Abstract

The USA developed Corporate Entrepreneurship Assessment Instrument (CEAI) (Hornsby, Kuratko and Zahra, 2002) is used to assess and implement a corporate entrepreneurial strategy. As psychometric instruments cannot necessarily be transferred between different cultures, the main objective of this study is to investigate the construct validity of CEAI, for a South African sample. An exploratory principal factor analysis with oblique rotation investigated the five-factor 48-item CEAI using a South African sample of 333 managers. Confirmatory factor analysis indicated an eight-factor 34-item solution (alphas in brackets): Work discretion (0.84), Management support and risk-taking (0.82), Rewards/ reinforcement (0.75), Innovative initiatives (0.84), Financial support (0.73), Sufficient time (0.76), Organizational boundaries (0.81) and Inadequate time (0.67). The application of this eight-factor scale is a powerful tool that allows management to investigate and communicate entrepreneurial expectations and facilitate entrepreneurial actions effectively.

Key words: Construct validity, Corporate Entrepreneurship Assessment Instrument (CEAI), portability, metric equivalence.