6. Development of youth entrepreneurial skills

CHAPTER 6

Author Nadzeya Putsiata

Development of youth entrepreneurial skills

This part of the methodology could be dedicated to discuss a list of competencies, which we should help to acquire a young person who wants to become an entrepreneur. However, this would be profanation as in this case not only specific skills are important, but also the whole system of knowledge, experience and abilities. Therefore in this section, we will discuss how should we help young people to improve in all areas related to business. In any case, it is first and foremost important to realize that entrepreneurship is not an inborn talent, but a set of skills to be developed. You don’t come into the world as an entrepreneur, but you become one. Thus, developing a youth entrepreneurship skills development system, it is important to build on information of how knowledge is received by the human brain.

FIRST STAGE TO HELP A YOUNG PERSON TO UNDERSTAND WHY HE WANTS TO DEVELOP ENTREPRENEURIAL SKILLS

A human being does not learn in order just to have knowledge, although sometimes we claim so. However, in such a case, when we learn only in order to have knowledge, information gained is quickly forgotten, and new skills and habits do not get established in everyday life. Knowledge alone cannot be the main goal of learning. Our brain is a complex system which strives to conserve energy. Therefore, it performs only those technical actions and functions which are necessary. If a person does not set a clear goal for himself (for his brain), the brain, without a clear technical task, will simply not create new neuronal connections because it will not understand what this is needed for.

Therefore, in order for learning to be meaningful, it is first of all important for a young person to understand why he/ she wants to acquire entrepreneurial skills.

Why this may be important to him/her (learning objective):

• to earn more;

• to make a dream come true (for example, to start one’s own business);

• to become independent;

• to understand which activities suit him/her and which don’t and etc

IMPORTANT!

1. The young person himself/herself must feel what motivates him/her (the goal), so that it would not be just one of fashionable choices of the society. For example, two people want to find the way how to eat

properly and hope to become experts in this field. One of them woke up this morning and realized that he wants to be an advocate of a healthy lifestyle. The second person wants to take an active part in exploring this topic because he learned he has diabetes. Which one of them is likely to memorize better the new information on healthy nutrition and which one will begin to apply it actively?

2. The objective must be important and significant. That is related to another feature of the human brain – he undertakes only those tasks which he understands as the most important. This is called the dominant principle. However strange it may be, even arguments such as “I am interested” and “I like” also fall into the list of goals which are set incorrectly.

3. In order to help young people to set entrepreneurial goals correctly, it is effective to use the SMART methodology.

SECOND STAGE ANTICIPATE A SPECIFIC BUSINESS SEGMENT THAT INTERESTS A YOUNG PERSON

It takes a lot of time to build any business and become an expert in your chosen field. Elon Musk may be an expert in the automotive, rocket and start-up business, but know nothing about the medical business. Nevertheless, he will always understand the basic principles of business creation. So one of the most important tasks is to help the young person understand what specific area he/she wants to master as an expert and what skills are required for this.

Here are some examples:

1. A young person dreams of opening his own café. He is interested in all stages of business development, except the financial part. He is not very good at mathematics and, therefore, he thinks that it would be easier to use the services of an accounting company. This is certainly not the worst option. Although financial literacy is one of the most important skills an entrepreneur needs to have, there are also such business developers who successfully avoid this responsibility. The most important thing here is that the youth worker already has a specific query and can begin to shape the young person’s learning trajectory

2. The young person has an idea of a new mobile app. Therefore, in order to implement it, he wants to learn entrepreneurship. In this case, we will already have a completely different learning trajectory.

By knowing exactly why he/she is interested in entrepreneurship, the young person will be able to see more specifically in which areas of business he/she already has sufficient knowledge in, and which areas will need to be strengthened. For example, a person who wants to open his own cafeteria and who is studying marketing will already be able to understand more clearly how to apply the acquired knowledge in practice, whereas another young person, who while still being at school understands that he/she wants to create mobile apps, will have a clear motivation to study IT.

THIRD STAGE CREATING AN INDIVIDUAL LEARNING TRAJECTORY TO STRENGTHEN KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS IN THE FIELD OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP

The topic of strengthening entrepreneurial skills covers many parts, but the most important are the following:

THE FIRST BLOCK. BASICS OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP

1. What is entrepreneurship and how do business ideas emerge?

2. Thinking design. It is applied to formulate a business idea based on people’s needs.

3. Business model and business plan.

4. Project management. THE SECOND BLOCK. FINANCE

1. Basics of financial literacy: what does the cost of goods and services consist of, how do you calculate price, margin, taxes and finally what is the cost of working time?

2. Ability to use Excel and Google spreadsheets for calculations.

3. Ability to create and calculate a financial model that combines investment costs when creating a business, monthly expenses, draw up a monthly and annual income plan, income and expense balance.

4. Knowledge how to manage cash flows.

5. Financial management – for better understanding and knowledge of the topic. 6. At what stage of the business and how can additional funding be obtained. THE THIRD BLOCK MARKETING

1. Basics of marketing: what do we need it for, what functions it performs in the project, what types of marketing exist.

2. Marketing research (market research and analysis).

3. Advertising and public relations.

4. Brand propagation (how to create a brand and maintain it).

5. Online marketing: SMM (social media marketing), SEO (search engine optimization) and reputation support. 6. Mobile marketing (for smart apps).

7. Marketing strategy.

THE FOURTH BLOCK LAW

1. What legal forms exist in the country and how do they operate?

2. Taxes

3. Intellectual rights and copyright

4. Contracts, agreements and other legal documents in business.

The best way to learn entrepreneurship is to create a real project, i.e. after mastering some of the information, immediately put it into practice, deliver the result, get feedback, improve and develop further.

