Embedding peer interactions in business support programmes to generate information to improve targeting
This study examines how peer interactions within business support programmes in Ghana can help identify high-potential entrepreneurs who benefit most from grants and training. Early evidence shows that networking strengthens professional ties and generates valuable information about peers that may improve targeting of support.
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Awadey-Boudreau-Davies-Policy-Brief-March-2026.pdf
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- Governments in lower-income countries commonly provide free or subsidised business support services, such as grants and managerial training, that aim to spur small firms' growth.
- A central challenge is identifying entrepreneurs who are both constrained and who have high marginal returns (MRs) to these interventions; attempts to predict entrepreneurs’ future success from information collected through such programmes have proved largely futile (McKenzie & Sansone, 2019).
- Motivated by the possibility that business networks contain substantial information about the potential of entrepreneurs and their businesses, we embed peer interactions in the Ghana Enterprises Agency’s Enterprise Grow Programme, a large-scale programme that provides small firms with scale-up grants, group-based managerial consulting, and peer networking. We conducted four days of classroom-based managerial training with groups of ten to 20 entrepreneurs and “speed dating” networking sessions with groups of six entrepreneurs. We are conducting an experiment to test whether entrepreneurs acquire information that is predictive of entrepreneurs’ future success and MRs to business support services. The experiment is ongoing.
- At the time of writing, there are two key insights from the survey conducted with 333 entrepreneurs after the networking sessions: First, business support programmes can strengthen entrepreneurs’ professional and social networks. Second, through these programmes, entrepreneurs can acquire information about their peers that is relevant for targeting.