Entrepreneurship

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Factors influencing the development of productive entrepreneurial behaviour among university students.
(2013) Memani, Mzwanele Mbonisi.; Fields, Ziska.
South Africa experiences high levels of unemployment and poverty with an official unemployment rate at around 25%. In order to solve this malaise, entrepreneurship has played a very important role to job creation, poverty reduction and creation of sustainable communities. Literature review indicates that most developed and developing countries have embarked on strategies that develop new businesses which are innovative and present growth prospects. The emphasis is on innovative activities that benefit the entire society and these fall under productive entrepreneurship. The other types of entrepreneurship are unproductive and destructive; and these refer to activities such as crime and rent-seeking as they only benefit the entrepreneur but harm the society. Literature review suggests that the tertiary institutions play an important role in stimulating innovation and growth of new ventures. The university students are perceived to be more instrumental in starting these innovative ventures than their unskilled or less educated individuals. Other than the exposure they get at their tertiary institutions, university students can also be exposed to productive entrepreneurship from their family and community environments. Against this background, the objective of this research was to investigate the factors that influence the development of productive entrepreneurial behaviour among university students. The respondents were identified by means of convenience sampling and in total 350 questionnaires were completed by the students at the University of KwaZulu-Natal’s Pietermaritzburg, Howard and Westville campuses. Given that the purpose of the study was not to generalise about the student population, only descriptive statistical analyses was used. The results of this research show that students consider entrepreneurship to be very important to the stimulation of economic growth leading to job creation and poverty reduction. Students had positive attitudes towards entrepreneurship as they perceived that it was more beneficial to start an own business and determine own salary rather than become an employee with job security. However, students were not likely to start a business immediately after graduation, given limited understanding and knowledge of running a business. More students admitted that their parents did not own a business and had never worked in a small business. Despite this lack of exposure within their family and community backgrounds, a significant number of respondents were exposed to entrepreneurship by the education system. The respondents highlighted that the tertiary institutions, in particular, had a major role to play in cultivating the entrepreneurial spirit among university students. Given that parties such as government, universities and the private sector tend to work independent of each other, and thereby lessening their impact; the results suggest that these parties need to work together to design initiatives that would have a greater impact for potential graduate entrepreneurs.
Factors influencing the successful adoption of technopreneurship in the food processing sector in Zimbabwe.
(2015) Kakava, Nicholas Zivengwa.; Fields, Ziska.
Technopreneurship has been found to be one of the modern approaches to lead economic development in such success stories like the Asian upcoming economies. From such a background, the study endeavoured to determine the factors which influence technopreneurship in such a developing nation as Zimbabwe. From theory and practice, technopreneurship is found to be the key to knowledge-based economies that can assist most developing countries that may struggle to industrialise. Zimbabwe as an economy is well positioned to produce food products for the domestic and other regional and international economies. The objectives of the study were: to examine factors that influence the adoption of technopreneurship in the food processing sector in Zimbabwe; to assess the importance given to technopreneurship by the food processing sector in Zimbabwe; to examine the feasibility of technopreneurship, and to test the relationship between factors that influence technopreneurship in the food processing sector in Zimbabwe. Current literature on technopreneurship addresses issues in developed countries and success stories of other upcoming economies like India and China. The study contributed to the context of technopreneurship in developing countries and especially in sub-Saharan Africa. The issues of a lack of development in such nations like Zimbabwe which may have natural endowments and what could be seen as good economic policies were addressed. A model of a technopreneurship system was proposed to contextualise the Zimbabwean technopreneurship situation and this could apply to most regional and global situations. The research onion was adopted to guide the research methodology and methods. The positivist research philosophy and a quantitative research approach were adopted to gather data through a questionnaire from the major industrial food processing technopreneurs in Harare. Nine companies were contacted to get a final sample of 147 respondents who included management, administrative and technical staff. SPSS was used for data management and quantitative data analysis techniques which included descriptive and inferential statistics adopted. Findings suggest that technopreneurship plays an important developmental role in the food processing sector and while several factors influenced technopreneurship such as internal processes; human factors; global factors; venture capital; partnerships, and government support was found to be the most important factor influencing all other factors. The major and determining factor influencing technopreneurship in the industrial food processing factor in Zimbabwe was Government support. A contribution to new knowledge and respective stakeholders in technopreneurship was made.
A framework to improve access to external finance by Small and Medium Enterprise start-ups.
(2018) Bamata, Nkombe Herman.; Fields, Ziska.; Govender, Krishna Kistan.
