*THE INFLUENCE OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE ON
ENTREPRENEURIAL INTENTIONS: A CASE STUDY OF UITM
SARAWAK
Dr.Kuldip Singh
Faculty of Administrative Science and Policy Studies
University Technology MARA Sarawak
Kampus Kota Samarahan
Kuching
e-mail; [email protected]
Abstract
The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of emotional intelligence on
student’s entrepreneurial intentions. The unit of analysis in this study were the students
who participated in the ETR300 programme. The sample size for the study was 186
students. The instruments used to measure entrepreneurial intentions was adopted from
Indarti and Kristiansen (2003) whereas the instrument used to measure emotional
intelligence was s adopted from the Self-Report Emotional Intelligence Test (SREIT)
developed by Schutte et.al (1998). The theoretical base of the SREIT rest firmly on the
work by Salovey and Mayer (1990). The study found a moderate intention ( mean 3.55)
to become an entrepreneur amongst the students and the overall emotional intelligence
of the students were 3.81. The study also found a positive and moderate significant
relationship between emotional intelligence and entrepreneurial intentions ( p.< 0.05, r
=.443). Apart from these, no significant relationship was found between gender and
parental influence on emotional intelligence and entrepreneurial intentions. Implications
and areas for future research was also discussed.
Introduction
The Malaysian have been encouraging unemployed graduates to become
entrepreneurs but its appears that graduates still prefer to work in the public or private
sectors. The government has included the entrepreneurial development program in it plan
especially for the youth including for student in school and institution of higher learning.
During the Ninth Plan period, Entrepreneurial development programmes were carried out
to nurture the entrepreneurial potential of youths and to enable them to participate
actively in business enterprises as well as promote self-employment. Towards this end,
Majlis Amanah Rakyat and training institutes such as Institut Keusahawanan. Belia
Negara conducted training, seminars and short courses as well as provided advisory
services to young and new entrepreneurs. A total of 79,740 youths benefited from these
programmes at the state and district levels during the Plan period. Measures were also
undertaken to inculcate the spirit and culture of entrepreneurship among students in
schools and institutions of higher education. The Usahawan Muda Programme, which
involved the setting up of Kedai Koperasi, was implemented in schools with the
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cooperation of the Parent Teacher Association (PTA). Co-curricular activities, which
incorporated elements of entrepreneurship were also carried out. Under the Program
Pembangunan Usahasiswa, a total of 32,470 students in public institutions of higher
education participated in various business activities such as Kelab Keusahawanan
Desasiswa and Pasar Pelajar. ( Ninth Malaysia Plan).
Literature Review
Entrepreneurial Intentions
An entrepreneur can be defined as a person who creates a new business in the face of risk
and uncertainty for the purpose of achieving profit and growth by identifying
opportunities and assembling the necessary resources to capitalize on them (Zimmerer
and Scarborough, 2002). Whereas entrepreneurship is the process of creating something
new with value by devoting the necessary time and effort, assuming the accompanying
financial, psychic, and social risks, and receiving the resulting rewards of monetary and
personal satisfaction and independence (Hisrich and Peters, 2002). Bird (1988, 1992)
defines intention as a state of mind that focuses a person's attention, experience, and
behavior toward a specific object or method of behaving. Bird further suggests that
entrepreneurial intention directs critical strategic thinking and decisions and operates as a
perceptual screen for viewing relationships, resources, and exchanges. Entrepreneurial
Intention, or the state of mind that directs and guides the actions of the entrepreneur
toward the development and implementation of the business concept, forms the basis of
this framework. This perspective is process-oriented, directing attention toward the
complex relationships among entrepreneurial ideas and the resulting outcomes of these
ideas (Bird, 1998). In a recent study, Crant (1996) found entrepreneurial characteristics,
including a “proactive” personality, to be significantly associated with entrepreneurial
intention. While Crant’s (1996) use of intentions to investigate future action is well
founded in psychology and entrepreneurship research (Ajzen & Fishbein, 1980; Bird,
1988; Katz & Gartner, 1988; Krueger & Brazeal, 1994; Brenner, Pringle & Greenhaus,
1991; Krueger, 1993), Robinson, Stimpson, Huefner and Hunt (1991) argue that
'attitudes' are a better predictor of entrepreneurial tendencies than are characteristics
Mazzarol et al. (1999) found that females were less likely to be founders of new business
whereas Kolvereid (1996) found male to have higher entrepreneurial intention than
females this was again supported by the works of Kolvereid and Moen (1997). As for the
age factor, Reynolds et al. (2000) found that younger people, in the 25-44 years age
group were the most active in entrepreneurial activities in Western countries and this was
supported by Sinha (1996).
