Does National Gender Equality Matter? Gender Difference in the Relationship between Entrepreneurial Human Capital and Entrepreneurial Intention

Gender equality contributes to economic growth and social progress by promoting women’s social and economic participation. The national gender equality level can affect women’s education and opportunities for economic participation. In this work, we examine whether entrepreneurial human capital (entrepreneurial education and experience) affects entrepreneurial intention and whether these relationships depend on gender and a country’s gender equality level. We used Global Entrepreneurship Trend Report (GETR) data provided by the Korean Entrepreneurship Foundation. The global survey was conducted by the Korean National Statistical Office in 2016. The data were collected from 20 countries, including Korea, and contain at least 2000 individual responses from each country. We used HLM analysis with the HLM 6.0 program to examine the hypotheses. Our results show that entrepreneurship education increases entrepreneurial intention, and that the relationship is stronger among women than men. We also found that for women, the positive relationship between entrepreneurial education and entrepreneurial intention is stronger in countries with lower gender equality. As for prior entrepreneurial experience, neither gender nor national gender equality level moderated the relationship between experience and entrepreneurial intention. This study contributes to the extension of entrepreneurship theory, especially in the area of women entrepreneurship. We confirm that entrepreneurial human capital contributes to entrepreneurial intention, and that gender and national gender equality level comprise an important social context that influences the effects of education and experience on the entrepreneurial intention of women.

Entrepreneurial Human Capital and Firm Dynamics

This paper shows that entrepreneurial human capital is a key driver of firm dynamics using administrative panel data on the universe of firms and workers in Portugal. Firms started by more educated entrepreneurs are larger at entry and exhibit higher life cycle growth. Consistent with an effect on growth, the thickness of the right tail of the size distribution increases with entrepreneur schooling. The evidence points to several underlying mechanisms, with technology adoption playing the most important part. I develop and estimate a model of firm dynamics that can parsimoniously account for these findings, and use it to draw aggregate implications. Accounting for the effect of entrepreneurial human capital on firm dynamics can substantially increase aggregate returns to schooling and the fraction of cross-country income differences explained by human and physical capital.

How the validation of prior learning can be used to assess entrepreneurial human capital investments and outcomes

Purpose This paper aims to depart from the premise that human capital investments and human capital outcomes are often tacit – an aspect, which is often neglected in the current literature on entrepreneurial human capital. The idea of this conceptual paper is to shed light on the social process of how human capital investments and human capital outcomes can be valued and made visible through the validation of prior learning. Thus, this study conceptualises the validation of prior learning as a post hoc, the reflective process through which an aspiring entrepreneur is guided. Design/methodology/approach This paper is conceptual and introduces a process model. Findings Findings indicate that the process of the validation of prior learning is well-suitable to inform aspiring entrepreneurs of their investments into human capital and their human capital outcomes. The process results in a (partial) certified qualification that provides entrepreneurial legitimacy. Research limitations/implications Thus far, the model is conceptual and should be validated via interviews and further empirical studies in the field. Practical implications Literature in the field of entrepreneurial human capital suggests that human capital outcomes are more important for success than inputs. Furthermore, context-specific knowledge, skills and abilities are more important than generalised outcomes. These findings have implications for the design of validation procedures. Originality/value Human capital has only been recently conceptualised as consisting of human capital investments and outcomes of human capital investment. However, thus far the literature falls short in acknowledging the tacit nature of human capital investments and human capital outcomes. This paper contributes a structured process of how human capital investments and human capital outcomes are linked and assessed. In so doing, this study extends a recent model of human capital investments and outputs (Marvel et al., 2016, p. 616).