Despite the efforts of the South African government to develop the Small Medium Enterprise (SME) sector, start-up businesses not only face restricted access to but also challenges in accessing external finance, which acts as the main barrier to their growth and development. In light of the aforementioned, this study aims to propose a framework to improve access to external financing by SME start-ups. The formulation of the framework is based on a review and critique of the literature on the key determinants of the success of SME start-ups, namely, start-up awareness, management skills, and the requirements of finance providers. SME start-ups may be considered as a special case of resource-based theory due to limited resources of the firm. Start-up awareness and management skills are considered as necessary resources that will help the SME to acquire and develop other resources that will lead to a competitive advantage and superior performance. This study has adopted a quantitative approach to collect and analyse data since this is the only way to test the various hypotheses postulated based on the resource-based theory. A sample of 252 SME start-ups was randomly selected from among SMEs located in Pietermaritzburg, the capital city of KwaZulu-Natal province in South Africa. Researchers may extent and roll out the research at the national level or other regions of the world. The data was used to conduct descriptive and inferential statistical analyses and structural equation modelling, using the Smart PLS statistical software. Seven hypothesised relationships were tested, and it was found that start-up awareness and management skills positively influence access by SME start-ups to government, corporate and personal/social sources of finance. This study provides the necessary tools to start-up entrepreneurs to improve their access to external finance in South Africa. This study specifically highlights the different determinants of start-up awareness and management skills, and explains how the SME start-ups’ applicability of these determinants would influence their external financing accessibility. Also, this study highlights how finance providers could be able to develop matured relationships with SME start-ups, assess their finance applications based on the determinants of start-up awareness and management skills. The proposed framework maps the start-up entrepreneur’s business awareness and the requisite management skills with the finance providers’ requirements for granting finance and provides the entrepreneur with a clear idea of the type of finance to apply for and the optimal financing options for their businesses.
Government policies and strategies in dealing with challenges confronting small and medium enterprises : a case of Harare, Zimbabwe.
(2015) Bomani, Mapeto.; Fields, Ziska.
This study focuses on the success the Zimbabwe government policies and strategies in addressing the challenges faced by small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Harare, Zimbabwe. The study was conducted with a view to developing a policy and strategy framework for promoting the development of SMEs in Harare, Zimbabwe. Harare, the capital city of Zimbabwe, was used as a study site. Pragmatism constituted the research philosophy for the study. The study adopted a case study design in which SMEs in Harare were studied. The mixed-methods approach was employed, along with concurrent triangulation. SMEs, officials from the Ministry of Small and Medium Enterprises and Co-operative Development (MSMECD), officials from the Small and Medium Enterprise Development Corporation (SMEDCO) and academics from three state universities in Harare constituted the population under study. The study employed purposive and stratified sampling techniques. Stratified random sampling was employed, in which the SMEs were divided into three strata: primary, secondary and tertiary. Purposive sampling was used to select the officials from the MSMECD and SMEDCO, as well as the key informants from three state universities in Harare. The study used a sample of six business advisors from SMEDCO and another six from the MSMECD. A sample of 382 SMEs was selected for the collection of empirical data using questionnaires. Of the 382 distributed questionnaires, 344 were returned, representing a response rate of 90 %. Primary data was gathered using questionnaires and in-depth interviews. Questionnaires were administered to the SMEs, while in-depth interviews were conducted with the officials from SMEDCO and the MSMECD, as well as key informants from the three state universities. Documents were employed as secondary sources of data for the study. The quantitative data collected through the questionnaires was analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The data was presented using figures, tables, graphs, pie charts, and percentages. The IBM Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 21 was used to analyse the quantitative data. SPSS was also used to calculate the Cronbach’s alpha. The alpha coefficient ranged from 0.729 to 0.878, indicating that the questionnaire was a reliable data collection instrument. Content analysis was employed in the analysis of the qualitative data gathered from the in-depth interviews. The intention was to achieve an adequate and detailed analysis of the data in order to obtain sufficient information relating to the challenges faced by SMEs in Harare, the vii government policies and strategies employed to address these challenges, and the success of the policies and strategies. The findings of the study showed that SMEs in Harare are confronted with challenges which include limited access to funding, limited access to markets, a lack of technical and management skills, antiquated machinery and equipment, increasing competition in the market, infrastructural challenges, and restrictive government laws and regulations. It was empirically confirmed that the government responded by creating partnerships with the private sector, non-governmental organisations, and other countries in the provision of funding, training and technology transfer. The study also revealed that the government promoted SME access to markets through participation in local and international trade fairs, business expos, and exhibitions, as well as facilitating SME involvement in public procurement. The government also imposed import duties to protect domestic businesses from foreign competition. Higher education institutions, which constitute part of the government’s overall strategy of promoting SME growth, have been instrumental in addressing SME challenges. However, despite its various policies and strategies, the government of Zimbabwe, on the whole, has not been successful in addressing the key challenges confronting the SME sector in Harare. This study builds on and broadens the current knowledge on the success of government policies and strategies in addressing SME challenges in Harare, Zimbabwe. Furthermore, the study proposes a policy and strategy framework for promoting the development of SMEs in Harare, Zimbabwe.

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Browsing Entrepreneurship by Author "Fields, Ziska."