Entrepreneurship addiction is frequently compared to workaholism, but important differences differentiate the two constructs. Workaholism typically unfolds within structured employment settings, where workers face organizational oversight, job descriptions, and established performance expectations. Workaholics often experience pressure from supervisors, corporate cultures, or economic demands (Andreassen et al., 2016). The risks they encounter—job stress, burnout, and interpersonal strain—are real but generally buffered by the stability of organizational employment.

Entrepreneurs, however, navigate a dramatically different landscape. Their risks are personal, financial, reputational, and often existential. When an entrepreneur becomes compulsively engaged in work, the consequences may include severe financial loss, business collapse, investor fallout, and disrupted family life (Cardon & Patel, 2015). Moreover, entrepreneurial over-engagement is not only socially accepted but often celebrated. Modern “hustle culture” glamorizes sleeplessness, constant productivity, and the idea of sacrificing everything for the dream—making it far harder for entrepreneurs to recognize their behaviors as harmful.

Thus, while both workaholics and addicted entrepreneurs exhibit compulsive work patterns, the entrepreneurial context involves higher stakes, fewer external constraints, and stronger cultural reinforcement. As a result, entrepreneurship addiction can be more intense, more socially invisible, and more damaging.

By Mustafa Tut Brown Jr.

The term “entrepreneurship addiction” was formally introduced by Spivack and McKelvie (2018), who argued that entrepreneurial effort can escalate into a pattern resembling behavioral addiction. In their framework, entrepreneurship addiction occurs when an individual continues to pursue entrepreneurial activities compulsively, even when doing so produces clear harm. These behaviors include chronic overwork, relentless opportunity seeking, refusal to rest after setbacks, and an inability to disengage from venture-related tasks.

Earlier work by Spivack, McKelvie, and Haynie (2014) proposed that entrepreneurship addiction could be meaningfully interpreted through Griffiths’ (2005) components model of addiction. This model includes six core criteria—salience, mood modification, tolerance, withdrawal, conflict, and relapse. When applied to entrepreneurship, these components manifest in patterns such as making the business the central focus of life, using entrepreneurial activity as emotional regulation, needing increasingly intense venture involvement to feel stimulated, experiencing distress when unable to work, encountering conflict in family or social domains, and returning to high-intensity entrepreneurial activity even after burnout or failure.

This framing suggests that entrepreneurship addiction is not merely “passion” or “dedication.” Instead, it reflects a compulsive behavioral pattern that persists despite negative consequences—psychological, relational, or financial. 

By Mustafa Tut Brown Jr.

Introduction

Entrepreneurship addiction is an emerging concept within organizational psychology and entrepreneurship research. While workaholism has been discussed for decades as a form of compulsive overwork within traditional employment structures (Andreassen et al., 2014), entrepreneurship addiction represents a parallel but distinct phenomenon. It describes the compulsive and uncontrollable drive to engage in entrepreneurial activity—sometimes to the detriment of physical health, relationships, financial stability, and overall well-being. Unlike workaholics, who operate within organizational rules and hierarchies, addicted entrepreneurs function in an environment marked by autonomy, uncertainty, and direct exposure to risk. This review explores the theoretical foundations of entrepreneurship addiction, its major distinctions from related constructs, and its implications across personal and professional domains.

By Mustafa Tut Brown Jr.