ABSTRACT
The study sought to determine the entrepreneurial skills improvement needs of self-employed technical college automobile technology graduates, four research questions and four hypotheses were formulated all derived from the literature review. 130 items questionnaires was used to collect relevant data from 30 respondents made up of automobile technical college self-employed graduates in Delta State. Mean and standard were used to answer the research questions while t-test statistics was employed to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The study revealed that, self-employed automobile technology graduates needs improvement in their technical skills in order to meet up with the current ways of servicing automobile products; they also need to improve on their managerial skills, marketing skills and financial skills. The study was able to submerge computer skills into technical skills such as use of sensor code, diagnostic code, engine sensor, scanner computer skill, Gear sensor, tune-up sensor, brake sensor, coil sensor, car board diagnostic indicator etc. Recommendations were made based on the findings of the study.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background to the Study
Entrepreneur is a person who has the ability to operate alone in business. It is one of the factors of production. The entrepreneur performs the function of building a business entity (Davis, 2008). An entrepreneur is a person who is willing and able to convert a new idea or innovation into a successful innovation (Schumpeter, 2013). The work of an entrepreneur is entrepreneurship. Therefore, entrepreneurship refers to creating and running own business. Entrepreneurship employs what Schumpeter called “the gale of creative destruction” to replace in whole or in part inferior innovations across markets and industries, simultaneously creating new products including new business model. Creative destruction is largely responsible for the dynamism of industries and long-run economic growth (Drucker, 2008). Entrepreneurship is about taking risks. The behaviour of the entrepreneur reflect a kind of person willing to put his or her career and financial security on the lines and take risks in the name of an idea, spending much time as well as capital on uncertain venture. Entrepreneurship according to Omolayo (2006) is the act of starting a company, arranging business deals and taking risks in order to make profit through the education skills acquired. Another view of entrepreneurship education is the term given to someone who has innovative ideas and transformed them to profitable activities. Entrepreneurship can be described as “the process of bringing together creative and innovative ideas and coupling these with management and organizational skills in order to combine people, money and resources to meet an identified need and create wealth. Nwangwu (2007) opined that entrepreneurship is a process of bringing together the factors of production, which include land, labour and capital so as to provide a product or service for public consumption. In this work, entrepreneurship is viewed as practical application of knowledge, ideas, skills, finance, personal behaviour, land, labour, capital and other resources in order to exploit environmental opportunities for the purpose of establishing a company. The acts of entrepreneurship are often associated with the uncertainty, particularly when it involves bringing something really novel to the world, whose market never exist. Therefore entrepreneur is a person who manages factors of production, a risk taker, an innovator who is motivated by the need for achievement, uses focus devotion and commitment to attain his goal. They search for different ways of doing things, new method, new market, extra funding, management strategies etc. They are instruments of dynamism (change). Entrepreneurship involves skills, These skills are needed by every entrepreneur to function effectively in his or her business or occupation.
Skills mean expertness or dexterity or practical ability, facilitating doing something. Skills can be defined in this work as great ability or proficiency, expertness in servicing, repairing, maintenance and marketing. (Ede, 2001). Skills are dexterity in handling tools, expertness in the use of tools and machines and that of production of objects with speed and accuracy. There are different types of entrepreneurial skills, these are technical skills, managerial skills, financial skills, marketing skills and computer skills.
Technical skills are the skills needed by automobile technology graduates to function effectively in his or her profession. It helps them to diagnose faults in vehicles using tools, equipment and machines such as spanners, wrench, jack, screwdrivers etc. Managerial skills are needed in the workshop for planning, organizing, controlling, coordinating and directing. Management is all about utilizing the little resources available to achieve a desired goal. Financial skills are crucial to the success of any Auto venture, not only to start but for growth, expansion and to meet competition and changing of customer’s expectation. Finance serves as link that makes small business interrelationships possible (Olannye and Oyibe, 2002).
Marketing skills are skills needed by an entrepreneur to promote his or her business into lime light, that is, bringing his products to the final consumers with the view of satisfying their needs and making profit from the firm. Computer skills are needed by the entrepreneur to service, repair or detect faults in cars. These computer skills reduce the stress of trial by error methods by automobile graduates. Most car manufacturers nowadays, contain one computer software or the other. This software monitors the emission of the engine as well as adjusts the engine to maintain low emission but self-employed graduates lack the skills to use these software. These skills stated above are needed by self-employed technical college automobile technology graduates to improve their automobile business.
Automobile Technology is the study of vehicle production, repair, servicing, maintenance, assembling, overhauling, selling of parts and selling of cars. Auto means car and mechanic means a person whose occupation is to repair machines especially the engine of motor vehicles. The layout of every vehicle is made up of the followings; engine, clutch, gear box, rear axle, front and rear suspension, steering mechanism, radiator, propeller shaft, brake system, cables, (Olisa, 2008). Automobile technology graduates are self-employed automobile graduates that need to improve their skills in automobile repair. Every graduate of automobile technology are expected to improve their skills in a particular area and become expert in it. Improvements of self-employed technical college graduates involve acquainting with new skills to expand and improve their servicing, maintenance and repairing skills in their automobile business. The derive to propose a qualitative practical content for the automobile technology taught at the technical colleges level was informed by the remarks often made by the media, employers of labour, evaluations of education programmes and the society at large that graduates of college of education (technical) are “rip off”, incompetent and are of general poor performance (Adiamoh, 2006). This perceived inadequate performance can be limited to many causal factors. Some can be controlled, some cannot among the items amenable to control and improvements are the practical contents designed to train automobile students, time frame for training and administration in technical colleges.
