An essential part of entrepreneurial activity is the drafting and narrating of an entrepreneurial vision. This study is premised on the observation that entrepreneurial groups form an interaction arena for the practice of imagining the future and asks how the content of entrepreneurial visions is shaped by the conditions of the group. Taking an entrepreneurship-as-practice lens, which we enrich with sociological theory on the future (Beckert) and small groups (Fine), we engage in an in-depth case study of 12 entrepreneurial groups. We show how the content of entrepreneurial visions is configured by four elements (i.e., fictional expectation for the business or the group; future orientation that is continuing or divergent) and name two group conditions (i.e., role confidence and hierarchical congruence) that direct their configuration. We propose that lacking role confidence can impede thinking about the future of a business and that narrative hierarchies that challenge structural hierarchies can open a window for divergent future orientation. This study contributes to a novel theoretical understanding of where entrepreneurial visions come from by emphasizing politics of expectations within groups and calling to consider group conditions as a relevant context for entrepreneurial visions.

创业活动的一个重要部分是起草和叙述创业愿景。本研究的前提是观察到创业群体形成了想象未来实践的互动舞台，并询问创业愿景的内容是如何被群体条件塑造的。以创业实践视角，我们丰富了关于未来（贝克特）和小团体（精细）的社会学理论，我们对 12 个创业团体进行了深入的案例研究。我们展示了创业愿景的内容是如何由四个要素构成的（即，对企业或团队的虚构期望；持续或不同的未来方向），并列出了指导他们的两个群体条件（即角色信心和等级一致性）配置。我们认为，缺乏角色信心会阻碍对企业未来的思考，挑战结构层次的叙事层次可以为不同的未来方向打开一扇窗户。本研究通过强调群体内的期望政治并呼吁将群体条件视为创业愿景的相关背景，有助于对创业愿景的来源进行新颖的理论理解。