Hospitality and tourism students: Are they ready for entrepreneurship?

Abstract

One of the career options of hospitality and tourism students is venturing into entrepreneurship. It is therefore crucial to assess their entrepreneurial readiness and the internal entrepreneurial environment that may influence their readiness. Descriptive method was used in the study. The participants were tourism and hospitality graduating students chosen using stratified random sampling. Results revealed that majority of the respondents have the intention of starting their own business after graduation because they want to attain financial success, while lack of capital hinders entrepreneurial intention. Furthermore, the respondents have generally high level of readiness in terms of skills in the area of personal maturity and portray a need for achievement and success. The strength of the internal entrepreneurial environment lies on the university’s lecturers and curriculum, while its weakness lies on the supporting resources provided for the students. Internal entrepreneurial environment has a high impact on the readiness of the students both in terms of their skills and personal characteristics. The entrepreneurial readiness of the respondents remains the same regardless of their entrepreneurial intention. A program for entrepreneurship development was proposed based on the results of the study.