The climate for entrepreneurship at higher education institutions

Abstract

While the importance of a supportive context for entrepreneurship is widely acknowledged, its antecedents are rarely investigated. We apply the concept of organizational climate to higher education institutions and examine the drivers of students' perceptions of the entrepreneurial climate in their university. Combining data from two unique datasets and using multilevel techniques, we analyze the relationship between university characteristics and such climate perceptions of 8009 students at public universities in Germany. We find university entrepreneurship measures to have a positive effect on students' climate perceptions, which also depend on students' background and gender. In addition, we find evidence for different peer effects, depending on students' affinity for entrepreneurship. For the general student population, including entrepreneurship content in their normal studies seems to be required to initiate a social process of sensemaking. However, students' perception of the entrepreneurial climate only depend to a certain degree on intentional entrepreneurship measures. In our study, general university characteristics have the strongest influence on climate perceptions. Overall, our study adds to our understanding of which parameters are important for establishing a more favorable and inspiring climate for becoming an entrepreneur at higher education institutions.

Gender differences in perception of the university education quality as applied to entrepreneurial intention

“…Although the decision to start a business is determined by other factors, university education plays an important role in this process. This is consistent with the findings of Zollo et al, (2017) and Shirokova et al, (2016), which show that the university environment has a significant impact on students in their business attitude and intentions (Bergmann et al, 2018(Bergmann et al, , 2016Hahn et al, 2017;Trivedi, 2016). In addition, Walter et al (2013) point out that during the course of higher education, the four factors of the organization of study that play a key role in the future business of students are: entrepreneurial education, support programs for entrepreneurship, interconnection with industry, and research orientation.…”

The role of national settings in the economic resilience of regions—Evidence from recessionary shocks in Europe from 1990 to 2014

“…8 It could be argued that fiscal deficit is more of an adaptive determinant than an inherent factor, but in our analysis, we determine the impact of fiscal deficit on growth as a function of public debt level, which can be regarded as an initial condition in each year. 9 This approach is employed in many studies to confront the problem of (spatially) nested data, for example, in: analyses of house price variations in districts (Baltagi et al, 2014;Fingleton et al, 2018); examination of the drivers of student's entrepreneurial climate perceptions (Bergmann et al, 2018); economic evaluation of regional health effects (Eibich & Ziebarth, 2014); estimation of spatial demand patterns (Case, 1991); educational studies where pupils are nested within schools or classrooms (Montmarquette & Mahseredjian, 1989). 10 For example, the correlation coefficient between share of industry measured by data in 2004 (2009) and 2005 (2010) is .9942 (.9850).…”

“… This approach is employed in many studies to confront the problem of (spatially) nested data, for example, in: analyses of house price variations in districts (Baltagi et al, ; Fingleton et al, ); examination of the drivers of student's entrepreneurial climate perceptions (Bergmann et al, ); economic evaluation of regional health effects (Eibich & Ziebarth, ); estimation of spatial demand patterns (Case, ); educational studies where pupils are nested within schools or classrooms (Montmarquette & Mahseredjian, ). …”

Testing McClelland at the Academy: An Analysis of Entrepreneurial Behavioral Characteristics

“…For students to perceive the university as an incentive for entrepreneurial activities, it is necessary that their peers also take these courses. The more a student participates in such a course, the more they realize that learning about entrepreneurship is important and that becoming an entrepreneur is a desired behavioral role, contributing to a positive climate [14].…”