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题记：美国弗吉尼亚大学达顿商学院的萨拉斯（Saras Sarasvathy）教授（其导师是诺贝尔经济学奖获得者赫伯特·西蒙）提出的效果推理（Effectuation）理论概括了一种超越古典决策逻辑的、解释创业者在不确定环境或市场不存在的情况下，创建新企业的独特行为的最有说服力的理论之一。这一理论在十余年间获得学界高度关注和广泛认可，被认为是创业研究领域最具原创性的成果。为深入了解萨拉斯教授的研究过程、研究方法及其成果——效果推理（Effectuation）理论的核心观点、理论精髓，从本期开始“子谦译文”将分5期连载萨拉斯教授在2001年发表的一篇重要研究文献——《是什么赋予创业者创业力？》（What makes entrepreneursentrepreneurial?）。
本译文为五篇连载的第1期。
What makes entrepreneurs entrepreneurial?
是什么赋予创业者创业力？
Professionals who work closely with them and researchers who study them have often speculated about what makes entrepreneurs “entrepreneurial”. Of course, entrepreneurs also love to hold forth on this topic. But while there are as many war stories and pet theories as there are entrepreneurs and researchers, gathering together a coherent theory of entrepreneurial expertise has thus far eluded academics and practitioners alike.
与创业者密切合作的专业人士和研究他们行为特征的研究者经常思索：什么让创业者“创业”。当然，这也是创业者喜欢探讨的话题。但是，尽管创业者和研究人员的数量如同战争故事和宠物理论那么多，但迄今为止，学术界和实践者都未能将连贯的创业专长理论汇集在一起。
What are the characteristics, habits, and behaviors of the species entrepreneur? Is there a learnable and teachable “core” to entrepreneurship? In other words, what can today’s entrepreneurs such as Rob Glaser and Jeff Bezos learn from old stalwarts such as Josiah Wedgwood and Leonard Shoen? Or even within the same period in history, what are the common elements that entrepreneurs across a wide variety of industries share with each other? In sum, is there such a thing as “entrepreneurial thinking” that can be applied across space, time and technology?
创业者这个群体的特征、习惯和行为是什么？创业是否有一个可被学习和教授的“核心”？换句话说，当今的创业者如罗布·格拉（Rob Glaser）和杰夫·贝佐斯（Jeff Bezos）可以从乔西亚·韦奇伍德（ Josiah Wedgwood）和伦纳德·肖恩（Leonard Shoen）等老一代创业者那里学到什么？或者说，在历史上的同一时期，各行各业的创业者之间又有什么可以分享的共同特点？总而言之，是否存在一种可以跨空间、时间和技术应用的“创业思维”？
In 1997, I set out on a rather perilous but exhilarating journey to investigate this question. Traveling across 17 states in the US over several months, I met with 30 founders of companies ranging in size from $200 M to $6.5 B and spanning a variety of industries from steel and railroad to teddy bears and semiconductors and bio-tech. The idea behind the study was not merely to interview these founders, but to get behind their stories and understand how they reason about specific problems in transforming an idea into an enduring firm. The entrepreneurs worked their way through a 17-page problem set over two hours, talking aloud continuously as they each solved exactly the same ten decision problems to build a company starting with exactly the same product idea. Rigorous analyses of the transcribed tapes led to rather surprising but eminently teachable principles. This set of principles, when put together, rested on a coherent logic that clearly established the existence of a distinct form of rationality that we have all long recognized intuitively as “entrepreneurial”. For reasons that will become clear in the next section, I have termed this type of rationality “effectual reasoning”.
1997年，我开始了一场冒险但却令人振奋的旅程来调查这个问题。我用几个月的时间游历了美国17个州，造访了30位公司的创始人，这些公司的规模从2亿美元到6.5亿美元不等，范围覆盖了从钢铁和铁路到泰迪熊、半导体和生物技术等各个行业。这项研究的初衷不仅仅是采访这些创始人，而是要知道他们背后的故事，了解他们在将一个想法转变为一个持久的实体公司时是如何思考和行动的。创业者们花了两个多小时完成了长达17页的调查问题，围绕十个完全相同的决策性问题的解决，这些创业者们持续地高谈阔论，展示他们各自如何从同一个产品构思开始建立公司的。通过对转录磁带的严密分析，我得出了一些特别令人惊讶但明显可教的原则。当把这套原则放在一起时，它建立在一个连贯的逻辑上，这个逻辑清楚地确定了我们长期以来直觉上认为的“创业者”的独特理性的存在。为了以下章节的具体清晰，我先将这种理性称之为“效果推理”。
Effectual reasoning: The problem
效果推理：问题
The word “effectual” is the inverse of “causal”. In general, in MBA programs across the world, students are taught causal or predictive reasoning – in every functional area of business. Causal rationality begins with a pre-determined goal and a given set of means, and seeks to identify the optimal – fastest, cheapest, most efficient, etc. – alternative to achieve the given goal. The make-vs.-buy decision in production, or choosing the target market with the highest potential return in marketing, or picking a portfolio with the lowest risk in finance, or even hiring the best person for the job in human resources management, are all examples of problems of causal reasoning. A more interesting variation of causal reasoning involves the creation of additional alternatives to achieve the given goal. This form of creative causal reasoning is often used in strategic thinking.
