Cultivating Entrepreneurial Competency through Counselling and Consultancy among Students in Higher Educational Institutes
Prof. Meera Mathur
Director
Faculty of Management
MLS University Udaipur
meeramathurfms@yahoo.co.in
Pooja Nihalani
Research Fellow
Manipal University. Jaipur
Dr. Jampala Mahesh chandra Babu
Associate Prof
Manipal University. Jaipur
maheshjampala@jaipur.manipal.edu
Pawan Nihalani,
Student Queen Marry,
University of London
Abstract
Entrepreneurship can catalyse any economy to grow and make students independent to earn their living with respect and dignity. This can also cultivate a sense of commitment among students to use the resources in a sustainable way. Entrepreneurship can foster innovation and economic growth in the country. Counselling can help students to cultivate educational and vocational training to build mind-set for the growth and development of the society. Counselling interventions can help students to focus on enhancing their self-awareness and goal setting for taking good decisions needed for growth and development of business. Career counselling can also help students to choose the best options abele as per their abilities and interest. Integrating entrepreneurship into career counselling can build readiness of students to build positive intentions to create their own small enterprises. The aim of the paper is analyse the impact of counselling and consultant to build entrepreneurial competency among students of higher educational initiates
Key words – Counselling, competency, entrepreneur’s student, development
Introduction
Entrepreneurship is a risk taking ability with lot of stress. Counselling can help in building resilience and suggest coping strategies for the well-being of individuals. The personalized guidance and support of counsellors can create help for students to overcome barriers and develop confidence to connect with the opportunities of the market. Entrepreneurial skills can help to mitigate unemployment which can became the basic cause of socio - economic problems. (Anwar, 2002) It is important for students to manage their anger and frustration so that they can be involved in constructive activities for economic gains. The young entrepreneurs face challenges of having of lack of knowledge and resources need to build activities of economic gains. The mentors can help them to explore industry and build their self- realization instinct of earning money by giving them right advice. The involvement in positive acuities can help students to build their recognition and independence through innovative endeavors. This will also help them to imbibe the positive attributes of hard work, optimism and organizing capacity (Carter, Gartner, and Shaver & Gate wood, 2003). The skills of entrepreneurs can help to build valuable intangible assets for the company. The basic skills needed by entrepreneurs are technical, communication and interpersonal skills specific to each industry (Brockman, 2011). The skills can relate to creativity, leadership and proactivity for managing their self-efficacy of growing in business ventures. (Miao, Qian, & Ma, 2017). The entrepreneurial motivation can help them to build the positive intention, behavior and performance (Obschonka, Hakkarainen, Lonka, & Salmela-Aro, 2017; Uy, Chan, Sam, Ho, & Chernyshenko, 2015). The self-efficacy in individuals is basic input for their effective career management. Entrepreneurships is an art, where entrepreneurs can transform the resources of society to build business ventures catering to the needs of customers. (Gibson, 2001).) Entrepreneurship can help to build the economic shape of any economy, where the young entrepreneurs can build new industry and generate employment (Henry, 2003). There is great need in educational institutes to give training for developing the entrepreneurial skills for creating value for the society. (Ducker, 2005). The involvement of students in economic activities can stimulate growth and employment. The broad acceptance of entrepreneurial skills in students can help them to grow with self-respect and empowerment (Schaumburg-Muller, et.al, 2010) The positive environment for growth of entrepreneurship can be created by mentors to build good minds of youth of any country to create a better future for themselves. (Okayed, Ileana and Udunze, 2014). The students can be connected to good training practices, where their strength can be identified to build collaboration with internships options of the industry. The students can learn to innovate and explore their personality to create new options for the career. (Ram Singh & Dr. O.P. Verma, 2012) The entrepreneurial education and training is essential for the development good business model in any economy. Self-efficacy and self-management is also needed for the growth of entrepreneurial skills (Chen & Bliese, 2002), the collective impact of self -efficacy factors can build the growth of entrepreneurs. (Krueger Jr, 2003). The team building and managing group behavior can also help students to build their leadership skills and motivate them to work together. (Chen & Bliese, 2002; Dawkins, Martin, Scott, & Sanderson, 2015).
