Finish career paths

Thanks to my Erwin-Schrödinger Fellowship I have been working on my habilitation project “E-Ship-Stories” at the Lappeenranta University of Technology since 2015. – The objective is to make young people more interested in becoming entrepreneurs and to highlight entrepreneurship as an attractive career. In order to do that one needs innovative educational trajectories that impart entrepreneurial skills, knowledge and passion, aspects that have received little attention from researchers in the past.

Research oriented toward entrepreneurship

These considerations induced me to study the impact of existing entrepreneurial careers on future entrepreneurs in my research project at the School of Business and Management. One of the tenets I explore maintains that both success stories from entrepreneurial reality and failure stories work well as teaching methods. The following questions seek empirical answers. First: do inspiring stories about entrepreneurs change someone’s attitude to entrepreneurship for the better? Second: do descriptions by successful entrepreneurs about their successes or failures trigger identical results? And third: do entrepreneurial stories presented with a multimedia approach constitute a suitable tool for teaching?

Reaping the first fruits

So far, my investigations have indeed revealed significant impact which I have presented at scientific conferences in Italy (e.g. ICIE) and am going to present in Australia (ACERE). Furthermore, there are two publications in the pipeline at the Journal for International Business and Entrepreneurship Development. As a guest editor for this journal I am also preparing a special issue on my research focus. In 2017, I will visit the University of St. Gallen for further research with special focus on gender specific differences.