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Article
Publication date: 29 September 2020

Gustav Hägg and Agnieszka Kurczewska

The purpose of the paper is to build on current discussions about the need for and role of guidance in learning and teaching, as well as to theoretically develop its specifics to…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of the paper is to build on current discussions about the need for and role of guidance in learning and teaching, as well as to theoretically develop its specifics to further advance our scholarly understanding of how to structure and enhance entrepreneurship education.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper takes a synthesizing conceptual approach, built on developmental psychology, instructional science, expertise research as well as the pedagogy–andragogy discussion and the role of guidance in contemporary entrepreneurship education research. In addition, a new term, odigogy, is developed.

Findings

Odigogy, from the Greek word odigós (to guide), addresses how to navigate student entrepreneurs in higher education. The term seeks to correspond both to the specifics of entrepreneurship as a subject and the characteristics of students in the classroom who are in a transitional phase between adolescence and adulthood.

Practical implications

The paper contributes to current entrepreneurship education discussions by offering a more balanced terminology positioned between how to teach (pedagogy) and how adults learn (andragogy). The paper provides insights for teachers when developing teaching methods and learning activities in higher education.

Originality/value

By introducing the term odigogy the paper seeks to contribute an enhanced understanding of the entrepreneurial learning process in higher education, which does not match pedagogical assumptions on how to teach children or adolescents, nor andragogical assumptions on how adults learn, or how to engage students in self-directed learning as presented in heutagogy.

Details

Education + Training, vol. 62 no. 7/8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0040-0912

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 3 March 2023

Agnieszka Kurczewska and Michał Mackiewicz

In spite of the recognised significance of habitual entrepreneurship, enough is not known about the drivers that lead individuals to become habitual entrepreneurs. Drawing from…

Abstract

Purpose

In spite of the recognised significance of habitual entrepreneurship, enough is not known about the drivers that lead individuals to become habitual entrepreneurs. Drawing from Lazear’s theory of entrepreneurship, this paper addresses the specifics of habitual entrepreneurs in terms of different human capital-related factors, including breadth and diversity of experience and education. This paper aims to elucidate what makes some people habitual entrepreneurs.

Design/methodology/approach

In this empirical study on a broad data set (1,538 surveys), the authors juxtapose habitual entrepreneurs with ex-entrepreneurs who decided to give up and chose a salary job after running their first and only firm. The authors formulate four hypotheses that are tested by using a logit regression to model the probability of being a habitual entrepreneur vs giving up entrepreneurship and choosing a salary job.

Findings

The probability of being a habitual entrepreneur increases with the diversity of both managerial and professional experience, as well as with the breadth of education. In addition, entrepreneurial self-efficacy supports setting up more than one firm.

Practical implications

The findings actualise knowledge of whether habitual entrepreneurs are unique concerning their pools of human capital. They broaden the knowledge of the backgrounds of the decision to start up a business again.

Originality/value

This paper contributes to the current entrepreneurship discussion by offering an enhanced understanding of habitual entrepreneurship. The phenomenon of repeatedly engaging in entrepreneurship is a promising source of knowledge that enables us to better understand entrepreneurship. In addition, the authors verify and extend Lazear’s theory to a new group of entrepreneurs.

Details

European Business Review, vol. 35 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0955-534X

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 14 April 2020

Agnieszka Kurczewska and Michał Mackiewicz

The purpose of this paper is to identify human capital factors that pertain both to setting up and successfully running a business. To achieve this objective, the authors apply…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to identify human capital factors that pertain both to setting up and successfully running a business. To achieve this objective, the authors apply and extend the theory of career choice offered by Lazear (2005) that explains individual selection into entrepreneurship.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors hypothesise that individuals with broader educational and professional backgrounds are more likely to start a business and are more likely to run a business in the long term. The authors tested the hypotheses using unique data from 800 current entrepreneurs, 800 employees who were previously entrepreneurs and 842 employees with no entrepreneurial experience, by means of a logit regression with robust standard errors and extensive robustness checks.

Findings

The authors empirically show that individuals with more diverse educational and professional backgrounds tend to have both greater chances of starting a company, as well as a higher probability of entrepreneurial success. Surprisingly, having managerial experience proved to exert a negative influence on the likelihood of starting a business while having an insignificant impact on the odds of entrepreneurial success.

