sabaragamuwa volume 18number 1 august 2020 43-54

SabaragamuwaUniversityJournal

Volume 18 Number 1 August 2020 pp 43-54ISSN 1391-3166 eISSN 2386-2041http://doi.org/10.4038/suslj.v18i1.7753

© 2020 Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka

Instilling Entrepreneurial Mind-Set through EntrepreneurshipEducation: A Systematic Review of Literature

Mathushan P.

Department of Economics and Management, Vavuniya Campus of the University of Jaffna,Sri Lanka

[email protected]

AbstractEntrepreneurship has never been more significant than at the present moment, when economies

across the world encounter the challenges of economic growth, connecting the inequality gap and solvingsocial problems. Society necessitates individuals equipped with entrepreneurial and innovative skills,attitudes and behavior. Education is one way the government can grasp to create an environment forentrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship education has generated considerable interest in recent decades.More so, entrepreneurship education fosters entrepreneurial mind-sets, behaviors and capabilities inyoung people enabling them to create and lead new organizations and entrepreneurship educators arehence looking for pedagogies that enable students to be exposed to multiple experiences in entrepreneurialdecision-making. However, the argument on the pedagogy of entrepreneurship education still remainsagnostic. The finest outcomes in entrepreneurship education are achieved when students are exposed toaction-oriented experiential learning that encourages problem-solving, creativity and peer evaluation.Building upon insights from existing literature, the findings suggest that, by embracing game-basedlearning model for entrepreneurship education, and design thinking approach in entrepreneurshipeducation can foster entrepreneurial mind-set. Notably, business simulation games can play in thedevelopment of entrepreneurial capabilities in undergraduate students.

Keywords: Business startups, Entrepreneurial competences, Performance, Self-employment, Knowledge,Skills, Abilities

Introduction

An entrepreneurial culture is a thrust forsustainable economic renewal and development,for the generation of new jobs and eventuallyfor promotions in human welfare [Kengatharan,2012, Volkmann & Tokarski, 2009]. Societiesneed individuals with entrepreneurial mind-set,innovative skills and attitudes. In recent yearsthe evolving body of academic research hasaddressed the effectiveness of entrepreneurshipeducation to inspire students for self-employmentand generating an entrepreneurial culture amongstthem [Lekoko et al., 2012]. Ideally, educationis one way the government can commit tocreate a positive environment for entrepreneurship.The introduction of entrepreneurship educationhas a revolutionary character, since it adds tothe traditional vocational training of employeesand academics, the entrepreneurial culture, moreappropriate to the new formats of labor relationsresulting from the restructuring of the worldeconomy [Almeida & Buzay, 2019].

Entrepreneurship subject which generally em-braces an exploration of starting and developinga business is often thought to be a likely subjectfor students in business management discipline.There is an evolving concern that students do nothave sufficient entrepreneurial skills and compe-tencies to startup business particularly runningsmall and medium enterprise (SME). Studentsanticipate themselves as merely job seekers notjob generators. Arbaugh et al. (2010) believes thatthe process of teaching entrepreneurship needs tobe highly interactive and immersive to developentrepreneurial skills in students.

Extension of entrepreneurship education en-capsulates the confidence that entrepreneurshipcan be teachable and entrepreneurs can bedeveloped [Erikson, 2003]. Entrepreneurship ed-ucation positively influenced students ’ learningoutcomes [Rideout & Gray, 2013]. This underpinsthe requirement for universities to launch en-trepreneurship education which should incorporateentrepreneurial mind-set and competencies to busi-ness management and non-business management

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http://dx.doi.org/10.4038/suslj.v18i1.7753