Most of the surveys show that education in entrepreneurship encourages graduates to
start their own businesses. In an early study, Clark surveyed a sample of students at a
medium- sized American university who were enrolled in an introductory
entrepreneurship course. He found that almost 80% of these students were considering
setting up their own businesses, and their plans were often turned into reality. Three out
of four students who indicated concrete plans to found a company did, in fact, start a new
venture. Furthermore, 76% of the respondents stated that the entrepreneurship course had
a strong or very strong effect on their decision to found a new business (Clark, Davis and
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Harnish 1984). McMullan, Long and Wilson report a high rate of new venture creation
among MBA students who attended more than three entrepreneurship-related courses at a
Canadian university (McMullan, Long and Wilson 1985). A review of a graduate
enterprise program in the UK suggests that the program provided more than half of the
participants with an incentive to start their businesses sooner than intended. Thus, this
initiative had an enabling and accelerating impact on the graduates' founding activities.
(Brown 1990). Irish students who participated in a student business plan competition
indicated that the initiative had a "very important" impact on their subsequent career
choices (Fleming 1994). Finally, Vesper and McMullan show that entrepreneurship
courses help alumni make better decisions in the startup process (Vesper and McMullan,
1997).
Entrepreneurial potential is influenced by people’s values, attitudes and beliefs (Krueger,
1993; Krueger and Brazead, 1994; Krueger and carsrud, 1993).Gibb (1992) sums up the
over-riding objective of entrepreneurship education is to develop enterprising behaviours,
skills and attributes, and by this means also enhance the students’ insight into, as well as
knowledge of doing business. The behaviour aspects, skills and attributes which may be
exhibited by an entrepreneur might include opportunity seeking, initiative taking, making
things happen independently, problem solving and risk taking, commitment to work and
tasks, ability to cope with or enjoy uncertainty and ambiguity, self-awareness, selfconfidence, creativity perseverance, persuasiveness, resourcefulness, negotiating skills,
and motivation and commitment to achieve Since then, a number of personality traits,
such as risk-taking propensity (Hisrich and Peters 1995), the need for achievement
(Johnson 1990), and locus of control (Bonnett and Fuhrmann 1991), have been discussed
as factors affecting people's aspirations to start a company.
Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence refers to one’s ability to be aware of one’s own feelings
and feelings of others, to differentiate among them, and used the information to guide
ones thinking and behavior (Salovey & Mayer, 1990). Mayer & Salovey (1997) also
define that emotional intelligence is the ability to perceive emotions, to access and
generate emotions and motional knowledge, and to reflectively regulate emotions so as to
promote emotional and intellectual growth. The three categories of abilities in emotional
intelligence as according to Salovey and Mayer are: evaluation, regulation of emotion
and use emotions in decision making. Meanwhile, Goleman (1998) refers it as the
capability for organizing our own feelings and those of others, for motivating ourselves,
and for managing emotions well in us and in our relationships. Martinez-Pons,
(1997/1998) refers emotion intelligence as an array of non-cognitive skills, capabilities
and competencies that influence a person’s ability to cope with environmental demand
and pressures.
According to Goleman (1997) there are 5 components of emotional intelligence
and the competencies associated are self awareness, self regulation, motivation, empathy
and social skills. Self competencies are associated with emotional awareness, accurate
self assessment and self confidence, meanwhile self regulation is associated to self
control, trustworthiness, conscientiousness, adaptability and innovation. Another
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component which is motivation is referring to achievement, commitment, initiative and
optimism. On the other hand, empathy refers to the understanding and developing others,
service orientation, leveraging diversity and political awareness. Lastly, social skills are
associated with influence, communication, conflict management, leadership, change
catalyst, building bonds, collaboration and team capabilities
Research Methodology
This study used the questionnaire method to collect the data and the main objective of the
study was to describe the relationships between emotional intelligence and
entrepreneurial intentions. The sample respondents consist of 200 students who are taking
the ERT 300 course. The students are from semester 4 until 6 and from different
academic programmes. The probability sampling technique was used namely systematic
random sampling The students were given 15 minutes to complete the questionnaire.. The
questionnaires were collected immediately after respondents have completed them.
Responses were obtained from 186 of 200 students (93.% response rate). To ensure
goodness of measure the Cronbach alpha coefficient was computed for each of the major
variables in the study. The reliability coefficients values exceeding 0.85 which further
strengthens the reliability of the instruments used for this study.
Questionnaires used to measure the variables was developed from previously used
questionaaire. To measure emotional intelligence Self-Report Emotional Intelligence Test
(SREITT) questionnaire developed by Schutte et.al (1998) were used. The theoretical
base of the SREIT rest firmly on the work by Salovey and Mayer (1990: 1997), which
concluded that emotional intelligence may be conceptualized as comprising the following
four major dimensions:
1. Perception, appraisal and expression of emotion
2. Emotion’s facilitation of thinking
3. Understanding and analysing emotions: employing emotional knowledge
4. Reflective regulation of emotions to promote emotional and intellectual growth
Entrepreneurial intentions of students were measured by using the questionnaire
developed by Indarti and Kristiansen (2003) and used by Ramayah and Zainon from
USM to study entrepreneurial intentions of university students. The main determinants of
entrepreneurial intention can be grouped into 4 main themes:
1.
