Abstract
The entrepreneurial education has had a significant impact on the education system. One of the differentiating elements of business training is the approach that can be achieved through a set of effective competencies. In this work, the authors discuss the key competencies that need to be addressed in training future university professionals for business success. For this discussion, they use the structural analysis as a tool for construction and analysis. Initially, they discuss the purpose of the investigation. Then, they focus on the selection of the main entrepreneurial competencies according to literature. Finally, they structure a set of key variables that professionals should develop for business success. Experts with experience in the business and educational fields assess the degree of dependence and influence of the relevant competencies. From the results, they reveal a system of strategic entrepreneurial competencies that is consistent with the need for entrepreneurial training.
TopIntroduction
Studies such as the GEM – Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (Bosma & Kelley, 2019), show that middle-income countries like Colombia are consolidating policies that have favored entrepreneurship in recent years. One of the indicators established by the GEM, NECI1, which evaluates the environment for entrepreneurship in 54 economies, places Colombia in the middle range and with a high rating in region 4.24. However, it is not clear that this environment favors the sustainable creation of endeavors. Indicators with low growth levels, such as the TEA2 and EBO3, are a constant in the past few years in Colombia. By the end of 2019, from the companies created during the first year, only 55% remain, while the second- and third-years report 41% and 31%, respectively. Under this panorama, authors such as Ramos, Campillo, and Gago (2010), Cárdenas and Naranjo (2018), and Primo and Turizo (2016), have inquired the relevance of the entrepreneur in the consolidation of these ventures, especially their entrepreneurial traits, knowledge, and competencies. This study identifies the substantial entrepreneurial competencies in university graduates that guarantee business success.
The Purpose of this chapter is identifying the most relevant entrepreneurial competencies to be trained in university students, in order to develop a professional who can guarantee business success, that is to say, generators of new ventures or employees who are recognized for their knowledge, skills, and business attitudes within an already constituted company.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Structural Analysis: Methodology that offers the possibility of describing a system by using a matrix that interconnects all the components that are involved in a system. This method makes it possible to study these dependency and influence relationships, and to identify essential variables.
Competency: The knowledge, skills, attitudes, and characteristics that the individual must possess in order to effectively and successfully perform a specific task.
MICMAC: Cross-Impact Matrix Multiplication Applied to a Classification, a method developed by M. Godet in collaboration with J.C. Duperrin.
GEM: The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor is the most prestigious and extensive study on the state of entrepreneurship worldwide.
Entrepreneurial competencies: Those qualities that a person must have to initiate and lead changes in his or her professional or personal environment. They are mainly composed of three aspects: Knowledge (knowing), Skills (knowing how to do), and Attitudes (willingness to do).
PEI: General statement that concretizes the mission, and links it to the institutional development plan; that is, it sets out the fundamental plans of institutional action through which the mission is carried out and gives meaning to short-, medium-, and long-term planning.