Herbert Mapfaira
Department of Mechanical Engineering
Gosekwang Setibi
Department of Management
Entrepreneurship Education:
Promoting an enterprising culture
among students
Outline
Introduction
Research Motivation
Role of entrepreneurship in economic growth
Role of entrepreneurship education in
promoting an enterprise culture
Current state of entrepreneurship in Botswana
Fostering entrepreneurship and a culture of
enterprise
Conclusions
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Introduction
 Definition of Entrepreneurship
• Entrepreneurship refers to an individual’s ability
to turn ideas into action.
• It includes creativity, innovation and risk taking,
as well as the ability to plan and manage projects
in order to achieve objectives. (European Union,
2012: 7)
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Introduction
 Importance of Entrepreneurship
• ENTREPRENEURSHIP is at the heart of economic
growth of any nation.
•
It is a major source of innovation, enterprise
productivity, and employment.
•
Entrepreneurship has also been identified as a
mechanism by which many people enter the
society’s economic and social mainstream, aiding
culture formation, population integration, and
social mobility
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Introduction
 Importance of Entrepreneurship
•
Entrepreneurship is a key driver of economic growth
•
•
•
•
This can be demonstrated by using entrepreneurial activity as a measure
of economic activity
According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (2002), the
national level of entrepreneurial activity has a statistically
significant association with subsequent levels of economic growth.
GEM data also suggests that there are no countries with high levels
of entrepreneurship and low levels of economic growth
Empirical studies indicate that industries with a high share of small
enterprises relative to the same industries in other countries
perform better in terms of output growth during the subsequent
3-4 years
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Research Motivation
 Research Question
• The level of entrepreneurship varies across
different countries, with some countries recording
significantly high levels of entrepreneurial
activities.
• A high level of of entrepreneurial activity has been
shown to foster competition, innovation,
economic growth, job creation and wellbeing of
the citizens (Raposo and Paco, 2011).
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Research Motivation
 Research Question
• Through its Vision 2016 policy, the government of Botswana
identified building entrepreneurship capacity through
entrepreneurship education as key to delivering the vision.
• By introducing entrepreneurship education, the government
hopes to promote an enterprise culture among students and
thus prepare them for self-employment upon graduation.
• This paper examines the following questions:
o What is the role of entrepreneurship education in promoting an
enterprise culture?
o What is the current state of entrepreneurship in Botswana?
o How can entrepreneurship and a culture of enterprise be
fostered?
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Role of entrepreneurship education in
promoting an enterprise culture
• Enterprise is defined as the application of creative ideas and
innovations to practical situations
• Both enterprise and entrepreneurship education focus on
equipping students and graduates to develop their overall
effectiveness beyond the educational setting
• Cultural factors can affect an individual’s willingness to start or
grow a business.
• Some of these factors, such as “fear of failure” may be deeprooted, and others such as the attitude to enterprise, can be
instilled in people from an early age
• The role of enterprise and entrepreneurship education is to
change people’s attitudes and to foster entrepreneurial
attitudes and behaviour
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Role of entrepreneurship education in
promoting an enterprise culture
• Generally, entrepreneurship education aims to increase the
awareness of entrepreneurship as a career option, and
enhance the understanding of the process involved in
initiating and managing a new business enterprise. It
covers:
o Education “about” enterprise (i.e. Entrepreneurship awareness),
o Education “for” enterprise (i.e. Preparation of aspiring
entrepreneurs for business creation), and
o Education “in” enterprise (i.e. Training for the growth and
development of established entrepreneurs).
o Providing the business skills that are needed in order to start a new
venture.
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Role of entrepreneurship education in
promoting an enterprise culture
• The objectives of entrepreneurship education can thus be
summarised as follows (European Communities, 2004):
o Promoting the development of personal qualities that are
relevant to entrepreneurship, such as creativity, spirit of initiative,
risk-taking and responsibility;
o Raising students’ awareness of self-employment as a career
option (the message being that you can become not only an
employee, but also an entrepreneur);
o Providing the business skills that are needed in order to start a
new venture.
