Entrepreneurial Human Capital: A Model for Analyzing and Validating the Key Competences for Entrepreneurship.

The paper aims to present a project designed for developing models, instruments and processes to analyze key competences involved in entrepreneurship. The objectives of the research are: To find the entrepreneurial competences that the entrepreneurs/non-entrepreneurs perceive to possess; To measure entrepreneurial aptitude; To outline a scale that describe the entrepreneurial competences; To have better knowledge of the enterprise creation process; To identify links between these variables and entrepreneurial success; To confirm variables involved in the model of entrepreneurial competences. The contribution to the literature Entrepreneurial human capital has been linked to nation-building processes and entrepreneurial competences are significant of scholarly research. This framework has been used to understand how to synthesize a model for analyzing and evaluating entrepreneurial human capital while being consistent with goals of European strategies that are oriented towards supporting a range of tools and instruments addressing the needs of individual citizens, through the implementation of an integrated credit transfer and accumulation system for lifelong learning (the European Qualification Framework – EQF). The methodology The quantitative research was conducted with a questionnaire that investigate links between the variables components of entrepreneurial competences. The questionnaire collects: personal and company data; entrepreneurial network; image of future job situation; image of male and female entrepreneurs; bureaucracy and investments in creating enterprise and Evaluation Competences Scale-EC-Scale (composed by 54 items on Educational level, Work Experience, Knowledge about Start-up Process, Knowledge during Start-up, Motivations, Entrepreneurial Skill and Entrepreneurial Aptitude Test-TAI®). The results and implications The results highlight that entrepreneurial human capital is composed of different elements which, when adequately measured and compared, can lead to the creation of a model. The entrepreneurs present an EC-Scale’s average score of 3.47 (s.d. .42), significantly different (t Student; plevel>.001) from the group of non-entrepreneurs (3.33; s.d. .47); competences (measured through self-perception and in a standardized way), presence of entrepreneurial network, and gender (male, in particular) are elements that influenced in a significant way the likelihood to become an entrepreneur (BLR and SEM).