busenitz@ou.edu (L. Busenitz). 1 Tel.: +1 314 977 3811; fax: +1 314 977 1482. 2 Tel.: +1 205 348 8931; fax: +1 205 348 6695. 0883-9026/$ – see front matter © 2010 Published by Elsevier Inc. doi:10.1016/j.jbusvent.2010.07.001 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Business Venturing