The mentors can help students to enhance their knowledge and skills and develop their talents and abilities. The training and communication can also help them to form networks for growth and development. (Dodescu& Badulescu, 2011).The students need to search and identify the formation process of developing business. This can help them to establish their own small startups. They need assistance from the industry experts. The counselors can help them to build the connections. It is important for them to manage their stress and build linkage to have safe options for growth (Pareek and Nadkarni, 2011). The socio-economic development of any regions can be promoted by the entrepreneurs who can build their own options of self-employment. The awareness can be created in the educational institutes to take responsibility of their work. (Debnath.S, 2010) .The student potential is underutilized and their economic participation can enhanced through training and participation in the business activities. (Srikanth et.al. 2013). The students face lack of motivation to work and grow because these lack of conducive and supportive environment to grow. The positive help form mentors can help them to connect with the best options for accessing sources of finances to build their own startups. The social restrictions can be handled by them in a confident way to grow in an innovative way. (Valarmathi, 2010). The skill development through practical guidance of counsellors can help students to refine their abilities and adapt to the changing need of market... The career counsellors can help students in identifying entrepreneurial opportunities for developing their business plans and promote entrepreneurships as a viable career path. The increased entrepreneurial activity can help students to build confidence and utilise their resources wisely. Counselling plays an important role in promoting and developing entrepreneurial skills and abilities of the students. The personalized support can help students to choose opportunities and empower themselves. The EDP can help students to learn and update their skills by collaborating with the best experts of the industry. This connection of students through the counselors can help them to stimulate efforts in the right direction to design the opportunities for growth. (Ms. Indira Kumari, 2014). The development programs can help them in fostering a positive attitude towards challenges. Counselling can help in build essential entrepreneurial skills through creativity and problem-solving ability to develop communication and leadership. Entrepreneurship can be shaped through counselling and positive advice given by trained counselors to connect with the industry options of growth. Counselling has emerged as a valuable tool for supporting entrepreneurship development. The entrepreneurial skills are necessary part of career management in relation to other general skills (Savickas et al., 2009) .The development programs can helps students to understand the action oriented beliefs needed for working and growing in a sustainable way. (Frese, 2009). The students need to imbibe abilities to build personality to work and grow in an empowered way. The emotional stability is needed to face the challenges of the market. The positive behaviors can help students connect with the risk taking options with a self-monitoring process. The students need to cultivate and develop a social personality so that can become cooperative and supportive to build their teams. The values are essential to shape the personality. The finite value system can be calculated by the level of money invested but infinite values could be investment of intangible efforts which are beyond money values like commitment, love, passion and loyalty. (Shinnar, Hsu, and Powell, (2014)
The students’ participation in entrepreneurship education can help them to develop higher self-efficacy skills. The training mentors can also help them to grow in a better way. (Abaho, Olomi, & Urassa, 2015). The mentors with higher level of training skills can help students to build higher and better learning practices. Kassean, Vanevenhoven, Liguori, and Winkel (2015), Gielnik et al. (2015) - The counselors in the universities can help students to foster self-efficacy through formal entrepreneurial education. Saeed, Yousafzai, Yani-De-Soriano, and Muffatto (2015) the perceptions for entrepreneurship cam be geared through support for concept development and execution of their ideas through the creation of small startups. (Maritz and Brown, 2013). The students need to participate in vocational training programs to build their abilities and nurture their talents. (Boukamcha, 2015). The participation in an entrepreneurship training program can build higher level of self-efficacy skills. (Venugopal, Viswanathan, and Jung, 2015). The financial literacy and training can help them to improve their skills for building and growing. The skill development programmers should be promoted by the government also where the students can connect and learn the technical skills for job creation. It is important for students to have options and opportunities for training themselves through government recognized bodies. (Baba, 2013). Counselling can help students to shape the goals of business and understand the concept of oneself to connect with market ethics. Cultivating entrepreneurial skills through counseling among students can be a valuable approach for preparing themselves to work and grow in the dynamic world. Counseling sessions can help students to identify their goals and make self-assessment to enhance their skills for the better development of personality. This can help to articulate their goals and vision for future to build resilience in the changing business situations. The counselling sessions can also help them to inculcate creativity and innovation through brainstorming sessions, where they can design small enterprises in an innovative way by involving in group activities. The students can think and grow in a positive way to solve the problems. The networking skills can be learnt by participating in group activities. . The students need to learn the basics of financial literacy to build their business goals. The entrepreneurial landscape is constantly evolving and growing with the impact of technology and modern scientific innovations. The mentors can help students to build supportive environment with network of industry specialist and stakeholder to support.
