D.Ed. / Entrepreneurs are people who have the ability to see opportunities and create energy when others fail to see possibilities. They are people who help to create positive experiences and thriving communities through their ventures. In the process entrepreneurs would inevitably experience challenging times. In fact, the challenges they may encounter might lead the average man on the street to believe that the venture is not viable. One of the differentiating characteristics of successful entrepreneurs is that they see opportunities and pursue them in situations where most people believe the odds are against any success (Bolton & Thompson, 2004:21; Haskins, 1998:2; Kuratko & Hodgetts, 1989:102). During these challenges, the entrepreneur will find him or herself in a lonely place, as there are few people who would be able to believe in the success of the venture, let alone be able to give support and encouragement. This situation motivated the study into the life stories of the entrepreneur from the perspective of psychology of education. A study that sets out to establish which personal qualities these people draw from; to identify the qualities and characteristics these people have in common and to describe a psychoeducational model for the development of these qualities. The primary research goal of this study is the description of a psychoeducational model for the development of entrepreneurs in Southern Africa. To achieve this goal, the following objectives were pursued, namely: a. To gain an understanding of the life story of a successful entrepreneur. b. To develop a psycho-educational model based on this understanding. c. To describe guidelines for the operationalisation of the model. In an undertaking to meet the above objectives, a theory generative, qualitative, explorative, descriptive and contextual research design were executed. The fieldwork was done by having semi-structured phenomenological interviews with successful entrepreneurs. The results obtained from the interviews were analysed and categorised and a literature study was carried out.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:uj/uj:8291 |
| Date | 31 March 2009 |
| Creators | Hattingh, Rene |
| Source Sets | South African National ETD Portal |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
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