Entrepreneurial Mindset of Students attending the International Service Design Week in Belgium in Fall 2019

Abstract

The development of the entrepreneurial mindset of students is a topic that is relevant from a practical perspective and actively discussed in research. The aim of this paper is to explore how students evaluate their entrepreneurial skills, which might be helpful to better understand the possibilities to promote the development of an entrepreneurial mindset amongst students. Drawing up on a self-assessment form developed by the Women’s Initiative for Self-Employment, we therefore conducted an empirical study among 39 students from 6 different countries. Our findings indicate that 92% of the surveyed students have at least satisfactory ability to become an entrepreneur, however, results differ between the nationalities. Moreover, we find self-confidence and willingness to take responsibility for his/her own successes and failures to be most strongly correlated with the ability to become an entrepreneur. We discuss implications for research and practice.