Literature Review
Entrepreneurship is basis of economic growth and so it needs diverse resources varying from financial to behavioral aspects to build sustainable business systems (Barazandeh et al., 2015). The basic competencies needed by entrepreneurs range from strategic, conceptual, opportunity, leaning and familism. Strategic Competency relates to capability and ability needed by individuals to assess the effectiveness of various strategies. (Rahman et al., 2014). It can help them to build thinking and planning aspects of various resources. (Stonehouse & Pemberton, 2002; Rahman, 2015 Parnell et al., 2000; Ahmad et al., 2010; Rahman, 2015). The conceptual competency helps individuals to think and cope with the changing uncertainties of the market to build effective business practices. (Ahmad et al., 2010). The conceptual competency can help students to define their behavior in a positive way. (Man et al., 2002; Rahman et al., 2016). This competency can also help them in managing the risk of market to take better decisions. (Man et al., 2002; Jansen (1992) the conceptual competency is actually the mental capability of individuals to manage their business practices. The opportunity competency helps entrepreneurs to identify and recognize market opportunities and options of growth to build and grow in an empowered way. (Man & Lau, 2000; Rahman et al., 2014). This ability helps them to recognize opportunities at the initial stage of business cycle (Yusoff et al., 2015). Learning Competency can help people to enhance the assimilation of knowledge with the growth of business activities. The learning of entrepreneurs can be reflected in the level of growth, development and knowledge. It helps to create new sources of research for designing better options of growth and progress. (Man 2001, Xiu- Qing& Li, 2013). Higher level of learning competency can help individuals to enhance their skills through better exposure of learning practices. (Argote & Miron-Spektor, 2011).The personal competency helps the individuals to improve their personal qualities to build effective business practices. (Man & Lau, 2000; Krishnan, 2013).The ethical competency helps individual to understand the ethical problems of society and deal with them in a sustainable way to conserve and preserve the finite resources of the society. The management ethics can help business to connect with the socially responsible activities to build goodness for the society. (Kaur and Bains 2013, Inyang & Enuoh, 2009) The Familism Competency helps individual to practice attachment and have trust and faith in the family system to connect and grow in a positive way. (Kuada, 2015). This competency is reflected in the practice of individual to assimilate loyalty for their team members (Zeiders et al., 2016). This reflected through their closeness and support for the member (Taylor et al., 2012). Kaur and Bains (2013). The familism is the concern and affection for all the family member to maintain the work life balance. The counsellors need to give services to build choices for the entrepreneurs so that they have the security of being engaged in positive efforts for building small startup. They need honesty and commitment to build discipline in the market by connecting to right resources, vendors and customers. The entrepreneurial education and training programs can enhance entrepreneurial self-efficacy (Kubberød & Pettersen, 2017; Wilson, Kickul, & Marlino, 2007; Zhao et al., 2005) , (Byabashaija & Katano, 2011; Gielnik, Uy, Funken, & Bischoff, 2017; Karlsson & Moberg, 2013; Nowiński, Haddoud, Lančarič, Egerová, & Czeglédi, 2017), (Sanchez, 2013), (Kerrick, Cumberland, & Choi, 2016; Lee et al., 2016, Bandura, 1997) The opportunities can be accessed by students if they have positive perceptions for learning and growing. (Zhao et al., 2005). The students can participate in entrepreneurship education and develop self-efficacy. (Shinnar, Hsu, and Powell 2014)
The counsellors and policy makers need to support entrepreneurial activities of students in collaborations with the business organizations (Hisrich, Langan-Fox, & Grant, 2007). The opportunities exploration can be made easy by the mentors to help and connect students (Shane, 2012) .The entrepreneurships can be generated within the organizations if students poses sharp skills and they can develop their entrepreneurial projects within the job framework also. (Zacher, Biemann, Gielnik, & Frese, 2012, Antoncic & Hisrich, 2001) There is a positive influence of entrepreneurial start-ups on job creation (Shane, 2009). The diversity of student crowd needs to be addressed to build innovative efforts for creating alliance and exchanges. The counsellors need to help students continuously to grow and connect with