Why Business Fail? A Thematic Review Analysis on SMEs

It is not easy to stand up again after any failure because the collapse may not only bind with the business organisation but it may root straight away to the individual or personality of the entrepreneur. The most important thing for any failure is to act fast and to ‘re-stand up again’ without any delay. However, most studies focused on the prediction of business failure which mostly concentrated on the sustainability of the distressed business. Therefore, this study was inspired by the idea that the recovery of the fail entrepreneur is much more straightforward as compared to the creation of a new entrepreneur. Thus, the aim of this systematic review is to synthesize the previous studies related to the reason and recovery of business failure among Small Medium Enterprises from 2014 to 2019 using ATLAS.ti 8. A thematic analysis approach; that is useful to code and deeply interpret the identified common themes; was being used upon these 42 articles has led into the generation of 21 initial codes characterizing the study of business failure, grouped in 4 clusters: (1) effect of business failure, (2) prediction of business failure, (3) reason of business failure and (4) solution of business failure. The results contribute to the future study on business failure among SMEs and can guide the educators, researchers and practitioners in this field.