Sabaragamuwa University Journal 2020, V.18 NO.1 pp 43-54

discipline students. Furthermore, entrepreneurshipeducation that incorporates factors that fostercreativity, innovation, self-confidence, leadershipand a positive attitude towards entrepreneurshipin the formative years of a learner’s educationare lacking [Timmons & Spinelli, 2007]. Reapingthe entrepreneurial mind-set in education thataims to teach entrepreneurship as a method thatrequires practice. It is broadly recognized thatentrepreneurship is a vital factor for the formationof generating job opportunities, economic growthand to elicit the strength of academic institutions.Thus, entrepreneurship can be classified as aninvestment and is vitally important for a nation toprosper in the economy. Therefore, the underlyingpurpose of this article is to investigate and discussthe role of entrepreneurial education for promotingentrepreneurial mind-set among students. Thepaper is structured as follows, addressing theresearch gap, introduction to entrepreneurship edu-cation and interdiction to entrepreneurial mind-set,introducing methodologies for entrepreneurshipeducation eventually it presents the conclusion andrecommendations.

In fact, Policy formulators and economic expertshave highlighted that entrepreneurship poses avital role in eliciting economic growth andinnovation [Fayolle & Gailly, 2012, Kengatharan,2013]. Secundo et al. (2015) epitomized thatcountry development in the knowledge-driveneconomy is not determined by the generation offresh knowledge literally by the ability to turn theknowledge into new products, and processes thatstimulate economic prosperity. Research findingsepitomize that entrepreneurship can be achievedthrough education. However, the research on theeffects of entrepreneurship education still has hugegaps [Young, 1997]. Accordingly, over the decades,entrepreneurship education programs have encoun-tered a rapid and global revelation within highereducation [Fayolle & Gailly, 2012]. Notwithstand-ing, most entrepreneurship studies are conductedin developed country contexts, and their findingsmay not be generalizable elsewhere [Solomon,2007]. Paradoxically, the consequences originatingfrom entrepreneurship education are still poorlyunderstood. Other studies found evidence that theeffects are negative [Oosterbeek, 2010]. Gorman etal. (1997) found that research about the effects ofentrepreneurship education is still in its infancystage.

There is still inconsistent and reasonable modelof matching which type of entrepreneurship edu-cation yields which outcomes since paradigms ofentrepreneurship education are diversified rangingfrom a causal and linear understanding of planning,through an approach which focuses on students’mindsets, to a process-related entrepreneurial andmethodical approach [Rasmussen & Fritzmer,2016]. Therefore, reaping an entrepreneurial mind-set in human capital is becoming a vital challenge.

Methods

The present study relies on the critical reviewof existing literature and empirical findings.Exploiting search strategies, 190 research articleswere identified with regard to the concepts ofentrepreneurship education and entrepreneurialmind-set. Despite, in accordance with antecedentstudies, henceforth criteria were harnessed inchoosing the article [Kengatharan, 2015]: (a) apeer-reviewed journal published between 1990 andthe present; and (b) full text published in English.The full papers were garnered from reputeddatabases such as Wiley Online Library, Emer-ald Insight, Sage Journals, ProQuest business,Business Source Premier (EBSCOhost), ExpandedAcademic (Gale), Science Direct (Elsevier), ISIWeb Science, the Sloan Work and Family ResearchNetwork at Boston College, and Google Scholarwhere a tremendous range of articles wererecognized worthwhile for the aforesaid concepts.The papers were screened in the following way.Articles that seemed more than once were deniedto one entry, and those that didn’t deal withuniversity entrepreneurship and entrepreneurialcompetencies together were eliminated.

Entrepreneurship Education

Entrepreneurship is not a new phenomenon;it has grasped increasing attention over the pastdecades. Today entrepreneurship is considered theessential lever to cope with the new competitivelandscape [Hitt & Reed, 2000]. Parallel to theevolution of the field of entrepreneurship we cannote an increasing interest in the developmentof educational programs to encourage and fosterentrepreneurship [Solomon, 2007]. Entrepreneur-ship education was pioneered by Shigeru Fijii,who started teaching in this field in 1938 atKobe University (Japan). In 1947 Myles Mace firstintroduced the course in entrepreneurship in theUSA at Harvard Business School [Katz, 2008].

