LAWRENCE — Entrepreneurs are often viewed as being independent. Motivated. Go-getters. These qualities help them persevere and thrive.
But for many entrepreneurs, there is something else going on inside that is darker and much harder to see.
“We continue to find evidence there is a higher prevalence of trauma in society and a higher likelihood people who have experienced trauma in the entrepreneurial community than previously understood,” said Elizabeth Embry, an assistant professor of entrepreneurship at the University of Kansas.
She addresses this topic in a new article titled “Now you see it: using a trauma-informed lens to redirect conversations on health, human capital and entrepreneurship.” It explores how trauma manifestations in the form of hyperarousal, intrusion and constriction (colloquially: “fight, flight and freeze”) affect entrepreneurs who experienced trauma at some point in their life. The article appears in the International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research.
Elizabeth Embry
“Trauma is an exogenous event that occurs in someone’s life that fundamentally disrupts their sense of agency and ability to function normally and has some significant rewiring of identity, purpose and trust,” said Embry, who co-wrote the article with Lisa Jones Christensen of Brigham Young University.
According to a 2016 study for Psychological Medicine, 70% of adults in the global population have been exposed to at least one traumatic event. Embry writes that trauma responses and the way they can disrupt life makes the flexibility of entrepreneurship attractive and adaptive for many coping with such histories.
“I am not saying that every entrepreneur has a trauma history. But in reality, when you look at who falls under the catchment of entrepreneurs just here in the United States — let alone the world — it’s oftentimes individuals who don’t fit into other employment models well,” she said.
Those include individuals from vulnerable populations and communities. Embry cites the long history of entrepreneurship programs aimed at immigrants/refugees, veterans and survivor groups.
“What do all those different populations have in common?” she asked. “In these categories, there is a high likelihood of trauma, either linked to intergenerational trauma or linked to the reason they are associated with that community. For instance, you don’t become a refugee because you want to be one. You become a refugee because your home is not safe anymore, and that’s through geopolitical strife or natural disasters.”
Embry said one reason trauma survivors become entrepreneurs is as a means of reclaiming their sense of self, identity and purpose. Entrepreneurs embrace that agency through many approaches.
“You can create new things that don’t exist. Or you can take things that exist and think about them in a different way. You can lean into the new identity and celebrate it. You have choices again and are able to control many aspects of your life, between what you’re doing, how you’re doing it, your timing and your place of work,” she said. “For an individual who’s been stripped of agency, to be able to have some of that control back in their lives is a really big deal.”
It was while doing work in the field of social entrepreneurship that Embry said she first realized the common undercurrent among such entrepreneurial individuals was how many were dealing with some degree of trauma. She sought to not only understand what could best support their endeavors but also question whether entrepreneurship exacerbates some post-traumatic manifestations, rather than helps and heals.
In response, her latest research provides a framework and theoretical model that unifies the work of medical and mental health practitioners, pro-entrepreneurship stakeholders and scholars with a goal of supporting people affected by trauma.
“A big part of engaging in entrepreneurship is saying, for example, ‘Hey, I’m not just a domestic violence survivor, I’m an entrepreneur. I have these new skill sets.’ This gives them another way of showing up in the world that can be separate from whatever that traumatic event or situation or circumstance was,” she said.
Now in her third year at KU, Embry began her career in public health and disaster management. Her ongoing academic work explores transforming existing practices from trauma-informed care into establishing principles and practices for a trauma-informed workplace.
“We see a lot of possibility in the model we present being embraced by incubators and accelerators,” Embry said.
“While they’ve been historically focused on, ‘Let’s teach you business principles. Let’s get your business off the ground,’ we’re saying that while you do that, take into consideration not only the knowledge of how trauma might manifest for these individuals but also how to create an environment for them where they can prepare for and manage some of these trauma responses and continue to be successful.”