Demographics and individual background
2.
Personality traits
3.
Contextual elements
4.
Environmental factors
The questionnaire is divided into three sections, Section one measures the
demographic data and section 2 measures emotional intelligence. Section 3 measures
entrepreneurial intentions.
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Findings and Discussions
More seventy percent of the students were females and the average age of the
students was between 20 to 21. Malays made up the majority of the students ( 90 %).
The mean for Grade Point Average (GPA) of the respondent is 2.83 whereas the mean for
the Cumulative Grade Point Average (CGPA) is 2.77. The highest number of respondents
that we collected is from Diploma In Public Administration (AM110) which carried
19.4% and the lowest number of respondent is from Diploma in Tourism Management
which carried 4.8%. Student in the final year which is semester 6 contribute the most at
59.1% and the least was from semester 4 at 14.0%.. It was also found that about 70 % of
the parents or relatives of the students do not own a business. This is summarized in
Table 1 below.
Meanwhile, the mean of the entrepreneur intention of respondents is 3.55. whereas, the
mean level of emotional intelligence of the student in UiTM is 3.81. This indicate that the
student’s level of entrepreneurial intention is average but emotional intelligence is above
average. A positive relationship was found between emotional intelligence and
entrepreneurial intentions ( r=..433, p=0.000). As for the influence of gender on
emotional intelligence and entrepreneurial intentions, there is no significant difference
between gender and emotional intelligence t (184) =-.0.08, p >.05.) and also between
gender and entrepreneurial intentions t (184) = -.1.292, p > .05).
Table 1: Profile of Respondents
Variable
Frequency
Gender
Male
46
Female
140
Percentage
24.7
73.3
Age
20 – 21
22 – 23
Over 24
121
64
1
65.1
Ethnicity
Malay
Iban
Bidayuh
Melanau
Orang Ulu
90
56
22
8
10
48.4
30.1
11.8
4.3
5.3
8
4.3
22
11.8
13
7
Program
Diploma
in
Building
(AP116)
Diploma
in
Civil
Engineering (EC 110)
Diploma
in
Electrical
5
0.5
Engineering (EE 111)
Diploma in Information
Management (IS 110)
Diploma
in
Office
Management
and
Technology (OM114)
Diploma
in
Planting
Management (AS 110)
Diploma
in
Public
Administration (AM 110)
Diploma
in
Quantity
Surveying (AP 114)
Diploma in Science (AS
120)
Diploma in Sport Studies
(SR 113)
Diploma
in
Tourism
Management (HM 111)
16
8.6
14
7.5
16
8.6
36
19.4
18
9.7
17
9.1
17
9.1
9
4.8
Part
Semester 4
Semester 5
Semester 6
26
50
110
14
26.9
59.1
Parent Owning Business
Yes
No
31
155
16.7
83.3
Relative Owning Business
Yes
No
62
124
33.3
66.7
Mean
2.83
2.77
Standard Deviation
0.85
0.87
Variable
Grade Point Average (GPA)
Cumulative Grade Point
Average (CGPA)
Conclusion and Implications
The study found that emotional intelligence is an important predictor of
entrepreneurial intentions since emotional intelligence is positively related to
entrepreneurial intentions. Universities should introduce emotional intelligence as a
component of entrepreneurial education so as to prepare graduates to become
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entrepreneurs when they graduate. When graduates are emotionally strong they will able
to handle the challenges and risks associated with starting a new business. So it can be
concluded that emotional intelligence can lead to business success for the young
graduates. Entrepreneurship programmes introduced in higher education emphasis the
emotional dimension of entrepreneurship The findings of this survey has implications for
theory and practice. In terms of theory , this study has extended previous research
conducted on emotional intelligence and is relationship to entrepreneurial intentions. The
results of study advocate that emotional intelligence is an important determinant of
entrepreneurial intentions. Regarding practical contribution, findings of this study may be
used by higher education managers to enhance entrepreneurial education. According to
this perspective, training that take into account the various elements of emotional
intelligence will help students to enhance their entrepreneurial intentions.
Finally, this study has certain limitations that should be acknowledged. First, the study is
limited to students taking the ERT300 course. There is no doubt that a more
comprehensive study involving a larger sample should be done. Future research direction
would be to include the moderating effect of variables like level of education, ethnicity
and parent involvement in business which has also been known to impact entrepreneurial
intentions. Notwithstanding, this study has set a foundation for further research on
emotional intelligence and its implications on entrepreneurship.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The authors would like to thank Carrie Anne and Flory Buan for their active involvement
and kind assistance during the data collection process.
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