44 © 2020 Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka


Intriguingly, the first entrepreneurship course washeld in 1947 at Harvard University, countlesscourses and programs have been developed andimplemented throughout the world. literatureReviews on entrepreneurship education and ofparticular entrepreneurship programs [Ronstadtet al., 1988] give evidence that these programsencourage entrepreneurs to start a business.

Indeed, it is a relatively new and emergingdiscipline that is entering its adolescence at collegesand universities, at least in the US. The past20 years have witnessed an enormous growth inthe number of small business management andentrepreneurship courses at different educationalinstitutions. A great number of programs arebroadly termed as enterprise or entrepreneurshipeducation, which have been carried out in schoolsand higher educational institutions throughout theworld[Alberti et al., 2004]. As opined by Solesviket al. (2013) university entrepreneurship educationis expected to promote students to enquire aboutentrepreneurial mind-sets that enhance the supplyof new firms by producing graduates [Hannon,2013]. Several prior studies found a positive impactof entrepreneurship education courses or programsat universities on perceived attractiveness and fea-sibility of new venture initiation or even on actualstartup activity [Fayolle & Gailly, 2012, Souitaris etal., 2007]. Indeed, the traditional Higher EducationInstitutions prototypes are viewed as department-led, generally in the form of a Business Schoolmodel [Gibb, 2008]. Entrepreneurship educationis frequently positioned in one department, withrudiments of outreach to other departments.This Business School approach evolved from theventure creation/business startup era of the late1990s. It caters for a target audience of businessand management students with an emphasis onbusiness planning and start-up skills, and has beenaccused of being too narrow in overall depth andapproach. Progressively, the emphasis is shiftingfrom teaching content “about” entrepreneurship,to developing “experiential” modes of learningand preparing graduates “for” and “in” enterprisescenarios [Taatila, 2010], through simulation andemulation of professional communities of practice.Curriculum and extracurricular activity are twobasic sources of learning experiences in an en-trepreneurship education program, but their effectis unequal. Peterman (2003) argue that formalcurriculum does not stimulate entrepreneurial

intention, on the contrary, it reduces tolerance forambiguity.

A rudimentary question within entrepreneurialeducation that never seems to go out of fashionis “Can entrepreneurship be taught?” It hasbeen a rapidly growing entrepreneurship educationsince mid-1990 as an emergence of new economicdirection by which knowledge has become aprerequisite resource for economic activities [YuChenh et al., 2009]. Entrepreneurship educationis distinctive in that it requires a “generalists”approach versus the more traditional specializedbusiness education programs [Hills, 1988]. Despitethe increasing number of activities and courses,there is still much discussion about the scope,objectives and methodologies that should beaddressed in entrepreneurship education [Fayolle &Gailly, 2012].

Entrepreneurship education literally focuseson accelerating entrepreneurial culture and itassists entrepreneurs to recognize and pursueopportunities. Charney & Libecap (2000) foundthat entrepreneurship graduates are more likelyto start new businesses, have annual incomesthat are higher, own more assets, and aremore satisfied with their jobs. Further it isnot limited to inspiring startups, innovative andnew business. Entrepreneurship is a competencyfor everyone, stimulating youth individuals tobecome creative and self-confident in whateverthey pursue [Gautam & Singh, 2015]. Gartner &Vesper (1994) evaluate the effectiveness and failureof entrepreneurship education experimentationin various countries and manifest a significantdiversity of programs offered. Entrepreneurshipeducation should be “geared toward creativity,multi-disciplinary, process-oriented approaches,and theory-based practical application [Plaschka& Welch, 1990]. Thus, Entrepreneurship educatorsmust find an enterprise culture which promotesentrepreneurial skills [Gibb, 2008]. Entrepreneur-ship studies that have entrepreneurial facetsshould advance skill building in the followingareas: negotiation, new product development,technological innovation, opportunity recognition,new market entry, the legal requirements of newbusinesses, and the ability to create a linkage fromvision to action [Johannisson, 1991, Mcmullan &Long, 1987].



