Attracted or Repelled? Investigating Job Seekers’ Perceptions of Obsessive Entrepreneurs

This study investigates the impact of entrepreneurs' obsessive passion on potential job seekers, exploring whether it functions as an asset or a liability in startup recruitment. Drawing upon signaling theory and person–environment (PE) fit theory, we develop a contingent model that elucidates job seekers’ perceptions of “obsessive passion” as a recruitment signal taking their individual characteristics as boundary conditions for the interpretation of this signal into account. Our hypotheses were tested through a metric conjoint experiment involving 181 job seekers, yielding 2,896 decisions. The results indicate that the impact of an entrepreneur’s perceived obsessive passion on a venture’s attractiveness as a potential employer is contingent upon the characteristics of the job seeker. Specifically, signaling obsessive passion is only attractive to job seekers with highly proactive personalities and entrepreneurial self-efficacy; those who score low on these factors, as well as those who are risk-averse, tend to be repelled by such signals. These findings contribute to the literature on new venture recruitment by demonstrating how signals of obsessive passion aid in the self-selection of applicants, ultimately attracting employees well-suited for the entrepreneurial environment.