Title: Students' entrepreneurial readiness in the United Arab Emirates: an empirical inquiry of related factors

Authors: Syed Awais Ahmad Tipu, Rachid Zeffane, James Ryan

Addresses: Department of Management, Marketing and Public Administration, College of Business Administration, University of Sharjah, P.O. Box 27272, Sharjah, UAE. ' Department of Management, Marketing and Public Administration, College of Business Administration, University of Sharjah, P.O. Box 27272, Sharjah, UAE. ' Department of Management, Marketing and Public Administration, College of Business Administration, University of Sharjah, P.O. Box 27272, Sharjah, UAE

Abstract: This paper explores the relationships of students| entrepreneurial readiness with gender, parents| employment status, field of study, academic performance, and students| preferred employment sector. The paper is based on a survey of 305 students in the college of business administration at the University of Sharjah, the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The results suggest that entrepreneurial readiness is strongly related to students| actual academic performance (i.e., GPA scores), family background (i.e., parents| employment status) and gender. However, the study did not reveal any significant relationships involving career preferences (i.e., preferred employment sector) nor field of study with the students| entrepreneurial readiness. The contribution of the present study is two-fold. First it attempts to fill the research gap by exploring the patterns of students| entrepreneurial readiness in the Gulf Cooperative Council (GCC) countries such as the UAE. Second, it explores factors which are not previously addressed in the entrepreneurship literature.

Keywords: entrepreneurship; entrepreneurial readiness; career preferences; employment; students; youth; Gulf Cooperative Council; GCC; United Arab Emirates; UAE; student entrepreneurs; gender; parental employment; field of study; academic performance; family background.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBG.2011.039393

International Journal of Business and Globalisation, 2011 Vol.6 No.3/4, pp.383 - 398

Published online: 27 Sep 2014 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article