Entrepreneurship education and training: an international perspective
Entrepreneurship education and training, as a field of academic and practitioner research, continues to grow in terms of relevance and topicality. Interestingly, it was not so long ago that researchers and policy makers relegated vocational education and training, together with related human resource aspects of entrepreneurship and small business development, to marginal or “back of the book” positions. Such neglect was evidenced by a marked paucity of dedicated research, specialist publications and peer refereed dissemination. In recent years, however, issues relating to education, training and the development of entrepreneurs and/or their workforce have climbed steadily toward the top of government agenda and currently represent a high priority imperative for government policy throughout the industrially developed and developing world. Conceptual and contextual difficulties tend to follow in the wake of rapid expansion and this area of academic endeavour is not an exception. In order to consolidate conceptual and contextual growth in this area of entrepreneurship research there is an urgent need for empirically rigorous articles to counterbalance the mass of variable quality publications that have flooded the market place in recent years. Individually and cumulatively, the 12 contributions included in this special issue are indicative of the richness and variety of subtopics that represent entrepreneurship education and training in contemporary thinking. This is the third special issue that we published on this topic since I took over as Editor in 2001, and we will continue to facilitate the dissemination of high quality contributions in this important aspect of entrepreneurship research.
In the first article, George Solomon provides an analytical overview of the state of entrepreneurship education in the United States, for the 2004 to 2005 period. The author found that in some areas of entrepreneurship education the use of technology has increased dramatically. Traditional teaching methods are still popular and continue to require that students create business plans. Importantly, however, educators in the US are increasingly using guest speakers and class discussions in order to illustrate the applied aspects of entrepreneurship. In the second contribution, Paul Hannon presents the findings of a comprehensive study of entrepreneurship education provision in England’s 131 Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). This study highlights both the scale and scope of dedicated entrepreneurship education in England. Importantly, the emergent results provide an empirically rigorous base for supporting the further development of entrepreneurship education provision and offer much needed opportunities for benchmarking and the exchange of good practice and related knowledge and experience. In the next paper Holden, Jameson and Walmsley revisit pertinent issues relating to the relationship between supply and demand in the Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) graduate labour market in the UK. The authors acknowledge that progress has been made in recent years, but conclude that serious deficiencies still remain in relation to the quality of information on the SME graduate labour market as well as the utilization of graduates in this important sector of the UK economy. In a related contribution, Colin Jones addresses the issue of how graduate skills can be developed in order to satisfy the needs of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) operating in Australia. The author argues that without the development of a student-centred learning environment, most graduate employees will not acquire the specific skills required by Australian SMEs. He concludes that a failure to consider relevant knowledge and skills as equal drivers of curriculum design can only result in relegating skills development to a secondary learning outcome position.
The fifth article considers the role that gender plays in a micro enterprise program that focused upon the development of quality business plans. Cook,Belliveau and Lentz found that women and men achieved similar program completion rates and overall business plan scores. Interestingly, it emerged that women scored significantly higher on the presentation of their business plans. Furthermore, the level of formal education a participant had upon entering the program mattered for women but proved not significant for men. In the sixth article, Matlay and Carey used longitudinal case studies to analyse the development and implementation of various approaches to entrepreneurship education in a sample of 40 new and established universities in the UK. The authors found that, over a ten year period (1995-2004), conceptual and contextual as well as design and delivery factors impacted significantly upon entrepreneurship education courses developed in these HEIs. Importantly, all the respondents claimed to have provided at least some entrepreneurship education courses. In the next article, Palakshappa and Gordon evaluate the impact that collaborative business relationships could have upon skills acquisition in small firms in New Zealand. Emergent results show that many small firms that are involved in business alliances are neither realising the intended benefits of collaboration nor are using these to develop new skills and competencies. In the next paper, Butler, Reed and Le Grice focus on how knowledge is disseminated in personal business networks and the way that this is used in small land-based businesses in the UK. The authors conclude that, with the pre-dominance of strong ties and low flows of information, rural businesses are unlikely to change either as quickly or as easily as similarly sized firms in other, less traditional industrial sectors.
In the ninth article of this special issue Walker, Redmond, Webster and Le Clus examine the relationship between small business owners and their uptake of Vocational Education and Training (VET) in Australia. The authors found that small business owners are mostly interested in training opportunities that are directly applicable to the specific needs of their businesses. The VET delivery,however, should be carefully structured in terms of location, timing and length of session. In the following paper, Barrett and Mayson explore the intersection between entrepreneurship and Human Resource Management (HRM) in a sample of 600 Australian small firms. It emerges that growing small firms are more likely than their stagnant counterparts to have formal HRM practices. As small firms make up the majority of the Australian business population, the authors suggest that size is directly related to the formalisation of HRM policies. Training commitment and performance in UK manufacturing SMEs is the focus of the eleventh article. Jayawarna, Macpherson and Wilson focus upon management development activities and their impact on performance in a sample of 198 manufacturing SMEs in the UK. Their results indicate that formal training is likely to contribute more significantly to performance than informal provision. In the final article,Choo and Bowley investigate the influence of training and development on employee job satisfaction at one of Australia’s fastest growing franchises. The authors conclude that the effectiveness and efficacy of relevant training programmes is largely dependent upon its quality, course design and employees’learning experiences. In turn, employee satisfaction was found to be influenced by work environment, company values and job responsibilities.
It has become customary to thank all the contributors, referees, advisors and commentators involved in the development and completion of a special issue, for all their hard work and commitment. Many thanks are also due to the staff at Emerald Publishing Group for all the hard work that takes place behind the scenes, and in particular to Martyn Lawrence who was at the receiving end of emails, electronic files and JAR forms. There is a lot of effort, expertise and times invested in publishing a special issue comprising twelve articles –both before and after these are submitted to the publishers. Similarly, there is a great deal of anticipation involved in waiting for, as well as satisfaction when, the complementary issues arrive. I wish to extend my gratitude to all those who have made possible the publication of this issue and sincerely hope that you will enjoy reading it as much as I will!
Harry Matlay