The growth of entrepreneurial human capital: origins and development of skill variety

Given that recent research on entrepreneurial behavior and success has established skill variety as a central human capital factor, researchers, educators, and policymakers have turned their interest to a deeper understanding of the formation of skill variety. Based on human capital theory and the competence growth approach in developmental psychology (highlighting long-term, age-appropriate, and cumulative skill-growth processes), we hypothesize that a broad, early variety orientation in adolescence is a developmental precursor of such entrepreneurial human capital in adulthood. This was confirmed in an analysis of prospective longitudinal data via structural equation modeling and serial mediation tests. We also find that an entrepreneurial constellation of personality traits, but not entrepreneurial parents, predicts early variety orientation, skill variety, and entrepreneurial intentions. By shedding new light on the long-term formation of entrepreneurial human capital, the results suggest that establishing and benefiting from an early variety orientation is not only an important developmental mechanism in entrepreneurial careers but gives those with an entrepreneurial personality an early head start in their vocational entrepreneurial development. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.

Entrepreneurial Profiles at the University: A Competence Approach

The Entrepreneurial University plays a central role in entrepreneurial ecosystems and actively influences the development of entrepreneurial human capital, which is a critical asset for many economies. There is thus a requirement for the identification and strengthening of entrepreneurial competences, but no previous studies have included any analysis of these competences in the university context using an approach based on profiles. The present study fills this gap by investigating the existence of different entrepreneurial profiles among students, based on their competences. It also defines key competences that are critical for differentiating between these profiles and improving entrepreneurial competence levels more generally. To meet these objectives, a field research campaign was developed. Data on 1104 students from various degrees and faculties were collected and analyzed using a quantitative methodological approach. The results reveal the existence of four entrepreneurial competence profiles, namely low profile, top profile, social profile, and grit profile. Among as many as 12 possible entrepreneurial competences, the most prominent can explain to a large extent the entrepreneurial profiles of students; these are networking and professional social skills, community engagement, perseverance of effort, and consistency of interest. The results provide evidence of the importance of social capital and grit. In addition to their contribution to the theory in this area and the development of the Entrepreneurial University paradigm, the results are also useful for the design of training strategies aimed at strengthening the levels of competence of students, thereby providing universities with tools to foster the creation of entrepreneurial human capital.

The role of human capital outcomes in generating business ideas

Purpose Despite the existence of a vast body of research on entrepreneurship, little is known about why some entrepreneurs are able to generate and realize more business ideas than others. This study aims to present a prospective answer to this question by empirically examining the relationships among human capital outcomes (entrepreneurial knowledge and skills) and the number of business ideas generated and implemented. Additionally, the authors examined the moderating effect of the entrepreneurial self-efficacy on the proposed relationships. Design/methodology/approach A statistical analysis on a sample of 340 Russian entrepreneurs was conducted. Findings The results from the analysis indicated that human capital outcomes (entrepreneurial knowledge and skills) are positively related to the number of generated and implemented ideas. Furthermore, it was seen that entrepreneurial self-efficacy significantly moderates the relationship between human capital outcomes and the number of implemented ideas. However, self-efficacy has no significant moderating effect on the relationships among human capital outcomes and the number of generated ideas. Finally, the results showed that the number of ideas generated mediates the relationships among human capital outcomes and the number of ideas implemented. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, no previous study has investigated the combination of such variables as entrepreneurial human capital outcomes, entrepreneurial self-efficacy and the number of new business ideas. This paper investigates this gap in the literature with an empirical analysis of the relations between the mentioned variables based on data collected from Russian entrepreneurs.

Health as Human Capital in Entrepreneurship: Individual, Extension, and Substitution Effects on Entrepreneurial Success

This study investigates how entrepreneurial health and spousal health influence monetary and non-monetary entrepreneurial success. Drawing on human capital theory in combination with a family embeddedness perspective on entrepreneurship and applying actor–partner interdependence models to longitudinal data, we conclude that overall spousal health constitutes an important extension of entrepreneurs’ human capital influencing entrepreneurial success. This study further contributes to human capital research by offering interesting insights and novel theorizing on substitution effects for different types of entrepreneurial human capital, and adds to a biological perspective on entrepreneurship by considering the differential role of biological sex in the health–success relationship.