FOURTH STAGE BUILDING SKILLS IN PRACTICE

The best way to learn for our brains is to do everything in practice, because that’s how they get feedback: “This has been done well and therefore an incentive has been received, and here it didn’t go the way it should, so you need to analyse the mistakes and next time do the task a little differently.” So practice helps to strengthen the skill. Another great practice is to repeat the same action many times. In this way, the brain forms a new pathway of strong neuronal connections and it is becoming easier and easier to perform a certain mentioned action.

At this stage it is effective to take the following actions.

1. To organize excursions to companies to show how existing businesses are working.

2. A young person’s internship in a company that best reflects his/her chosen business field and profile. The first young man we have already mentioned can do an internship in a cafeteria. In addition, it would be ideal if he practised all areas of activity in that cafeteria. The second young person can do his internship in a company that develops mobile applications.

3. Job shadowing – to spend a few days in the shadow of an entrepreneur for the purpose of understanding what is he doing and how. 4. Starting your own business is the most expensive, but also the most practical way of learning.

FIFTH STAGE COMMUNICATION WITH PEOPLE WHO HAVE PRACTICALLY BUILT THEIR OWN BUSINESS

Another important need of the human brain to make the learning run smoothly is the possibility to learn from authoritative people and experts in their field. This way of learning from people that surround you is one of the oldest and it gave primitive people a chance to survive. Nowadays, the issue of life and death is no longer so relevant, but the principle remains the same. When we learn from people who inspire us and evoke thoughts like “wow, after all, he did it, I would also like to do the same” the brain absorbs everything faster and more efficiently, and when such a person encourages us to act, there is no limit to motivation.

The following tools can be used at this stage:

1. Invite experts (of certain fields mentioned in the third stage) to give lectures: entrepreneurs, financiers, lawyers, marketing specialists.

2. Attend conferences in any field together with young people and give them the task of collecting as many business cards as possible. In the second stage, it is possible to agree on collaboration, i.e., on mentoring with one of the individuals whose contact was received. The ability to establish connections is one of the most important entrepreneurial skills. 3. Internships and excursions described in the fourth stage

Most importantly, keep in mind that all the mistakes young people will make while learning entrepreneurship are the most valuable learning experiences that need to be enjoyed and accepted with gratitude. In this process, the youth worker supports the young person, helps him to reflect on everything, to improve and motivates him not to stop moving forward.

SPECIFICS OF WORKING WITH YOUNG PEOPLE WITH SPECIAL NEEDS DURING THE CAREER COUNSELLING PROCESS

In modern society, there are more and more discussions about inclusive education in order to ensure the quality learning for all those involved in the educational process, regardless of needs or psychological and physical health characteristics. Like everyone else, people with special needs experience fear of the future, mistrust and anxiety regarding tomorrow. It is also important to note, that for this group of people everything that is new causes a particularly high stress.

After all, such people are often seemed to be thrown out of the social context, which is important because it is where human character, behaviour and perception are shaped. Therefore, the first thing to pay attention to when working with young people and when dealing with young people with special needs is to help them integrate into social life and to make this integration process as secure and flexible as possible.

In this chapter, we present the successful experience of the Belorussian organization “IT for everyone” in the aforementioned area. This is a great example of how an organization that works with young people can integrate into its daily work programs intended for young people with special needs.

“We have given the hearing impaired young people the opportunity to learn from regular teachers, and we have opened up all accesses to community communication channels so they could communicate according to their interests. All communication was done via social networks. Young people with special needs also had the opportunity to go on organized excursions to IT companies, a list of recommended events was prepared for them and visits to the above-mentioned events were organized in order to integrate them into social life. Later inclusion groups were formed. Hearing impaired young people worked with other teenagers on a joint project. In preparation for the project, all the young people communicated by using the messenger. In today’s world, it is not difficult to organize a communication system with society members with special needs, because most tasks can be performed by communicating remotely. Later, young people who were studying with us and who gained experience when participating in projects were offered to work in small teams or become freelancers. In this way, the youth employment program was successfully implemented” Alena Dzinman “IT for Everybody” The second thing that is worth paying attention to is the selective (tunneling) thinking that is typical of young people with special needs. This target group is more often than any other characterized by a pattern of stereotypical thinking formed since childhood, which results in a certain lifestyle full of established internal emotional states when one thinks in narrow categories of concepts. This presents challenges in trying to go beyond the framework of customary thinking and behaviour and in expanding the range of routine actions.

The selective thinking prevents young people with special needs from seeing alternative options, as from their childhood they have been told to be able to perform only a limited number of actions. However, after explaining everything to such young people in detail, revealing them all the possibilities they have, defining their actual situation, telling them what they can achieve, what level of earnings to expect, and after they are being properly accompanied, everything will turn out differently.

However, in order to avoid any illusions, the most important thing is to help young people with special needs to divide the whole path of their goals and achievements into clear stages and to define the specific results to be achieved at each stage. It is more important for this target group of young people than for any other group to see clear small steps in their actions, each of which has a clear end and a tangible reward and encouragement.

“We have worked not only with young people who are deaf and hard of hearing, but also with those who have serious musculoskeletal disorders. Remote learning for this target group is a real opportunity to acquire education, a profession. The remote learning provided by our organization is carried out via skype in lessons’ format along with google virtual classroom. Lessons’ broadcasts are organized via skype, there is interactive communication, the recordings can be viewed again later. Google virtual classroom is a free platform. All you need to sign in is to have your own google account. Here, teachers place all lesson-related material and tasks that young people do and receive feedback. There are also online chats on social networks – participants can communicate with teachers and ask any questions as well as talk to each other.” Alena Dzinman “IT for Everybody”

In today’s world, information and digital technologies open up an enormous amount of possibilities, and special needs cease to be an insuperable barrier to learning and career development.