the best options of the market. The global economy is changing and creating profound and substantial changes for people to grow and connect though professional forums. The consultant and technical support from experts can help them to connect with the funding sources for creating the seed capital assistance. The focus of the students has to be changed to build a positive outlook for doing things on time. The self-efficacy of students for entrepreneurial skills can be measured (e.g. Brinckmann & Kim, 2015). The complex psychological constructs can be recognized and insights can be created through systematic research. (E.g. Schjoedt & Craig, 2017). The experience of establishing or running one's own business build their confidence and enhance their learning process. (Lee, Hallak, & Sardeshmukh, 2016; Zhao et al., 2005). The students need to have an approach of gratitude to build their self-esteem and connect with training options to improve their professional capabilities. The mentors can help students to enhance their personal competency by imbibing self-awareness and self-management. The motivation to grow can be cultivated by having empathy and social skills where they can have respect their team members - The concept of self is important for entrepreneur and this can help them to express themselves in a professional way. The Social competency is an ability to build interpersonal skills, where student’s t can have empathy to build relationships of trust to work together in a team. The social skills can help students to build bonds for collaborating and working with various groups. Entrepreneur is person who brings change in the society by identifying business opportunities and gathers resources to fulfill the demand of the market. (Anyakoha 2006) The employment options can be generated by the entrepreneurs. There is mismatch of options between the skills available for employers and the skill of the employees. The entrepreneurs need to match this gap by giving training (Dabalen and Oni 2000). The counsellors can help students to choose their career options and develop skills in relation to their future plans. (Magaji & Magaji, 2014). The counsellors need to understand students and help them to change their personality to take up entrepreneurial responsibility of connecting with options and opportunities available in the market. (Muyil, 2011). The students need interest and farsightedness to connect with the business opportunities (Magaji & Magaji, 2014). The skill, ability and talent can help to take business responsibilities a positive way. (Hornby, 2006). The skills can be acquired through formal and informal training to learn and grow in an empowered way. (Magaji & Magaji, 2014). Counselling plays an important in guiding and helping students to connect and grow in a conducive environment. The spirit of students needs to be nurtured to build positive sentiments. (Obi, 2016; Bhuyan, 2007). The counselors can help student to build a mindset for building their own startups for stimulating opportunities to grow. (Obi, 2013; Obi, 2016). The mentors can help students to build interest and develop skills for connecting to innovative career options to catalyze the economic growth. The positive interest can help students to connect many opportunities in the market. (Wood & Hays, 2013). The choices of jobs options depend on their interest and value for building skills in the related field. (Pisarik & Shoffner, 2009). The individual personality mapping of students done by counsellors can help them to choose the right options of their career as per their talents and abilities. (Shepard & Marshall, 1999) The counsellors can also help students to build their personality and choose the best career options. (Michel, 2013). The counselors can also help to create a hope for the future among students to become the best versions of themselves. (Shepard & Marshall, 1999). The society needs counselors to connect the youth to industries to overcome the problems of unemployment The problems created by unemployment can build a social unrest with the problems ranging from robbery, prostitution and money launderings.( Chiekezie, Nzewi & Erhinmwionose, 2016). The work experience can enhance self-efficacy which can be built through internships and industry collaboration (Farashah, 2015; Hockerts, 2017; Pfeifer, Šarlija, & Sušac, 2016). The quality of work experience is directly proportional to the level of self-efficacy and skills present among students. (Sardeshmukh & Corbett, 2011). The leadership and work experience can help students to grow in a positive way. (Kickul, Wilson, Marlino, and Barbosa (2008) the learning and social persuasion can build the psychology of students to grow in an empowered way. (Zhao et al., 2005).
