Page 125 - guidance-supporting-europe-s-aspiring-entrepreneurs-policy-and-practice-to-harness-future-potential

Guidance supporting Europe’s aspiring entrepreneurs
Policy and practice to harness future potential

4.4.3. Entrepreneurship centres
In some countries, HEIs or national/regional authorities have established
entrepreneurship centres to foster enterprising activities among students and
staff. These centres often pave the way for business incubators (see above).
Entrepreneurship centres coordinate entrepreneurial activities, such as courses,
awareness-raising activities and entrepreneurship education programmes.
Entrepreneurship centres were identified in Denmark, Hungary, Iceland and
Netherlands.
Six entrepreneurship centres are located in Dutch HEIs (NIRAS Consultants
et al., 2008). One of these, the entrepreneurship centre of the Delft University of
Technology, provides a good practice example in this field. The centre has
embedded entrepreneurial educational activities in the curricula throughout the
university on the bachelor and master levels and recently introduced a
programme for PhD students. Lectures have an interdisciplinary character and
are developed and delivered by members of staff from different faculties. The
centre also organises several extracurricular activities, such as a summer school
programme or guest lectures (Ibid.).

4.4.4. Mentoring and business coaching
A mentor is someone with more experience, sharing and imparting knowledge to
someone younger or less experienced. The concept can work well in a business
environment where an entrepreneur may have a great idea for a business but
needs guidance in turning it into a successful and profitable venture (further
information about entrepreneurial mentoring can be found in Chapter 5.1).
Though entrepreneurial mentoring has been identified as one of the most
successful guidance relationships in the context of entrepreneurship (e.g.
European Commission, 2006a; St-Jean and Audet, 2009), one-to-one mentoring
programmes are less common than the other three start-up guidance methods in
HEIs in Europe. Nonetheless, our research identified HEIs using mentoring as a
form of enterprise start-up support in Belgium, Spain, France, Latvia, Hungary,
Portugal, Finland, Sweden and the United Kingdom where they are most
commonly used as part of a business degree. Mentoring and coaching
programmes are organised by universities, by university career centres and by
student unions (the latter is the case in Sweden). Mentoring programmes are
only rarely available for HE students in Bulgaria, Ireland, Luxembourg,
Netherlands, Poland and Slovenia. In Norway mentoring arrangements are being
piloted. In Luxembourg, the Chamber of Commerce has developed a mentoring
programme which is not only available to HE students but also to other potential

119