Research limitations/implications

The findings are informative for those planning or pursuing an entrepreneurial career, but they are also relevant for the purpose of entrepreneurship education.

Originality/value

The author's extend the body of research supporting Lazear's (2005) theory by showing that broad education and professional experience not only contribute to a higher propensity to start a company but they are also success factors in business per se.

Details

Baltic Journal of Management, vol. 15 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1746-5265

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 20 November 2017

Agnieszka Kurczewska, Paula Kyrö, Krista Lagus, Oskar Kohonen and Tiina Lindh-Knuutila

Although the role of reflections in entrepreneurship education is undeniable, the research has focused mainly on their advantages and consequences for learning process, whereas…

1401

Abstract

Purpose

Although the role of reflections in entrepreneurship education is undeniable, the research has focused mainly on their advantages and consequences for learning process, whereas their dynamics and interrelations with other mental processes remain unexplored. The purpose of this paper is to better understand how personality and intelligence constructs: cognition, conation, and affection evolve and change along the learning process during entrepreneurship education.

Design/methodology/approach

To better understand reflective processes in entrepreneurial learning this paper adopts the tripartite constructs of personality and intelligence. By employing longitudinal explorative research approach and self-organizing map (SOM) algorithm, the authors follow students’ reflections during their two-year learning processes. First, the authors try to identify how the interplay between the cognitive, conative, and affective aspects emerges in students’ reflections. Then, the authors investigate how this interplay evolves during the individual learning process and finally, by looking for similarities in these learning pathways, the authors aim to identify patterns of students’ reflective learning process.

Findings

All constructs are present during the learning process and all are prone to change. The individual constructs alone shed no light on the interplay between different constructs, but rather that the interplay between sub-constructs should be taken into consideration as well. This seems to be particularly true for cognition, as procedural and declarative knowledge have very different profiles. Procedural knowledge emerges together with emotions, motivation, and volition, whereas the profile of declarative knowledge is individual. The unique profile of declarative knowledge in students’ reflections is an important finding as declarative knowledge is regarded as the center of current pedagogic practices.

Research limitations/implications

The study broadens the understanding of reflective practices in the entrepreneurial learning process and the interplay between affective, cognitive, and conative sub-constructs and reflective practices in entrepreneurship education. The findings clearly indicate the need for further research on the interplay between sub-constructs and students’ reflection profiles. The authors see the study as an attempt to apply an exploratory statistical method for the problem in question.

Practical implications

The results are able to advise pedagogy. Practical implications concern the need to develop reflective practises in entrepreneurial learning interventions to enhance all three meta-competencies, even though there are so far no irrefutable findings to indicate that some types of reflection may be better than others.

Originality/value

The results of the analysis indicate that it is possible to study the complex and dynamic interplay between sub-constructs of cognitive, conative and affective constructs. Moreover, the research succeeded in identifying both individual variations and general reflection patterns and changes in these during the learning process. This was possible by adopting a longitudinal explorative research approach with SOM analyses.

Details

Education + Training, vol. 60 no. 7/8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0040-0912

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 8 August 2016

Gustav Hägg and Agnieszka Kurczewska

The purpose of this paper is to justify, elaborate and elucidate the concepts of action, experience and reflection, and how they are intertwined when discussing contemporary…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to justify, elaborate and elucidate the concepts of action, experience and reflection, and how they are intertwined when discussing contemporary entrepreneurship education. These concepts have been given a meaning in entrepreneurship education, but have not been discussed in-depth, and by that have been abridged in meaning and purpose, and mostly been treated in isolation from each other.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is conceptual and takes its starting point in the historical development of the field and discusses the concepts, from philosophical roots and their application, in entrepreneurship education.

Findings

Neither of the discussed concepts are enough to generate learning one by one, as they are intertwined within the learning process that aims to generate knowledge. From this perspective, an understanding of how these concepts work, both individually and in synergy, is of importance for entrepreneurship education.

Research limitations/implications

The discussion presented in this paper may be a starting point for future empirical studies on entrepreneurial learning, by developing the meaning of action, reflections and experience, or by trying to conceptualize them.

Practical implications

The study indicates that entrepreneurship education should not concentrate only on one dimension of the entrepreneurial learning process, as for example, on actions, but should try to combine all of its discussed elements.

