PERSONALITY SKILLS NEEDED BY BUSINESS EDUCATION GRADUATES FOR ENTREPRENEURIAL SUCCESS IN SOUTH-WEST NIGERIA

Oluwasina, B. R (Ph.D); Olatoye, A.O (Ph.D) & Ojeyinka, A. Grace

Abstract

This study determined managers of small and medium scale enterprises rating of personality skills needed by business education graduates for entrepreneurial success in South-West Nigeria.One research question was answered and two hypotheses were tested. The study adopted descriptive survey research design. A sample population of 910 SME managers was selected for the study using mutli-stage sampling technique. A five point rating scale questionnaire containing 13 items was used for data collection. Cronbach Alpha was used to measure the internal consistency of the questionnaire which yielded a reliability co-efficient of 0.81. The researchers administered the instrument with the help of three research assistants to the respondents. Data collected were analyzed using mean and standard deviation to answer the research questions while t-test and analysis of variance were used to test the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance using SPSS 23.0. Findings of the study revealed that SMEs managers generally rated personality skills as highly needed by business education graduates for entrepreneurial success in South-West Nigeria. The study also disclosed that gender and years of experience did not influence respondents’ mean ratings on the personality skills needed by business education graduates for entrepreneurial success. The study recommended among others that, personality skills identified in this study needed for entrepreneurial success should be included in the curriculum content of business education programme and be taught to all business education students.