“效果”一词与“因果”相对。一般而言，在世界各地的MBA课程中，学生都会被教授因果推理或预测推理，并渗透在商业的各个职能领域。因果推理始于预先确定的目标和一系列给定的资源，并寻求以最佳、最快，最便宜、最有效等全方位手段实现既定目标。生产中的制造与购买决策、选择营销中潜在回报最高的目标市场、选择金融风险最低的投资组合、甚至为人力资源管理工作雇用最佳人选，这些都是需要用到因果推理的典型实例。因果推理一个较有趣的变形是开创其他的替代资源以实现给定的目标。这种创造性的因果推理常被用于战略性思考。
Effectual reasoning, however, does not begin with a specific goal. Instead, it begins with a given set of means and allows goals to emerge contingently over time from the varied imagination and diverse aspirations of the founders and the people they interact with. While causal thinkers are like great generals seeking to conquer fertile lands (Genghis Khan conquering two thirds of the known world), effectual thinkers are like explorers setting out on voyages into uncharted waters (Columbus discovering the new world). It is important to point out though that the same person can use both causal and effectual reasoning at different times depending on what the circumstances call for. In fact, the best entrepreneurs are capable of both and do use both modes well. But they prefer effectual reasoning over causal reasoning in the early stages of a new venture, and arguably, most entrepreneurs do not transition well into latter stages requiring more causal reasoning. Figure 1 graphically depicts the different forms of reasoning discussed above.
然而，效果推理并不是从一个既定目标开始的。相反，它始于一套既定的资源，并允许随着时间的推移，目标从始创者和与之互动者的多种设想及愿望中不断涌现出来。如果说因果方式思考者就像寻求征服沃土的伟大将军（如成吉思汗征服了已知世界的三分之二），那效果方式思考者就像要起航行入未知水域的探险家（如哥伦布发现新世界）。需要特别指出的是，同一个人在不同时间，可以使用因果推理也可以使用效果推理，这取决于环境的要求。事实上，最好的创业者既有能力又能绝佳地运用这两种模式。但在新企业创建的初期阶段，他们更倾向于使用效果推理而不是因果推理。
可以说，大多数创业者并没有很好地过渡到需要更多因果推理的后期阶段。下图以图形方式呈现了上面讨论的不同形式的推理。
While causal reasoning may or may not involve creative thinking, effectual reasoning is inherently creative. The simple task of cooking dinner may be used to contrast the two types of reasoning. A chef who is given a specific menu and has only to pick out his or her favorite recipes for the items on the menu, shop for ingredients and cook the meal in their own well equipped kitchens is an example of causal reasoning. An example of effectual reasoning would involve a chef who is not given a menu in advance, and is escorted to a strange kitchen where he or she has to explore the cupboards for unspecified ingredients and cook a meal with them. While both causal and effectual reasoning call for domain-specific skills and training, effectual reasoning demands something more –imagination, spontaneity, risk-taking, and salesmanship.
因果推理可能也可能不涉及到创造性思维，但效果推理本质上一定会涉及到创造性。做饭的简单任务可用于对比两种类型的推理：（如果）一位厨师被给出特定菜单，他只需要为菜单上的菜色挑选他最喜欢的食谱，然后根据食谱购买食材并在自己设备齐全的厨房里做饭，这就是一个因果推理的例子；效果推理的例子则是一位事先未获得菜单的厨师，被护送到一个陌生的厨房，在那里他必须探索橱柜中不确定的食材并用它们做出一顿饭。
尽管因果推理和效果推理都要求针对特定领域的技能和培训，但效果推理需要更多的东西——想象力、自发性、冒险精神和销售技巧。
（未完待续，敬请关注续篇。本文转载请注明出处,侵权必究）
作者——Saras D. Sarasvathy
译者——师柔剑
审稿——吴现波
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