Originality/value

By exploring the origins and developments around the concepts, the paper brings a deepened understanding of what the field considers as important when learning entrepreneurship. By decomposing and mutually referring the concepts, the authors contribute to the call of strengthening the theoretical and philosophical understanding in entrepreneurship education.

Details

Education + Training, vol. 58 no. 7/8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0040-0912

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 4 May 2021

Gustav Hägg

The purpose of the paper is to theorize how to develop student entrepreneurs' ability to reflect by means of a learning activity called the entrepreneurial diary, which seeks to…

6759

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of the paper is to theorize how to develop student entrepreneurs' ability to reflect by means of a learning activity called the entrepreneurial diary, which seeks to develop self-regulated learners capable of intelligent entrepreneurial action. The importance of self-regulation in entrepreneurship is linked to the individual's ability to make judgments under conditions of uncertainty, which requires reflective thinking.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper builds on a synthesized conceptualization of three main literature strands, reflective thinking, cognitive-load theory and experiential entrepreneurship education. In addition to the synthesized conceptualization, it builds on some empirical insights derived from a venture creation master programme in which the learning activity has been developed and refined for the last seven years.

Findings

The main finding from the paper is the theoretical justification for why reflective thinking deserves an important place in the educational process and how the entrepreneurial diary as a learning activity can create a bridge between theory and practice in venture creation programmes that take an experience-based pedagogical approach. Furthermore, the study also provides some empirical insights of how students create self-awareness of their learning through the method and the metareflection reports. Self-awareness is foundational for developing conditional knowledge on why and when to make entrepreneurial decisions to balance the often action-oriented processes seen in venture creation programmes.

Originality/value

The paper provides both a practical learning activity to be used in the entrepreneurial classroom and a theoretical contribution on how entrepreneurial experience is transformed into entrepreneurial knowledge to enhance students' judgmental abilities to make entrepreneurial decisions in future entrepreneurial endeavours.

Details

International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research, vol. 27 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1355-2554

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 14 October 2021

Anisur R. Faroque, Olli Kuivalainen, Jashim Uddin Ahmed, Mahabubur Rahman, Hiran Roy, M. Yunus Ali and Md Imtiaz Mostafiz

Although both institutional export assistance and entrepreneurial orientation (EO) contribute separately and positively to export performance, the interplay between them has…

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Abstract

Purpose

Although both institutional export assistance and entrepreneurial orientation (EO) contribute separately and positively to export performance, the interplay between them has received little attention. This study examines the role of international EO in deriving performance benefits from governmental and nongovernmental export assistance.

Design/methodology/approach

In this longitudinal study, two surveys were administered at two different times: In 2011, 705 Bangladeshi apparel exporters were surveyed, and in 2019, a subsequent survey of 198 firms in multiple industries was conducted. The aim of the surveys was to assess the relationships between governmental and nongovernmental assistance, EO and export performance.

Findings

The results of the first survey show that, while nongovernmental assistance influences performance directly and via EO, governmental assistance has only direct effects. Furthermore, the negative influence of government assistance on EO reduces the total effects and renders them nonsignificant. The results of the second survey demonstrate that government EPPs have both direct and indirect positive and significant effects on market performance, indicating a partial mediation, whereas quasi-governmental assistance has positive and significant direct effects as well as negative but nonsignificant indirect effects. Nongovernmental EPPs have both direct and indirect significant effects on international performance, indicating a partial mediation.

Research limitations/implications

The study has important implications for researchers studying export assistance and its impact on firm performance. Instead of adopting a parochial view of government assistance, this study categorizes such assistance into three types – government, quasi-government and nongovernment. Furthermore, this study bridges the export assistance and international entrepreneurship literature by including EO.

Practical implications

Entrepreneurs must emphasize the use of government assistance in order to enhance export performance. However, to promote both entrepreneurship and performance, they must emphasize nongovernment assistance. Exporters should also capitalize on the assistance extended by various quasi-governmental agencies to bolster export performance.

Originality/value

Given the performance advantage of export assistance, this study highlights the contribution of the private sector in promoting export entrepreneurship while shedding light on the pernicious role of (quasi-)governmental assistance in export entrepreneurship.

Details

International Marketing Review, vol. 38 no. 6
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0265-1335

Keywords

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