Covenant Journal of Entrepreneurship

How Entrepreneurial Thinking can contribute to Curb Youth Restiveness in the Niger Delta Region of Nigeria

Sunday Adiele Okoroafor — 2024-03-15

The objective of the paper is to discuss how entrepreneurial thinking can contribute to curb youth restiveness in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. Methodologically, the sources of data collection for the paper are secondary mainly based on qualitative content and documentary analysis with few quantitative contents. The research design is descriptive. The finding of the paper on the first part shows that the skill requirements for an entrepreneur include people-factor skill, creative skill, politeness skill, appreciation skill, and screw it, just do it skill. The paper on the second part finds out that the Niger Delta youths are passionate about their future and life, and have the desire to work, take risk, and dream big in order to improve their entrepreneurial thinking skills. One of the recommendations of the paper is that the Niger Delta youths should beyond the desire to be empowered academically and entrepreneurially, begin to engage their mind critically; thinking how best to make best use of the empowerments they have received so far. The paper concludes that every entrepreneur is businessman but not all businessmen are entrepreneurs, and it takes bringing a new idea into an already existing business to have entrepreneurship.

LIFE COACHING AND EMPLOYEE PRODUCTIVITY IN THE CREATIVE INDUSTRY IN LAGOS STATE, NIGERIA

Modupe Olayinka AJAYI — 2024-03-15

Life coaching is a key managerial behavior that organizations must promote to develop employees and achieve higher levels of productivity. Hence, the need to assess the effect of life coaching on employee productivity in creative industry in Lagos State, Nigeria. Purposive sampling was employed to select three companies in Lagos State for their production value which include Hi-Impact Television, Azusa Productions and GDH Designers Hub. The entire staff of the three companies were selected, in all 179 respondents were sampled. Descriptive, chi-squared and Z- test were employed for analyses. The result shows that 94.6% of the respondents were still in their productive years and that they still had more years to spend in their work places. Majority of the respondents (63.1%) are male and 76.6% of the employees were first degree holders. Before the life coaching intervention, 85.6% of the respondents were aware of a life coaching, 66.7% of the respondents set goals at work while after the coaching intervention, 94.6% set goals at work. The result shows that only coach competence has no significant effect on employee productivity while Coachee efficacy, coaching condition and other factors have significant effect on employee productivity. The result revealed that there is significant difference in the productivity of the experimental and control group in the study area. The study therefore recommends that Managers, Executives and Human Resource Personnel should focus more on providing life coaching programs to supplement training and development practices in their organizations to enhance productivity.

Social Capital Influence on the Financial Health of Micro and Small Businesses Operated by Graduate Students in South-Western Nigeria

Emmanuel Olorunleke ESEYIN — 2024-03-15

The study investigated social capital influence on the financial health of micro and small businesses operated by graduate students in South-Western Nigeria. Four research questions and two hypotheses were answered and tested in the study. Mixed method approach was adopted in the study. Population of the study was all students and entrepreneurship lecturers in Universities in South-Western, Nigeria out of which 309 respondents (300 graduate students and nine lecturers) were sampled for the study using multistage sampling technique. Questionnaire and Interview were used for gathering data. The data gathered were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics namely; frequency, percentage, mean, binary logistic regression, chi-square and t-test at 0.05 level of significance. The result of the study revealed that the dimensions of social capital had positive effect on the financial health of the businesses operated by the students and the relationships were significant. It was revealed that the manufacturing and agriculture sector where underexplored by the students while the service sector had the higher proportion of entrepreneurs. The reforming of the curriculum was recommended to capture more of social capital development by the students.

