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1 – 10 of 45Mette Lindahl Thomassen, Karen Williams Middleton, Michael Breum Ramsgaard, Helle Neergaard and Lorraine Warren
Context impacts the design and practice of entrepreneurship education, but there is limited focus on context in entrepreneurship education literature. The purpose of this paper is…
Abstract
Purpose
Context impacts the design and practice of entrepreneurship education, but there is limited focus on context in entrepreneurship education literature. The purpose of this paper is to review the entrepreneurship education literature to understand how context has been addressed, derives contextual elements from prioritized literature and explores how context can be adapted to and designed with in entrepreneurship education.
Design/methodology/approach
A systematic literature review is undertaken to explore context in entrepreneurship education literature. Context entrepreneurship education yielded 239 items. After refinement, 232 entrepreneurship education associated publications were reviewed by the team of authors. Using selection criteria, 26 prioritized publications were analyzed and categorized according to a theoretical framework.
Findings
Context has been addressed both conceptually and empirically, quantitatively and qualitatively, and can be categorized across three sociological phenomena levels – micro, meso and macro. Within these levels, more specific context elements emerge from the entrepreneurship education literature. The findings assert that while context is highly influential in relation to entrepreneurship education, it is arbitrarily described, and holds a variety of documented and diffuse elements. Educators have a limited span of control in relation to context elements, however, for the most parts elements can be adapted to or designed with. Finally, due to the influence of context it is difficult to identify a universal best practice of entrepreneurship education because there simply is no ceteris paribus.
Research limitations/implications
Contextual elements which emerged from the literature consider various subjects, spaces, structures and networks. Context is complex and has had limited treatment in entrepreneurship education literature, thus additional analysis and experimentation is necessary.
Practical implications
Context shapes understanding and influences learning. Addressing entrepreneurship education across three levels – micro, meso and macro – and through four framing questions – who, what, where and when – guides educators in how context influences and can be used when designing education.
Originality/value
The paper gives new insight into how context is addressed in entrepreneurship education literature, and how this can influence educational design.
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Inge Birkbak Larsen and Helle Neergaard
This research presents and evaluates a method for assessing the entrepreneurial mindset (EM) of students in higher education.
Abstract
Purpose
This research presents and evaluates a method for assessing the entrepreneurial mindset (EM) of students in higher education.
Design/methodology/approach
The research considers EM a multi-variable psychological construct, which can be broken down into several conceptual sub-categories. Using data from a master course in entrepreneurship, the authors show how these categories can be applied to analyze students’ written reflections to identify linguistic markers of EM.
Findings
The research reports three main findings: analyzing student reflections is an appropriate method to explore the state and development of students’ EM; the theoretically-derived EM categories can be nuanced and extended with insight from contextualized empirical insights; and student reflections reveal counter-EM categories that represent challenges in the educator’s endeavor to foster students’ EM.
Research limitations/implications
The commitment of resources to researching EM requires the dedication of efforts to develop methods for assessing the state and development of students’ EM. The framework can be applied to enhance the theoretical rigor and methodological transparency of studies of EM in entrepreneurship education.
Practical implications
The framework can be of value to educators who currently struggle to assess if and how their educational design fosters EM attributes.
Originality/value
This inquiry contributes to the critical research discussion about how to operationalize EM in entrepreneurship education studies. The operationalization of a psychological concept such as EM is highly important because a research focus cannot be maintained on something that cannot be studied in a meaningful way.
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Helle Neergaard, Sarah Robinson and Sally Jones
This paper introduces “pedagogical nudging” as a method, which can transform student dispositions and their perceived “fit” with the field of entrepreneurship. The authors…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper introduces “pedagogical nudging” as a method, which can transform student dispositions and their perceived “fit” with the field of entrepreneurship. The authors investigate what characterises the identity change process experienced by students when exposed to pedagogical nudging.
Design/methodology/approach
Using ethnography, the authors apply an experiential-explorative approach to collecting data. The authors collected 1,015 individual reflection logs from 145 students of which the authors sampled 290 for this paper combined with interviews, observational and documentary data.
Findings
Pedagogical nudging techniques help (1) expose and challenge the student habitus by planting footprints in the mind; (2) straddle the divide between student and nascent entrepreneur by enabling them to recognise and experiment with an entrepreneurial habitus and (3) figuratively learn to climb the entrepreneurial tree by embracing an entrepreneurial habitus. In the first step, the authors use the interventions as cognitive means of influencing (pedagogical nudging). In the second, students participate in an iterative meaning-making process through reflection. In the third, they internalise the “new” entrepreneurial habitus—or discard it.
Research limitations/implications
The authors extend existing knowledge about the effect of particular kinds of pedagogies in entrepreneurship teaching, and how these can support enterprising behaviour. The authors demonstrate how an exploration of the inner self, identity and beliefs develops the capacity for students to re-shape future outcomes and create value.