Entrepreneurial Mind-set

The concept of mindset instigates from thecognitive psychology fields. Shepherd Douglas(1997) define EM as an ‘ability and willingness ofindividuals to rapidly sense, act, and mobilize inresponse to a judgment decision under uncertaintyabout a possible opportunity for gain’. McGrath& MacMillan (2000) firstly defined entrepreneurialmindset as ‘the ability to rapidly sense, act, andmobilize, even under highly uncertain conditions’Mindsets are not innate; they can be influenced andlearned by an individual’s prior knowledge and theinteraction with current environment [Mathisen &Arnulf, 2012]. Entrepreneurial mindset describedby scholars as the ability to sense, act, andmobilize under uncertain conditions. Scholars havesuggested that “the successful future strategistswill exploit an entrepreneurial mindset and theability to rapidly sense, act, and mobilize, evenunder uncertain conditions [Bolk et al., 2003].

Entrepreneurial mind-set has been compre-hended in terms of traits, skills and knowledge.Prerequisite skills for successful entrepreneursmight encapsulate oral presentation, skills, inter-personal skills, and the capability to formulateand execute a solid business plan [Ronstadt, 1985].Personal qualities such as outgoing personality,leadership skills, self-reliant, innovativeness andthe ability to engage in risk-taking [Martin &Staines, 1994] and behavioral qualities such likea huge picture perspective, recognizing busi-ness opportunities, commitment, seeing need forcontrol, having the conscious mind of what isright, deal with uncertainty, using contacts andconnections and embracing competence consideredas entrepreneurial competencies [Mitton, 1989].The ability to be dynamic, flexible, and self-regulating in one’s cognitions given dynamic anduncertain task environments [Haynie et al., 2010].

Other definitions of entrepreneurial mindset ex-isting in the literature vary but the common pointof them is that entrepreneurial mindset is a wayof thinking or an ability to capture entrepreneurialopportunities in an uncertain situation. As opinedby Mitchelmore & Rowley (2010) entrepreneurshipcompetency, develop skills and ability clusterswhich were identical to those in managementand leadership theory. Notwithstanding, two newskills appeared; opportunity and self-managementstudies [Chandler & Jansen, 1992, Herron &

Robinson Jr., 1993]. Declarative entrepreneurshipknowledge, procedural entrepreneurship knowl-edge, knowledge about oneself as entrepreneurialskills, marketing skills, resource skills, opportunityskills, interpersonal skills, learning skills, strategicskills, marketing, strategy, resource acquisition,opportunity identification/creation, learning skills,interpersonal skills, leadership skills, collaborativeskills, creativity.

Mitchelmore & Rowley (2010) developed acompetency model that represent the followingcompetencies.

Cognitive and non-cognitive mind-set en-capsulates resource acquisition skills, opportu-nity identification/creation, learning skills, marketniche/product innovation, idea generation, envi-ronmental scanning, recognizing and envisioningtaking advantage of opportunities, and formulatingstrategies for taking advantage of opportunities.Moreover, there are many scholars made aconsideration on these competencies [Chandler &Jansen, 1992, Maresch et al., 2016, Man & Lau,2000, Volkmann & Tokarski, 2009].

Business and management mind-set incor-porates development of the management systemnecessary for the long term, functioning ofthe organization, acquisition and development ofresources required to operate the firm, businessoperational skills, Previous involvement withstart-ups, managerial experience, familiarity withindustry, financial and budgeting skills, previousexperience, management style, marketing skills,technical skills, Industry skills, business planpreparation, goal setting skills, and managementskills [Chandler & Hanks, 1994, Man & Lau,2000, McGregor & Tweed, 2001].

Human relations mind-set encompasses theability to develop organizational culture, delega-tion skills, motivate individual and in groups,hiring skills, human relations skills, and Leadershipskills [Brinckmann & Hoegl, 2011, Herron &Robinson Jr., 1993].

