Page 57 - 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

five countries (Greece, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, and Netherlands). However, job
satisfaction among entrepreneurs is higher than among the employed. In a
survey from 2000, 33% of self-employed without employees and as many as 45%
of self-employed with employees reported being very satisfied with their working
conditions against only 27% of employees (European Commission, 2003, p. 7).
These findings have significance to the study because they show that there
is a great degree of variety in European countries in terms of how
entrepreneurship is perceived by the general public and the media. Education,
training and guidance services and media can be used as channels to improve
general perceptions of entrepreneurship.

2.4. Business formation skills

Surveys indicate that most Europeans do not feel ready to start their own
business venture. Only around 40% of Europeans feel that they have the skills
necessary to start a business (Allen et al., 2008; Bosma and Levie, 2009).
Residents of Greece (58%), Slovenia (52%) and Iceland (50%) are more likely to
believe that they had the entrepreneurial skills required. Conversely, only one in
four felt that they had the requisite skills in France.
In addition to skills, the availability of opportunities for setting up businesses
plays a factor in their aspirations. Less than one third of Europeans feel that there
are opportunities to start a firm in the area where they live (30%) (Allen et al.,
2008; Bosma and Levie, 2009); across innovation-driven economies more
broadly, only one-fifth of inhabitants think such opportunities exist. In Belgium
(15%) and Spain (16%), a lower proportion of inhabitants feel that entrepreneurial
opportunity exists while almost half of Norwegians think that opportunities are to
be had in starting up a business (49%).
Around a third (35%) of Europeans who feel that there are opportunities to
set up a business in their area, state that a fear of failure would prevent them
doing so. The fear of failure is less prevalent in Belgium (25%), Norway (25%)
and Finland (26%), but much higher in Greece (45%), Spain (45%) and France
(47%). Also, the economic crisis plays a role as the attitudes of early-stage
entrepreneurs towards starting a new business were more pessimistic in 2010
compared to the year before. More than half of the entrepreneurs stated that
turbulent economic conditions can diminish new start-ups and reduce risk-taking.
The critical attitudes were highly visible in Greece (76%), Spain (72%) and
Portugal (62%). (Kelley et al, 2010).

51