Examining entrepreneurial competencies and their relationship to self-employment intentions among engineering students A case study from India

The growth of technological institutions in India has been exponential and supply has exceeded demand in the job market. Against this background, it is a social responsibility of universities to provide alternative career options for engineering graduates. To encourage entrepreneurship careers among engineering graduates, the Visvesvarayya Technological University (VTU) in India introduced a compulsory course on 'Management and Entrepreneurship' for all engineering students in their pre-final year. This paper reports on a study undertaken to identify the entrepreneurial competencies and self-employment intentions of these pre-final year students so that appropriate training could be provided in their final year. An Entrepreneurial Competencies Index (ECI) and a Self-Employment Intentions Index (SEI) were developed and, by mapping the ECI with the SEI, prospective entrepreneurs were identified as those who scored high in both competencies and intention. Using correlation coefficients and chi-square tests of relationships, it is shown that demographics have little influence on entrepreneurial competencies. The results of the study enable entrepreneurship educators to identify specific training needs and thus to design a competency-based curriculum for entrepreneurship education.