Hiatt

Shon R. Hiatt, a doctoral student in organizational behavior and strategy in Cornell's ILR School, has received a Kauffman Dissertation Fellowship in Entrepreneurship from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation for his dissertation, "The Influence of Heterogeneous Institutional Actors on New Venture Foundings, Technological Variation, and Survival in the U.S. Biodiesel Industry."

His research looks at the effects of institutional factors on entrepreneurial opportunity creation, discovery and exploitation. He also investigates the organizational processes, strategy and networks of firms in mature and emerging economies. His latest research looks at how political institutions moderate entrepreneurial processes and firm performance of 900 startups in Colombia.

Hiatt's fellowship of $20,000 is one of 15 awarded to current Ph.D. students who are engaged in the study of entrepreneurship at U.S. universities. The fellowships were presented at the Allied Social Science Associations' annual meeting in San Francisco in Jan. 3.