Objective of the study -The basic objective of the study the various aspects and dimensions of entrepreneurial skills of students designed through counselling. The aim is to design a strategic framework for the development of entrepreneurial skills among students of higher educational institutes through counselling.
Research Methodology is s systematic approach of nay saying the primary and second sty source of information related to the topic of the research paper. The review of literature is done to build theatrical knowledge. The research design was built by the formation of hypo this. The question ate was prepared to be circulated among student. The research designs is qualitative and mixed-method approaches to collect resources. The data collected through questionnaire analyzed by screening it and uploading into software of SPSS versions 26 the study was conducted on selected students from the list of private and public colleges of Jodhpur .The small sample of 140 students was contacted to get the information. The liker scale of 5-point was used. The rating started from strong disagreeing to strongly agreeing.
Hypothesis testing
Null Hypothesis -H01: There is no significant difference in the impact of counselling on entrepreneurial competency of students when they are classified on the basis of gender
Alternative Hypothesis -H01: There is no significant difference in the impact of counselling on entrepreneurial competency of students when they are classified on the basis of gender
Null Hypothesis- H02: There is a significant difference in the impact of counselling on entrepreneurial competency of students when they are classified on the basis of age
Alternative Hypothesis -H02: There is no significant difference in the impact of counselling on entrepreneurial competency of students when they are classified on the basis of age
Null Hypothesis - H103: There is a significant difference in the impact of counselling on entrepreneurial competency of students when they are classified on the basis of specialization
Alternative Hypothesis- H03: There is no significant difference in the impact of counselling on entrepreneurial competency of students when they are classified on the basis of specialization
Analysis of Data
Frequency Table for various dimensions of entrepreneurial Competency
Strategic Competency |
Frequency |
Percent |
Neutral |
13 |
7.2 |
Agree |
99 |
55.0 |
strongly agree |
68 |
37.8 |
Opportunity Competency |
|
|
strongly disagree |
2 |
1.1 |
disagree |
41 |
22.8 |
neutral |
78 |
43.3 |
Agree |
51 |
28.3 |
strongly agree |
8 |
4.4 |
Personal Competency |
|
|
Disagree |
10 |
5.6 |
Neutral |
50 |
27.8 |
Agree |
77 |
42.8 |
strongly agree |
43 |
23.9 |
Learning Competency |
|
|
strongly disagree |
19 |
10.6 |
Disagree |
8 |
4.4 |
Neutral |
10 |
5.6 |
Agree |
81 |
45.0 |
strongly agree |
62 |
34.4 |
Ethical Competency |
|
|
Disagree |
26 |
14.4 |
Neutral |
102 |
56.7 |
Agree |
52 |
28.9 |
Familism Competency |
|
|
strongly disagree |
4 |
2.2 |
disagree |
5 |
2.8 |
neutral |
61 |
33.9 |
agree |
88 |
48.9 |
strongly agree |
22 |
12.2 |
Descriptive Statics of the various dimensions of entrepreneurial competency
Dimensions |
N |
Mean |
Std Dev. |
Strategic competency |
180 |
3.6056 |
.72078 |
Conceptual competency |
180 |
4.3056 |
.59886 |
Opportunity competency |
180 |
3.1222 |
.84995 |
Personal competency |
180 |
3.8500 |
.84876 |
Learning competency |
180 |
3.8833 |
1.23395 |
Ethical competency |
180 |
3.1444 |
.64403 |
T test Where the T - Value is 3.6
Dimensions |
T |
Df |
Sig |
Strategic competency |
.103 |
179 |
.918 |
Conceptual competency |
15.807 |
179 |
.000 |
Opportunity competency |
-7.542 |
179 |
.000 |
Personal competency |
3.952 |
179 |
.000 |
Learning competency |
3.081 |
179 |
.002 |
Ethical competency |
-9.490 |
179 |
.000 |
Familism competency |
1.008 |
179 |
.315 |
ANOVA or F-Test for Hypothesis Testing
|
Demographic Groups |
F |
Sig |
Hypothesis |
1 |
Gender |
50.533 |
.000 |
H01 –N1-rejected H01 – A1 -accepted |
2 |
Age |
69.767 |
.000 |
H02 –N1-rejected H02 – A1 –accepted |
3 |
Specialization |
30.619 |
.000 |
H03 –N1-rejected H03 – A1 -accepted |
Implications of Data
The demographic classification of students is done on the basis of age, gender and specialization differ in their perceptions for entrepreneurial competency impacted by effective counselling services. .The F test helps to reject the null Hypothesis of H01, H02 and H03 as the sigma is less than .05. The T- test shows that the ethical and opportunity competency needs more attentions as their value is negative .The results of Hypothesis are as follows :
Recommendations and Suggestions
