Abstract

Autonomy is one of the most popular motivations for individuals to start their own business (Carter, Gartner, Shaver, & Gatewood, 2003) and it has been found to increase business owner- managers’ job satisfaction (Benz & Frey, 2008). The entrepreneurial process, however, requires owner-managers to work long hours, assume multiple roles to conduct challenging tasks, and meet different stakeholders’ expectations (Buttner, 1992; Wincent & Ortqvist, 2009). This demanding process thus is likely to give rise to stress (Harris, Saltstone, & Fraboni, 1999), which reduces owner-managers’ job satisfaction (Buttner, 1992) and offsets the positive impact of autonomy on job satisfaction. Therefore, it is valuable to explore the boundary conditions for the autonomy – job satisfaction relationship to understand how the positive impact of autonomy on job satisfaction can be sustained over time.

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