An entrepreneur is seen as a person who set up a business / an organization, and he/she is taking on the financial risks in order to gain some profit for himself / herself or /and for the community as a whole. The definition hides behind a lot of other characteristics an entrepreneur should have, in terms of attitudes, knowledge, and skills. An entrepreneur is seen first as a risk-taker, and as an innovator, a person able to spot the needs / the opportunities in the community, and respond to these in a profitable and sustainable way.
How people become entrepreneurs? Some are natural risk-taker and innovators, other learn to be entrepreneurs, developing specific attitudes, knowledge and skills. Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency, from European Commission, prepared a specific framework for entrepreneurship education, in Entrepreneurship Education at School in Europe. National Strategies, Curricula and Learning Outcomes (2012, available at: http://eacea.ec.europa.eu/education/eurydice/documents/thematic_reports/135en.pdf, p. 19).
This framework includes the main attitudes, knowledge and skills needed to become an entrepreneur. Thus, an entrepreneur needs:
- Entrepreneurial attitudes: self-awareness and self-confidence
These are seen as the basis attitudes for all the other attitudes, knowledge, and skills needed by a would-be entrepreneur.
- Other entrepreneurial attitudes needed to be developed are: taking the initiative, risk taking, creativity and problem solving.
- Entrepreneurial knowledge: economic and financial literacy, knowledge of business organisation and process, and knowledge of career opportunities and world of work.
- Entrepreneurial skills: practical exploration of entrepreneurial opportunities (ex.: designing and implementing a business plan), and communication, presentation, planning and working in team skills.
The current toolkit, and also the other online resources created within the YourKITE project provide scenarios that are focused on developing most of these essential attitudes, knowledge and skills, such as self-awareness / critical thinking, creativity, problem solving, basic economic and financial knowledge, entrepreneurship as a career path, knowledge on aspects related to running a business (business model, decision making, negotiations, production, leadership style, etc.), and communication, presentation, planning and working in team skills.
The following section will provide you the basic information on the attitudes, knowledge and skills developed through the entrepreneurship scenarios available in the toolkit. While the information is mandatory to be read when preparing the workshops on entrepreneurship, it also can be used as basic knowledge for you to learn about entrepreneurship. Let’s start!