Conceptual and relationship mind-set com-prises conceptual competencies, organizationalskills, interpersonal skills, the ability to managecustomers, mental ability to coordinate activities,written and oral communication skills, decisionmaking skills, analytical skills, logical thinkingskills, deal-making skills and commitment compe-tencies [Man & Lau, 2000].



It has been recognized that four componentsof an entrepreneurial mindset: alertness to op-portunity, risk propensity, ambiguity tolerance,and dispositional optimism [Cui et al., 2019].Entrepreneurial mindset can be improved throughtraining and can be considered as a mind habit thatrequires learning to shape [Schmidt & Ford, 2003].

Conceptual linkage of entrepreneurshipeducation and entrepreneurial mind-set

In the last few years, research in entrepreneur-ship has begun to look at the education issuemore deeply but still in a very fragmented way.Young (1997) suggests that there are two setsof reasons why students may want to studyentrepreneurship: first, they may want to startup their own business; second, they may wishto acquire knowledge which will be helpful intheir careers in larger organizations. Alberti et al.(2004) highlight that entrepreneurship educationis crucial for enhancing entrepreneurial skills,attitudes, and behaviors that foster economicgrowth of the country. Further entrepreneurshipeducation in universities has a positive impact onattitude towards entrepreneurship and turns fosterentrepreneurship as a meaningful and respectablecareer prospect for graduates [Galloway & Brown,2002].

Notwithstanding, Souitaris et al. (2007) re-vealed that extracurricular activities like guestspeakers, business plan competitions, and en-trepreneurship incubator projects are incentivesto the motivation of entrepreneurship. It hasbeen found that curricular and extra-curriculareducation have an unbalanced impact on universitystudents, and that formal courses and extracurric-ular activities have moderate roles in the formationof entrepreneurial intention and other compe-tences [Arranz et al., 2017]. More so, entrepreneur-ship programs offer social interactions with otherparticipants, lecturers, and mentors, participantsenhance perceptions that entrepreneurship isalso a socially desirable career path [Smith &Woodworth, 2012]. Entrepreneurship educationtakes many different forms including curricularcourses and extracurricular activities and servesdifferent purposes in undergraduate level. Cuiet al. (2019) recommended that entrepreneurialknowledge can be acquired through theoretical-oriented activities like successful entrepreneur’sspeech, face-to-face communication with an en-

trepreneur, conferences or workshops related toentrepreneurship, entrepreneurial spirit and valuestransmitted by the university or colleges, andentrepreneurial skills and competencies can beobtained through practical-oriented activities suchas entrepreneurship club, entrepreneurship designcompetition, enterprise visit or internship, businesssimulations or games, entrepreneurial incubationproject, and entrepreneurial activity of resourcingor networking.

Notwithstanding its claimed significance, theEM research is still embryonic [Krueger, 2017].Existing findings on EE impact have mainlyaddressed EI and very few studies have examinedthe EE-EM link. Furthermore, it is vague how EMevolves throughout education. Intriguingly, emo-tional factors are fundamental for the constructionof EM because affective events pose a pivotal rolein entrepreneurial learning and because differenteducational designs can trigger affective events,which successively endorse entrepreneurial com-petences [Lackeus, 2014]. Nevertheless, emotionalconstructs are infrequent in EE research [Kyro,2008]. A possible emotional mediator between EEand EM is entrepreneurial inspiration [Souitaris etal., 2007], a gap for EE researchers seeking theemotional drivers of EM.

The goal of most research on entrepreneur-ship education is to investigate the impact ofentrepreneurship educational programs on indi-viduals’ intention to act entrepreneurially andthe performance of the businesses created bythese students subsequent to these educationalprograms [Patzelt, 2014]. Entrepreneurship ed-ucation must furnish future entrepreneurs withthe vital skills to address the need to accelerateeconomic development through creating new ideasand changing over those ideas into feasible andprofitable businesses. Entrepreneurship educationmust foster entrepreneurs with the necessaryskills to meet the need to generate economicdevelopment through creating new business ideasand transforming those ideas into profitable busi-ness. Entrepreneurship education incorporates allprocesses proposing to encourage entrepreneurialmindset, attitudes and skills and considering awide range of elements like idea generation,creation, growth and innovation [Fayolle & Gailly,2012]. Students have bit or no opportunity toexperience entrepreneurship practically since theprograms focus more on the theoretical transfer of



entrepreneurship knowledge than on the practicalaspect [Lekoko et al., 2012]. Therefore, universitiesshould teach students theory to supplementpractical learning experience.