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Role of entrepreneurship education
in promoting an enterprise culture
 Case Study on developing enterprise culture: Kaufman
Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership
• A Kauffman Center study (Charney and Libecap, 2000) finds
that education in entrepreneurship increases the likelihood of
start-ups, and self-employment, and enhances the economic
reward and self-satisfaction of entrepreneurial individuals
• In particular, compared to other business school alumni,
entrepreneurship graduates:
o
o
o
o
Are three times more likely to start new businesses.
Are three times more likely to be self-employed.
Have annual incomes that are 27% higher and own 62% more assets.
Are more satisfied with their jobs.
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Role of entrepreneurship education
in promoting an enterprise culture
 Case Study on developing enterprise culture: Kaufman
Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership (Cont’d)
• The Kauffman study also found that:
o On average, small firms employing entrepreneurship graduates
had greater sales and employment growth than those that employ
non-entrepreneurship graduates.
o Entrepreneurship graduates seem to gravitate toward high
technology companies.
o Entrepreneurship graduates either founded or worked for hightechnology firms in greater numbers than other business school
alumni.
o Entrepreneurship graduates are more involved in new product
development and research and development activities.
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Entrepreneurship in Botswana
Entrepreneurship Intention and Activities
Outcomes
• About 71% of adult population report claims that
• BUT only 28% are involved in
they have the skills, knowledge and experience for
the early stages of business
undertaking entrepreneurial activity.
creation and ownership
• 67% of adults (18-64 years) in Botswana believe that
they have identified opportunities for starting a
business
• About 28% of Botswana’s adults are involved in the • BUT only 6% of adults actually
early stages of business creation and ownership
own an established business
• 77% of Botswana’s young people (18-34 years)
• BUT only 28% are early stage
reported that they intend to go into business in 2012.
entrepreneurs.
• 70% of young people claim to have the necessary
skills to go into business.
• 66% of young people felt that they can identify
good business opportunities.
• 73% Batswana view entrepreneurship as a career
option
• BUT only 28% are involved in
the early stages of business
creation and ownership
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Entrepreneurship in Botswana (Cont’d)
Entrepreneurship Intention and Activities
Outcomes
• 25% of Batswana are deterred from
entrepreneurship due to fear of failure.
• About 16% of Batswana reported relinquishing a
business.
• 40 % of start-ups fail due to lack of adequate
financing and lack of profitability.
• The state of entrepreneurship in Botswana indicates following
shortcomings:







Poor attitude towards entrepreneurship
Inadequate promotion of entrepreneurship
Lack of entrepreneurship knowledge / education
Poor access to financing
Poor enterprise management growth skills
Lack of start-up support
High entrepreneurship entry barriers
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Fostering entrepreneurship
and a culture of enterprise
• Promote an entrepreneurial society and a culture of enterprise, in
particular through education and training.
o Integrate entrepreneurship at all levels of the formal education system
(from primary to university) and
o Ensure access to information, skills and expertise relating to
entrepreneurship via “lifelong learning” programmes for the adult
population.
o Remove barriers to entrepreneurship among specific target
(marginalised) groups within the population (e.g. women, youth)
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Fostering entrepreneurship
and a culture of enterprise
• Create an entrepreneurial business environment conducive to
enterprise creation
o Remove administrative and regulatory barriers to new firm entry and
growth,
o Policy design in areas such as competition, the regulatory framework, the tax
system, labour markets etc should take account of the way these areas impact
SMEs and innovation in knowledge-based economies.
o Improve access to financing and to information, and other support
infrastructure and services to build capacity of start-ups.
• Ensure the reduction and simplification of administrative
regulations and costs which fall disproportionately on SMEs.
o Take account of SME views during the regulatory process;
o Employ requirements for regulatory agencies to prepare Small Business
Impact Statements during the regulatory process.
o establish one-stop shops for regulatory information and
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Conclusions
• The study has shown that the state of entrepreneurship in
Botswana is poor.
• Though intentions to set up businesses are high, perhaps a sign of
high unemployment rate, very few people goes on to form a
business.
• This indicates existence of entry barriers and lack of skills and
knowledge on entrepreneurship.
• A framework that can be used to formulate entrepreneurship policy
to alleviate the problems was presented.
• It is believed that the formulation of a robust national
entrepreneurship policy and its effective implementation will assist
the country in increasing the rate of new firm creation and improve
the growth of newly formed companies
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