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

learning, suggested that members should ‘provide information and guidance on
entrepreneurship, promote entrepreneurial skills, and raise awareness among
educators and trainers of the important role of enterprises, among others, in
creating growth and decent jobs’ (International Labour Organisation, 2004). The
expert group report on New skills for new jobs (European Commission, 2010e)
stresses the guidance provider role of the public employment services also in
terms of designing their training schemes and services in order to stimulate
entrepreneurship and self-employment.
Recent EU policies on VET and HE emphasise the importance of career
guidance, but do not usually link it to the entrepreneurship agenda. For example,
in 2006 the Council Conclusions on the future priorities for enhanced European
cooperation in VET reiterated the need for ‘improved guidance throughout life to
take better account of the opportunities and requirements of VET and of working
life, including increased career guidance and advice in schools and for families,
in order to ensure informed choice’ (Council of the European Union, 2006); it did
not explicitly refer to the need for more career guidance for entrepreneurship.
Similarly, there was no special mention of entrepreneurship guidance in the 2009
Communiqué of the Conference on the Bologna Process 2020, where the
Ministers responsible for higher education in the 46 countries of the Bologna
Process declared that ‘higher education institutions, together with governments,
government agencies and employers, shall improve the provision, accessibility
and quality of their careers and employment related guidance services to
students and alumni’ (European Ministers Responsible for Higher Education,
2009).

2.2. Entrepreneurship in Europe

It is important to examine entrepreneurial activity in Europe to understand
differences between countries and groups of individuals which are more or less
likely to pursue an entrepreneurial career. This is particularly important as, for a
long time, Europe has been far behind the US in entrepreneurial activity
(European Commission, 2003; European Commission, 2004a; Volkmann et al.,
2010).

2.2.1. Entrepreneurial activity in Europe
Many people have the ambition of setting up and running their own business and
today more people than ever have decided to do so. There are many Europeans
who wish to grasp the opportunity (and risk) of working for themselves and to

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