As cited by Solomon (2007) the actuality ofentrepreneurship is the ability to visualize anddevelop business venture through resources fromfunctional disciplines and ability to deal withrisk and uncertainty involved in a business [Shep-herd Douglas, 1997]. The positive relationshipbetween education and business startups hasbeen acknowledged by international literature formvarious viewpoint and approaches [Niyonkuru,2005], moreover, according to researcher’s pointthere is a viability to enhance entrepreneurialability through education.

The fundamental purpose of education onentrepreneurship in universities is to enablethe students to formulate and implement theirown business with less involvement of othersas soon they finish their degrees instead ofwaiting for the employment opportunities for along period of time. In general, universities aimto provide an opportunity for students to ac-quire comprehensive knowledge and understandingabout entrepreneurial mindset and orientation,sharpen students’ knowledge, abilities, attitudesand competencies through entrepreneurship edu-cation, provide vast insights about formulatingplans (business plan), business startups, cre-ativity, innovation, enhance self-efficiency amongstudents consequently, fostering advertence onentrepreneurship as a career option, make studentsto exploit analytical skills by utilizing real businessinformation and situations to solve problems andmake decisions, encourage students to utilizecreative thought processes to solve business issues.In this sense, serious games emerge as a pertinentapproach to developing entrepreneurial skills.Indeed, there is much argument about the roleof education, skills and personal developmentwithin the overall sphere of enterprise and HEentrepreneurship. The discourse is driven bypolitical and economic burdens concerning theability of Higher Education Institutes (HEIs) todevelop well rounded graduates that “fit” within atwenty-first century global economy [Gibb, 2008].

Taatila (2010) highlighted that key attributesof an entrepreneurial mind-set encompass perse-verance, trust, determination, risk management,a positive attitude towards change, tolerance

of uncertainties, initiative, the need to achieve,understanding of timeframes, creativity, an un-derstanding of the big picture. Evolving ideasrelating to entrepreneurial education are muchwider than just teaching students how to developnew business plans, or create and manage businessstart-ups (traditional entrepreneurship education).Conversely, our argument also embraces theemphasis on pedagogical developments in experi-ential learning, the development of the teacher-learner experience, wider life skills and goodcitizenship, as vital parts of the “enterpriseeducation” perspective [Draycott & Rae, 2011,Jones & Iredale, 2010]. Policy makers believe thatincreased levels of entrepreneurship can be graspedthrough education [EU, 2006] and especiallyentrepreneurship education. However, in Sri Lankacontext this might not be the anticipated level.Crayford et al. (2012) epitomize that it is a portionof a rising ambition for education providers,students and community stakeholders to developentrepreneurial learning opportunities based on arelational view and input from a wider variety ofsources than the past. Notwithstanding, there isalso a strong emphasis on moving creative ideasinto action which encompasses soldier communityrelations and employer partnerships as part ofentrepreneurial learning and strategy-making.

EM fosters individuals to conceive and actentrepreneurially because it reinforces successfulforthcoming strategies [Covin, 2006]. In gen-eral, the foundation of EM lies in cognitiveadaptability which is pivotal to reap requiredoutcomes following entrepreneurial action. EM isnarrowly associated recognition of opportunity,which deceives at the core of entrepreneurshipand defines entrepreneurial success. Connectingthe association between EE and EM would thuscontribute to a deeper understanding on the scopeand extent of EE impact. One of the crucial tasks isto confirm whether EE can absolutely impact thereaping students’ EM [Maresch et al., 2016].

