Education and training

2.3.4 Education and training

Education and training is one of the most used means to encourage entrepreneurial activity within a nation. For new entrepreneurship the entrepreneur’s human capital, as expressed in his or her education, experience and skills, constitutes the most important initial resource endowment (Wright et al., 2007). Training and educating entrepreneurs is according to Levie

Handelshøgskolen i Bodø 27 and Autio (2008) expected to enhance the supply of entrepreneurship through three different mechanisms:

1. Through providing instrumental skills required to start up and grow a new business.

2. Through the enhanced cognitive ability of individuals to manage the complexities involved in opportunity recognition and assessment and also in the creation and growth of new organizations.

3. Through the cultural effect on students attitudes and behavioral dispositions.

Research has shown that highly specialized education programs on entrepreneurship is not suited to provide the broad based and practical training required to teach entrepreneurial skills. The best results of enhanced entrepreneurial potential is obtained through highly practice-oriented training, by addressing a broad set of management, leadership and organizing skills and by emphasizing discovery-driven and contingency approaches to business planning ( Levi and Autio, 2008). Norway was one of the first countries that developed a national strategy plan for entrepreneurship in the school system. The

governments’ goal has for many years been to increase the number of business start-ups and particularly those having growth ambitions and potential. One of the main agents in obtaining this has been through the education system. In 2004 the government launched a strategy plan for entrepreneurship in education and training including teacher training. The vision for the government is:

“Entrepreneurship in the education system shall renew education and create quality and multiplicity in order to foster creativity and innovation” (Rotefoss and Nyvoll, 2008).

This strategy document is the most explicit national entrepreneurship policy document in Norway. In the global GEM report from 2000 a strong coherence was detected between higher education and the level of entrepreneurial activity within a country. Perceived barriers to entrepreneurship like financial support and legal formalities also seem easier to overcome;

the higher education and training aspiring entrepreneurs have (OECD, 2007). By placing entrepreneurial education at the center of its entrepreneurship policy, Norway experienced a significant increase in the early stage entrepreneurial activity rate in 2006. Even though direct effects of policy initiatives are hard to detect, most likely some of it can be related to this effort (OECD, 2008). However, the OECD report (2008) finds that some of the programs

Handelshøgskolen i Bodø 28 targeted towards specific professions are not sufficiently developed, and recommends that entrepreneurial education on university level is strengthened by better targeted programs.

Porter (1990) describes education and training as the single greatest long term leverage point available to all levels of government in upgrading industry. Research has shown that many of the most successful industries have strong ties to universities and technical schools.

In Porters (1990) study of nations competitive advantage, he found that nations that had invested heavily in education, had advantages in many industries that could be traced to human resources. World standards for businesses and human resources are high, and achieving these standards demands involvement from the government. There seem to be an agreement that attaining a high level of education, positively influences the probability of becoming involved in a business start up process (Reynolds et al., 1999).

Norway has several state owned enterprises whose main objective is to encourage commercial activities and develop links between educational institutions, research centers and the industry. The SIVA network is the biggest one. In promoting entrepreneurship outside of the school system both SIVA and Innovation Norway plays an important role. There are several initiative and courses in entrepreneurship in adult education. The OECD report (2008) suggests that these programs could be better integrated with existing active labor market policies. The number of social assistance beneficiaries in Norway is relatively high for a low unemployment country and by addressing these beneficiaries it could enlarge the pool of potential entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship in education is perceived as an important tool in fostering a culture for entrepreneurship and positive attitudes towards entrepreneurs. Since Norway started participating in GEM the Norwegian experts has for several years pointed out lack of entrepreneurial education as being one of the problem in increasing the number of new business start-ups. In light of the reviewed litterateur and the results from both 2005 and 2008 the analysis will show if there has been improvements and if so, are they adequate?

Based on the literature review, the importance of adequate Entrepreneurial Framework Conditions have been demonstrated. Financial support is the most widely recognized

regulator of allocation of effort to entrepreneurship. Through government policies, the government has the ability to affect all the conditions necessary to foster more entrepreneurs and more entrepreneurial activities. This can be done both through government programs and through a numerous of other efforts like education and training. Education and training is one of the most used means when governments try to encourage more entrepreneurial activity

Handelshøgskolen i Bodø 29 within a nation. It is therefore reason to believe that the Norwegian expert panel will have both knowledge and opinions about these conditions.

Handelshøgskolen i Bodø 30