Journal of Enterprising Culture

Does an individual's positive attitude towards entrepreneurship education promote the growth of new ventures? It appears that it does. The empirical results presented in this paper support a prima facie claim that a relationship exists between attitude towards entrepreneurial education and business start-up. The aim of this paper is to investigate the hypothesised positive relationship between new venture founding and attitude towards entrepreneurial education (AEE). Limited if any research on new venture founding in the past has explored the contribution of AEE in business start-ups. A survey is carried out on a large sample (more than 15,000) of tertiary students residing in Singapore. In analysing the dataset, we have controlled for various factors in the regression analysis. Due to the limitations of our study, we are cautious not to assert any causal link between these 2 variables. The implications of the results to policy makers and educators are discussed along with suggestions for future research in order to refine our present understanding of these relationships.

At present, the rate of small firm adoption of the Internet's ubiquitous World Wide Web (the web) far exceeds the actual exploitation its commercial potential. An inability to strategically acquire, comprehend and use external knowledge is proposed as a major barrier to optimal exploitation of the Internet. This paper discusses the limitations of applying market orientation theory to explain and guide small firm exploitation of the web. Absorptive capacity is introduced as an alternative theory that when viewed from an evolutionary perspective provides potentially more insightful discussion. An inability to detect emerging business model dominant designs is suggested to be a mixture of the nature of the technology that supports the Internet and underdeveloped small firm knowledge processing capabilities. We conclude with consideration of the practical and theoretical implications that arise from the paper.

A family business can be defined as a business where a family exercises a significant influence over ownership and/or management. The objectives and the values of the family business and the business family can be complementary but they can also be conflicting. The entrepreneur has to take account of the wishes and objectives of his extended family and of his small family or household.

An empirical research – made possible by the support of Cera Foundation - has been conducted with 1032 Belgian entrepreneurs, 501 in agriculture and 531 outside agriculture. Areas of conflict can be related to the allocation of profits and the position of individual family members in the family business. The survey shows that most entrepreneurs work very hard and spend a lot of time in the business. Only a minority of the respondents consider family values 'important', but when they do, the family gets a very high place in the hierarchy of values. Satisfaction on the job and autonomy (being one's own boss) are the most important values.

Most entrepreneurs get considerable support from their husband or wife. They want to have a day of rest each week and want to leave business when their age is between 60 and 70. If a succession is possible, most prefer to have one of their children to succeed them. The succession is a process that has to be planned carefully.

The interaction between the business family and the family business can have positive and negative effects, but in a market economy the competitiveness of the business must be preserved in all circumstances.