The journey to develop educated

entrepreneurs: prospects and

problems of Afghan businessmen
In todays rapidly changing world of innovation and technology, entrepreneurship is
considered as the main driver of economic growth.
University
students being treated as potential entrepreneurs tend to start businesses after
completion of their studies.
The concept of entrepreneurship is perhaps as old as the institution of barter and
trade,
where buyers would buy a commodity at a certain price and sell at an uncertain
price.
This tradition has progressed to entrepreneurship powered by complex human
personality, favourable culture, strong national economy and innovative technology
(Dodd, 2002).
Scholars have various degrees of disagreements on the definition and
domain of the field (Baumol et al., 2007)
Given the enormity of disagreements over definitional aspects of entrepreneurship,
entrepreneurship education has also received similar attention. Several kinds of
entrepreneurship programs operate to facilitate graduates in their career-related
decisions (Nabi et al., 2006).

These include programs that aim to increase students

awareness of psychological and motivational needs, and generic and industry skills.
These skills range from transferable, core, interpersonal and industry-specific skills.

The development of such skills is important given the increasing number of students

considering or pursuing entrepreneurial careers (Gatewood et al., 2002; Holden et

al.,
2007).

Future researchers should focus on entrepreneurial motivations

and the role of socio-economic environment in enabling opportunity
entrepreneurship

Baumol, W.J., Litan, R.E. and Schramm, C.J. (2007), Good Capitalism, Bad Capitalism,
and the
Economics of Growth and Prosperity, Yale University Press, New Haven, CT.
Dodd, S. (2002), A grounded cultural model of US entrepreneurship, Journal of
Business
Venturing, Vol. 17 No. 5, pp. 519-35.
Gatewood, E., Shaver, K., Powers, J. and Gartner, W. (2002), Entrepreneurial
expectancy, task
effort, and performance, Entrepreneurship Theory & Practice, Vol. 27 No. 2, pp.
187-206.
Nabi, G. and Holden, R. (2006), Graduate entrepreneurship: intentions, education
and training,
Education + Training, Vol. 50 No. 7, pp. 545-51.

The marketing curriculum and

educational aims: towards a
professional education?
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this conceptual paper is to address the current debate about the role of

business and marketing education. Should marketing courses be pragmatic and professional,
geared
towards practical knowledge of necessary tools and techniques; or should they be academic and
intellectual, aimed at creating scholars who happen to be marketers. Should marketers be trained
or
educated?

Corporations, in this era of globalisation, face new and ever more complex
issues.
Information rich societies, particularly through pressure groups, are able to
monitor
and analyse business activities to unprecedented degree.
This paper seeks to place the current debate on marketing education
within the context of educational theory and, in so doing, explore the
possibility that at
least some of the current problems can be linked to marketing education.
The aims of education
If children themselves were considered, education would not aim at making them belong to
this party or that, but enabling them to choose intelligently between the parties; it would aim
at making them able to think, not at making them think what their teachers think (Russell,
1992, pp. 401-2).

Linking ones philosophy of education to the determination of educational aims

immediately comes up against the problem that educators may all hold different
philosophies, and therefore may all enter the classroom with different aims in mind.
This suggests that a degree in marketing, or indeed in anything, needs to be planned as
a whole programme and not on a unit-by-unit basis. The programme needs to be a
coherent whole. This may lead to differences between the views of practitioners and
educators regarding the ultimate aims of any programme. For practitioners, this is

most often manifest in a debate over content what should business schools be
teaching students, perhaps so they can hit the employment world fully trained and
reduce future development costs?

Yet, it is clear that education is driven by an aim or collection of aims, which

have been adjudged worthy of pursuit. Indeed, we hold that educational policy today is
driven by the idea that the value of education lies in instrumental benefits.
At the level of the individual student, all educators in the higher education sector will
have come across some students whose only reason for undertaking a degree is to obtain
a well paid job at the end of it.

Educators though, may view things differently. educators are concerned with the development
of individual
potentialities or the development of intellect and character (Peters, 1970, p. 27).

understanding the modern firm is a necessary part of any business education,

if degree courses in business disciplines concentrate on providing students with just an
understanding of the modern firm, then it would seem to be instrumental education
that is being provided. Clearly, it is possible to understand the marketing needs of the
modern firm without viewing them critically. However, an intrinsic business education
would go further than simple understanding. It would enable the student to assess
critically the very process and nature of the firm, and then to discuss alternatives.
Intrinsic education is concerned with opening and expanding the intellectual capacities
of the mind, to enhance the students understanding of the world in which they live with
all of its complexity. Peters (1970, p. 29) suggests that we do not naturally talk of

educating men as rulers, soldiers, [etc.]; we talk of training them.

If marketing education is to be a professional education, the core skills and

techniques must be taught. But the requirements for expertise, a grasp of the virtues of
ethics, and a commitment to the common good demands that a marketing education
is geared towards intrinsic aims. The essential difference is that, whilst they are a
sufficient condition of an instrumental education, core skills and techniques are a
necessary but not sufficient condition of an intrinsic education.
Ethics is a key variable for long-term success (Nelson, 2003): amoral leadership is
outdated. Dobson (2003) argues that it is not a case of profit vs ethics, but profit
through ethics. Doing well comes from doing good, especially in industries where a
good name is a key competitive advantage and the loss of if very costly (Nelson, 2003).

Russell, B. (1992), The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell, Routledge, Padstow.

Nelson, R. (2003), Ethics and social issues in business: an updated communication
perspective, Competitiveness Review, Vol. 31 No. 1, pp. 66-74.
Dobson, J. (2003), Why ethics codes dont work, Financial Analysis Journal,
November/December, pp. 29-34.

Todays educational drama

planning for tomorrows
marketers
The marketing education literature suggests that graduates lack skills in areas such
as communication, intelligence gathering, teamwork, planning and negotiation

(Cunningham, 1999); that marketing educators have focused on technical skills at the
expense of soft skills such as communication, listening, and translating/mastering
internal politics (Kover, 1980);

Regarding the balance of skills

versus knowledge taught by marketing educators, a study by Davis et al. (2002) found
that marketing alumni considered they had been given too much factual knowledge at
the expense of requisite school-of-hard-knocks skills for initial employment.

Moreover, there is a general view that increasingly employers are recruiting

graduates on the basis of generic skills such as critical thinking, intelligence gathering,
communications skills and quantitative reasoning over and above specific marketing
conceptual skills and knowledge (Taylor, 2003).

Davis, R., Misra, S. and Van Auken, S. (2002), A gap analysis approach to marketing
curriculum
assessment: a study of skills and knowledge, Journal of Marketing Education, Vol.
24
No. 3, available at: http:/proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?

Cunningham, A.C. (1999), Commentary confessions of a reflective practitioner:

meeting the
challenges of marketings destruction, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 33 Nos
7/8,
pp. 685-91.

Kover, A.J. (1980), New grads must prove they have skills employees seek,
Marketing News,
Vol. 14 No. 2, available at: http:/proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?

Taylor, K.A. (2003), Marketing yourself in the competitive job market: an innovative
course preparing undergraduates for marketing careers, Journal of Marketing
Education, Vol. 25 No. 2