Personality Traits and Social Support as Predictors of Entrepreneurial Preference among Students in a Higher Institution in Ibadan, Oyo State

G. Esohe EHONDOR — 2024-03-15

Graduates unemployment has remained a sticking issue among the Nigerian youths as many universities turned out thousands of graduates every year. Studies have examined several predictors of entrepreneurial preferences with varying results. Therefore, this study investigated personality traits and social support as predictors of entrepreneurial preference among students of a tertiary institution in Ibadan. The study adopted cross-sectional survey design while purposive sampling technique was used to select the Federal College of Agriculture, Moor Plantation, Ibadan. Data were collected from 206 participants using validated questionnaires. Data were analysed using t-test for independent samples and multiple regression analysis while the tested were accepted at a p < 0.05 level of significance. The result indicated that personality traits of extraversion, neuroticism, conscientiousness, agreeableness, openness to experience and social support jointly predicted entrepreneurial preference among study participants (R2 = 0.32, F (6,198) = 15.58, p < 0.05). Also, the results revealed that extraversion (β = 0.43, t =5.91, p < 0.05) and agreeableness (β = 0.17, t = 2.33, p < 0.05) independently predicted entrepreneurial preference among study participants. Finally, the result showed that social support significantly influenced entrepreneurial preferences (t (203) = 6.25, p < 0.05) among study participants. The study concluded that personality traits and social support are strong predictors of entrepreneurial preference among study participants. It is recommended that the government and various shareholders should profile students while in school and provide social support to encourage them to go into self-employment after graduation.

Path Modelling of Interest in Entrepreneurship Programme, Intention to Start New Business and Employability skills among University Students

S. Olufemi AKINTELU — 2024-03-15

The problem that was addressed in this study was how the NUC entrepreneurship curriculum impacted student knowledge to become successful entrepreneurs after graduation to enhance economic growth in Nigeria. Cross-sectional research design was used for this study, and undergraduate students were the unit of analysis. Students that had participated in entrepreneurship programme organized by the university constituted the target population. This study was designed to assess whether entrepreneurship education enhances graduate employability. In other to test the hypotheses raised, the study used a sample of 145 undergraduates students drawn from fourteen (14) departments in three faculties of Samuel Adegboyega University, Nigeria. Data obtained was analyzed using path modelling to test the hypothesized model. Findings from the structural model assessment indicate that Students interest in entrepreneurship positively and directly affects their intention to start new business. Thus, a positive and significant relationship between interest in entrepreneurship programme and intention to start a new business among the sampled students. This implies that every time a student show interest in entrepreneurship training, it increases the students’ intention of starting a new business by 29%. Furthermore, the structural assessment further revealed that showing interest in entrepreneurship programme by the students enhances their employability skills. Consequently, the two hypotheses tested in this study were accepted.

Adult Education and Entrepreneurial Sustainable Development in Nigeria: A study of Akwa Ibom State Agency for Adult and Non-Formal Education (2007-2023)

Michael Eugene Ekpo — 2024-03-15

Education is the key to human and national development in modern globalized and highly technological world of the 21st Century. Through education, information, communication, technology, innovation, entrepreneurial skills are developed and transferred across the globe for sustainable development. Adult education is one aspect of education introduced in Nigeria to tackle the problem of high rate of illiteracy particularly amongst the adults who could not afford formal education. Adult education is targeted at ensuring education for all by 2030. It involves basic literacy, post-literacy and vocational training programmes, which add values to entrepreneurship in Nigeria. The study identified as its objective gaps in adult education programmes and its impact on entrepreneurial sustainable development in Akwa Ibom State, and provided remedial to the gaps. Descriptive and Survey methods were employed to administered 10 items questionnaire on the respondents from 9 selected centres, 3 from each senatorial district out of 888 adult education Centre’s with sample size of 126 using stratified sampling technique. Simple percentage and tabular presentation were adopted for data presentation and analysis while secondary data analyzed contextually. The study among others revealed that Adult education have significant and direct impact on entrepreneurial sustainable development in Akwa Ibom State by building individual skills/knowledge for SMEs and self-empowerment, job creation/employment opportunities, and outlined its challenges/weaknesses to include: inadequate funding of the programmes, policy inconsistency at the implementation stage, lack of teachers’ qualification, low learners enrollment, lack of learning materials and infrastructures etc. It concluded there is need to strengthen Adult and non-formal education for effective entrepreneurial sustainable development in Akwa Ibom State and by extension Nigeria. It recommended proper funding of Adult education, training of teachers and facilitators, proper monitoring and evaluation of the programmes to prevent corruption, empowerment/employment opportunities should be offered to Adult learners by various level of governments.