Conclusion and Recommendations

Drawing on the conceptual insights, findingsof the study suggests that, typically, schoolsand universities should promote entrepreneurshipeducation as a career option and enforce en-trepreneurship expertise and experiences amongstudents, undergraduates, and master’s degreestudents. Lucidly, the transforming academic



culture is a generic hazard, which encapsulatesthe entrepreneurial thinking, fear of start-ups,traditional teaching methodologies and so forth.More specifically, the emergence of ICT has asignificant impact on developing entrepreneurialmind-set among students and graduates. Thus,schools and universities can foster in expandingentrepreneurial culture through ICT platforms.

An individual Entrepreneurial Mindset shouldencapsulate action-orientation, innovativeness(presumably discontinuous), resilience toadversity/optimism, persistence at goal-directedbehaviors, domain-specific self-efficacy (possiblygeneral self-efficacy), role identity (mentalprototypes), entrepreneurial intensity, tolerancefor ambiguity and uncertainty, risk-aversion(lower), future orientation (ability to delaygratification?), entrepreneurial behaviors (notjust launching a venture), entrepreneurialintentions, value creation (versus opportunism),market orientation [Krueger, 2017]. Thus, thereshould be a course module which encapsulatesdeveloping entrepreneurial mind-set to foster theentrepreneurial thrust among the students.

Anchored in the theoretical and empiricalevidence, the study confirms the needs well thoughtout of university entrepreneurship for developingentrepreneurial competencies.

Entrepreneurship courses should be imple-mented with the comprehensive understandingabout the type of graduates the trainer purposesto produce. Moreover, outreach projects shouldbe in place to affirm with the level of a desiredrole to the local entrepreneurial atmosphere. Theyidentified that there has been a shift from a startupview to an attitude -changing perspective ofentrepreneurship education. This entrepreneurialeducation has become imperative accompaniedwith the demand with the students searchingbusiness education that can offer the essentialskills to succeed in an exponentially growingand complex management environment. There-fore, incorporating entrepreneurial competenciesin entrepreneurship education in universities helpstudents to enhance and practice new skillscorresponding with entrepreneurship and newbusiness startups and eventually, that would fosterentrepreneurial spirit and growth.

Therefore, the emerging generation of en-trepreneurship educators must avoid the paradigm

paralysis that has consumed so many businessdisciplines. Cui et al. (2019) opined that en-trepreneurship education poses many differentmethods comprising curricular courses and ex-tracurricular activities and serves different pur-poses in undergraduate level. Johannisson (1991)identified five elements in entrepreneurial learning:know-why, know what, know-how, know-who andknow-when and suggested a basic distinctionbetween theoretical-oriented learning (e.g. ‘knowwhat’, ‘know-why’) and practical-oriented learning(e.g. ‘know-how’, ‘know-who’) in entrepreneurshipeducation.

Entrepreneurial learning has been described asthe process of learning to discover and exploitopportunities [Draycott & Rae, 2011] and can beconsidered a form of action learning. A numberof authors argue that action learning is aneffective pedagogic approach in developing andimproving new ventures [Stewart & Hitt, 2012]or at least using experiential learning to developentrepreneurial traits.

In further, universities can provide an idealenvironment for training and development ofentrepreneurial competencies and core skills thus,students can reinforce their generic skills suchlike proactive thinking, creativity and innovation,critical thinking, analytical skills, conceptual skills,interpersonal skills, decision making skills and soforth that dramatically impact on business startup.Lucidly, entrepreneurship training needs a non-traditional approach whereby students must learnto embrace the challenges of operating in a businessenvironment that favors creativity and risk taking.Moreover, technical training to acquire technicalcompetencies, presentation, discussions and highlyinteractive classroom sessions can be conducted todevelop a special training record book that can bemaintained to keep training records and progress ofthe students is reviewed continuously. Students arereferred to various surveys in order to get first handexperiences on business and business startups. Alecturer can be appointed for every student formentoring. Make students responsible to meet thementor regularly.

