Competence-based approach to teaching international opportunity identification: cross-cultural aspects

Abstract

Boosting entrepreneurship is an important strategy for transforming the competitiveness of European economies (Commission of the European Communities, 2004). Two key areas for action are educating entrepreneurs and supporting the internationalisation of small and medium-sized enterprises (Commission of the European Communities, 2004). This paper explores how entrepreneurship education can facilitate international entrepreneurship by fostering international opportunity identification competencies. Entrepreneurship education needs to develop the actual task competence of identifying opportunities and the perceived task competence (self-efficacy) of the entrepreneur. Competence and self-efficacy are developed and applied in context (Man, 2005). Hence, we argue that culture is a significant contextual variable. We explore the possible moderating influence of cross-cultural training on entrepreneurial competence and self-efficacy in identifying international opportunities. We then recommend strategies for increasing entrepreneurial competence and self-efficacy in identifying international opportunities through cross-cultural training.