Practical implications
By using nudging pedagogies, educators can support students to develop new ways of acknowledging and coping with transformative learning.
Originality/value
The research documents how it is possible to 'nudge' our students towards more entrepreneurial behaviours.
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Colette Henry, Joan Ballantine, Marcus Dejardin, Helle Neergaard and Alena Křížková
Helle Neergaard, William B. Gartner, Ulla Hytti, Diamanto Politis and David Rae
Inge Birkbak Larsen, Per Blenker and Helle Neergaard
The aim of this paper is to examine the usefulness of the stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) model for systematizing and further exploring the knowledge of the role of…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of this paper is to examine the usefulness of the stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) model for systematizing and further exploring the knowledge of the role of entrepreneurship education (EE) in fostering students' entrepreneurial mindset (EM). Current research studying the EM in an educational setting often fails to conceptualize this mindset and its attributes rigorously and to include epistemological considerations regarding how the authors can know whether a person has developed an EM or not.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors test the S-O-R model by combining it with a critical realist approach to develop a conceptual model for understanding the EM and its development in an educational setting.
Findings
The authors identify eight psychological constructs that represent markers of the EM. The authors further surface the multi-causal characteristic of learning in EE. The authors' model cannot be applied to detect causal relationships, but it is useful in exploring potential causal tendencies and plausible explanations of the mechanisms and circumstances of EE, which may, in concert, potentially foster the psychological attributes associated with an EM.
Originality/value
The paper addresses the often-overlooked epistemological considerations related to how the authors can know anything about psychological and theoretical constructs, such as the EM. A conscious discussion about how the authors can develop knowledge and insight about the EM and how individuals develop it is critical to justify a continued focus on the EM in EE.
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Constanza Reyes and Helle Neergaard
The objective of this article is to map and assess current evidence in women's technology entrepreneurship in business incubators with the aim of producing a conceptual framework…
Abstract
Purpose
The objective of this article is to map and assess current evidence in women's technology entrepreneurship in business incubators with the aim of producing a conceptual framework that will allow us to understand how gender shapes the life of women technology entrepreneurs.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors conducted a systematic literature review. The data set comprises 49 publications, including peer-reviewed articles and prominent book chapters. These are first categorized according to their feminist approach and second analysed using an inductive thematic approach to map dominant concepts and research methods.
Findings
The authors develop a framework with four dimensions: (1) antecedents, (2) challenges, (3) outcomes and (4) solutions. The authors show that current literature mainly focuses on the challenges faced by women technology entrepreneurs in incubator settings. Although liberal feminist research is present, social feminist perspectives dominate, with poststructuralist research as a close second. Interestingly, current research has not focused much on individual characteristics; in other words, the baggage that women bring with them in terms of prior experiences is hardly investigated, even though there is general agreement that socialization shapes women's experiences of and responses to gender challenges.
Originality/value
The authors contribute to the literature in the following ways: The developed framework assists in understanding how gender is an overarching factor that shapes every facet of the life of a women technology entrepreneur, and how incubator environments intensify gender issues. Indeed, being in an incubator environment adds an extra layer of gendered conditions, thus intensifying the challenges that women meet, creating a “triple masculinity trap”. The review highlights that little is known about how early conditioning shapes women technology entrepreneurs' reactions to the gendered conditions they meet and that there is a lack of research on how women “do entrepreneurship”.
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Jan P. Warhuus, Franziska Günzel-Jensen, Sarah Robinson and Helle Neergaard
This paper investigates the importance of team formation in entrepreneurship education, and the authors ask: how do different team formation strategies influence teamwork in…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper investigates the importance of team formation in entrepreneurship education, and the authors ask: how do different team formation strategies influence teamwork in higher education experiential learning-based entrepreneurship courses?
Design/methodology/approach
Employing a multiple case study design, the authors examine 38 student teams from three different entrepreneurship courses with different team formation paths to uncover potential links between team formation and learning outcomes.
Findings
The authors find that team formation mode matters. Randomly assigned teams, while diverse, struggle with handling uncertainty and feedback from potential stakeholders. In contrast, student self-selected teams are less diverse but more robust in handling this pressure. Results suggest that in randomly assigned teams, the entrepreneurial project becomes the team's sole reference point for well-being. Seeking to protect the project, the team's ability to deal with uncertainty and external feedback is limited, stifling development. In student self-select teams, team well-being becomes a discrete reference point. This enables these teams to respond effectively to external project feedback while nurturing team well-being independently.
Originality/value
Education theories' implications about the benefit of team diversity may not apply to experiential learning-based entrepreneurship education's typical level of ambiguity and uncertainty. Therefore, educators may have to reconsider the unique dynamics of team formation strategies to ensure strong teamwork and teamwork outcomes.
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