Technical colleges are educational institutions with different technical programmes which automobile technology is one of them. Others are electrical, wood work, metal work and building technology. The aims and objectives of technical colleges are to inculcate spirit of self-reliance. According to National policy on education (NPE, 2004) technical colleges are institutions where students acquire both practical and theoretical knowledge in a particular profession. These are institutions preparing students for occupations that are classified above the craft skills but below the scientific or engineering professions. According to Ayonmike (2011) technical colleges are institutions designed to train people for work to reflect the modern trends and development in occupations and skills requirement. Technical colleges according to FRN (2004) are to inculcate skills for self-reliance, knowledge, attitude and values needed at work. Most technical colleges in Delta State lack facility that will equip teachers and students with the necessary skills needed to set-up their businesses. This also means that self-employed automobile technology graduates lack the full confidence to repair all new automobile designs. As such, this situation necessitated this study to determine the entrepreneurial skills improvement needs of self-employed technical college Automobile technology graduates in Delta State. Technical college self-employed graduates could be residing in rural or urban areas.
Rural area means a geographic area that is located outside cities and town. According to Health Resource and Service Administration (HRSA, 2010) the word “rural” as encompasses, all population, housing and territory not included within an urban area. Whatever is not urban is considered rural. Urban areas are geographical areas located within cities and towns.
Statement of the Problem
The self-employed technical college automobile graduates are selective in the repair of cars because they lack the skills to put some cars in order. The ideal situation is that, as technical college automobile technology graduates, they are expected to repair all cars at ease. But the reverse is the case because the graduates lack the financial strength to purchase all the equipment, tools and machines needed for them to function effectively. The gap is that technical college automobile graduates are selective in the repairing of cars as a result of poor or no facilities to work. They service most cars by trial and error because of their low skill understanding during their years of formal training. With these, one can say theoretical content supersede practical application .Again they don’t know how to use computer application in detecting and correcting faults in cars.
Purpose of the Study
The general purpose of this study is to determine the entrepreneurial skills improvement needs of self-employed technical college Automobile technology graduates in Delta State.
Specifically, the study intends to identify the;
- Technical skills improvement needs of self -employed technical college Automobile technology graduates.
- Managerial skills improvement needs of self-employed technical college automobile technology graduates.
- Financial skills improvement needs of self-employed technical college Automobile Technology graduates.
- Marketing skills improvement needs of self- employed technical college automobile technology graduates.
Significance of the Study
The results of this study upon dissemination would be of immense benefit to teachers, students, parents, curriculum developers, technical college automobile graduates and the society at large. It will help the teachers to see the need of teaching students using all types of cars in the workshop. Practical knowledge in repairs of various brands of cars should supersede theoretical knowledge. This will equip the learners with technical skills to repair and service all cars in their firm. The teacher will also benefit in this study because, it will make him to see the need for innovation, strategic thinking and critical thinking. Then his technical skills in the course of teaching will know no limit.
The students will benefit immensely because they will go out there in the society equipped, no fear of unemployment, instead they will create job for others and for themselves.
Parents will never regret sending their children to technical colleges, because they will graduate full-baked and not half-baked. Again immediately, the technical college Automobile graduates will start doing something and making money as well as fending for themselves and for their family. And they will become managers and employers of labour. Parents will not see the huge amount spent on their children as colossal wastage.
The findings of this study will help curriculum planners and developers revisit the curriculum of Automobile technology, either to remove or increase the contents. It will spur planners to include ICT application in the repairing of vehicles.
Finally, it is hoped that findings from this study will be of great benefits to automobile technology graduates, because it will make them to think of retraining, sourcing for fund to purchase necessary equipment, tools and machines for them to work with ease.
Research questions
The following five research questions will be used to address this study;
- What are the technical skills improvements needs of self-employed technical college automobile technology graduates?
- What are the managerial skills improvement needs of self-employed technical college automobile technology graduates?
- What are the financial skills improvement needs of self-employed technical college Automobile Technology graduates?
- What are the marketing skills improvement needs of self-employed technical college Automobile technology graduates?
Hypotheses
Ho1: There is no significant difference between the mean responses of self-employed Automobile technology graduates in rural areas and the graduates in urban areas on their technical skills improvement needs.
Ho2: There is no significant difference between the mean responses of automobile technology graduates in rural areas and the technology graduates in urban areas on their managerial skills improvement needs.
Ho3: There is no significant difference between the mean responses of self employed automobile technology graduates in rural areas and the graduates in urban areas on their financial skills improvement needs.
Ho4: There is no significant difference between the mean responses of self-employed Automobile technology graduates in rural areas and the graduates in urban areas on their marketing skills improvement needs.
Scope of the Study
The study is delimited to entrepreneurial skills improvement needs by Automobile Technology graduates to be self employment in Delta State. It is also delimited to Automobile Technical skills, managerial skills, financial skills marketing skills and computer skills.