The counseling’s sessions of the students can help them to discover their inventory of traits and abilities to build their professional and saleable skills. The relationships and social acknowledgements can help them to discover their innovative competencies. The students need to have positive mind to build emotional intelligence for working with various groups of people in a supportive and cooperative way. The students also need to focus on their analytical reasoning so as connect with the industry and face the challenges by solving their problems. They need to understand the art of social relationship for managing emotions and helping people to achieve their goals. They need to build the work values of having devotion to work and grow in positive way. The process of self-improvement can only start, if they have faith and confidence in themselves. The students need to find some work and start investing their resources and time so that their life can have some meaning. Work can make their life interesting and they can learn new things to face the challenges of the changing world. The student need to understand their values to build and grow. They need to take efforts to develop their personality. This can help to build self-realization of having respect for their own dignity. The work attitude can also help them to have feelings of beliefs to behave in a positive way with people. The professional competencies of students can be enhanced through trained mentors, who can imbibe value based development. The students need to build values for believing in the continuous process of acquiring knowledge to work on their technical skills. The professional abilities can be designed by performing and working on business platforms to exchange and grow in an empowered way. The student entrepreneurial skills are related to their ability of being productive to manage resources for the growth of economic enterprise. The student quality quotient and behavioral aspects can be managed by mentors and counselors who can understand students and connect them to the learning environment. The students need to understand the power of knowledge and connect with industrial growth through consultancy and building wealth for themselves.
The time relevant learning can help them connect with right set skills available with the changing technology and market trends. The soft skills need to be cultivated, where they need to learn about loyalty and commitment to work with people. The students also need coping skills to build an ethical environment with changing pattern of social and community needs. The diversity and distinctiveness of cultures need to be respected and practice anti-discriminatory practice.Students are intangible assets of the educational institutes and they need to be upgraded for building their value by imbibing qualities of loyalty, leadership, innovation and knowledge. The talented, skilled and knowledgeable students with innovative ideas are most valuable assets who can connect to opportunities of growth and development the values have to be cultivated through the education system and develop potential of students to build ethics, commitment, cooperation and emotional stability
Conclusion
The counselling in higher educational institutes can help students to build their entrepreneurial skills. The development programs in collaboration with industry experts can help students to grow in an empowered way. The consultancy of good mentors can help students to connect with industry experts to learn through internships and eradicate unemployment. The skill development and vocational training programs are also becoming part of new education policies to make them fit for the long run. Student achievement refers to the process of growth and achievement to build his confidence for choosing the right option. The positive Student is reflected through the student's hold on the knowledge, character and quality of work. The basic dimensions of entrepreneurial skills are conceptual competency, opportunity competency, learning competency, personal competency, ethical competency and familism .The counsellor’s assessment can help them to build their self-efficiency, intelligence, goal-centeredness, confidence, knowledge and understanding, creativity, imagination, and innovation. The counsellors can improve development process of students by adopting practices of building positive feedback to improve their confidence and help them to grow well. . The student development should be their personal so that they could do their self-reflection to build skills and abilities. Counselling and personal interaction can help them to groom their life in a better way. The environment and social system is impacting study’s ad their economic independence can be created through their development of their vocational skills. The decision making abilities of the students can help students to be more creative when they guided by trained mentors.
References