Leadership in entrepreneurial venturing successraised many questions on the specific competenciesthat enable individuals to lead entrepreneurialactivities. Therefore, developing leadership skillfor entrepreneurs can be taken into account.Eventually, not only must students be exposed



to a business education that emphasizes multi-disciplinary skills but they must participate in an“entrepreneurial experience. The students can puton their course knowledge, exercise their analyticalskills, learn to communicate effectively, exploittheir negotiation skills, working collaboratively inteams, compliance with legislation, and harnesscreative through processes to eradicate businessproblems. Students can also learn new businessstart-ups troubles like writing business plans,obtaining business loan as a startup capital.Through this “entrepreneurial experience” thestudents developed entrepreneurial competencies.

Entrepreneurship should provide students withthe chance to grasp transferable skills that canbe harnessed in any firm context, and thereshould transcend a narrow focus on businessstartup [CIHE/NCGE/NESTA, 2008]. Definiteefforts are also being focused at encouraginginnovative activities and in refining innovativecapabilities. It should be considered the crucialfactors that play a key role within EE, suchas the contents of courses, pedagogical methods,teaching models and learning experience. Thepedagogy should encapsulate relevant techniqueslike running a real business, visiting businesslocation and interviewing entrepreneurs. Theseteaching techniques might be considered as themost vital in enhancing their entrepreneurialawareness and mind-set.

Game based learning

Innovative pedagogical approaches such asgame-based learning (Gamification), which providean immersive environment, are especially wellsuited for entrepreneurship education [Ahn, 2008].Game-based learning is an evolving pedagogy thatcarries together the emerging nature of younglearners and experiential learning. Williams (2015)suggests that the business simulation endorsedstudents to confront their limitations, overcomesome of them and make significant progress in theirlearning. Using SimVenture improved students’ ap-preciation of business in general and the challengesentrepreneurs have to face in running a business.Business simulation game, SimVenture, developsnot only students’ business and management skillsbut also their entrepreneurial attitude and values.Game-based learning combines the benefits oftraditional teaching and learning (that is, lecturesand tutorials).

Business simulation games

Business simulation games are currently beingused to teach a broad range of business andmanagement disciplines. Business games generatea dynamic environment that presents a series ofdecision-making activities. Every cycle creates anew situation with a new problem to solve ordecision to make. Simulations not only constructa nearly ‘real world’ experience but also help tobring theory and practice together by develop-ing the ability to use acquired knowledge andskills [Williams, 2015].

Design thinking Approach

Design thinking process was proposed by theStanford School and the HPI School of DesignThinking. It involves six interdependent phases:understand, observe, define, ideate, prototypeand test. Daniel & Ellis-Chadwick (2016) furtherrevealed that the DT process has now becomea trend in management and new product de-velopment fields, but its use in the context ofentrepreneurship education is rather new. The‘understand’ phase refers to a team effort to gatherand use information in order to understand acertain problem domain and so to become moreknowledgeable about the nature of the problem inquestion [Lugmayr et al., 2014]. In the ‘observe’phase, team members interact with potential userswith the aim of engaging with their conceptionof reality and examining their problems, habits,attitudes and needs. Based on the results of theprevious phases, the team is now in a positionto define the problem or aspect of the problemthey wish to concentrate on. In the ‘ideation’phase, the team starts to develop solutions, ideasand proposals, using various techniques to enhancecreativity. Some of these ideas and proposals canthen be taken to the ‘prototype’ phase, in whichmock-ups are produced. These are then tried outin practice in the ‘test’ phase to evaluate possiblesolutions [Lugmayr et al., 2014].

FLIGBY

FLIGBY is a serious game that was originallydeveloped with the objective of simulating thebusiness management process and the applicationof Flow Theory in a business context [Almeida &Buzay, 2019]. FLIGBY appeared in the market asa serious game integrating three dimensions: (i)learning the Flow in business; (ii) using simulationas a practical teaching tool; and (iii) including



motivating elements as games. The objective wasto provide a serious game that can be used ineducation and training of business, management,and entrepreneurial skills and attitudes.

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