Since 1993, like other African countries, Ghana's governments have sought to promote the private sector and entrepreneurship-led economic development, prioritising industrialisation and women empowerment. Successive governments have sought to achieve this through relevant policies prioritising building entrepreneurial capabilities and providing special credit to female entrepreneurs in manufacturing to address gender discrimination in access to financial resources and disparity in capabilities to manage entrepreneurial ventures. The role of owner competencies is known to be crucial for venture performance. Consequently, academic and state institutions and development agencies have embraced the notion and signal from the government to provide entrepreneurial competencies training for women entrepreneurs, some of whom have received government grants to fund their enterprises. However, some entrepreneurship training programmes in Ghana were adjudged as irrelevant because they failed to address the needs and circumstances of participants. Furthermore, recipients of grants without relevant competencies could not use the funds to grow their enterprises. The call to study how women entrepreneurs acquire and deploy entrepreneurial competencies and norms that inhibit women entrepreneurship has come to the fore. The study explores how women entrepreneurs in Ghana develop competencies to pursue entrepreneurial opportunities in manufacturing in Ghana. The study applied a qualitative approach involving a study of twenty-six women entrepreneurs in manufacturing. The data collection techniques deployed included semi-structured interviews, shadowing, and documentation. The findings of the study are encapsulated in a contextualised competency development framework designated Progressive Eclectic Learning Framework, which provides a new and holistic view of the relationship between entrepreneurial learning, competencies and the pursuit of opportunity. First, the framework reveals that besides the universal entrepreneurial competencies, the Christian faith, a personal characteristic, is a significant competency for pursuing entrepreneurial opportunities because of its immense and expansive influence on entrepreneurial actions. The framework also shows that the respondents progressively develop relevant entrepreneurial competencies through multiple sources, including hitherto unrecognised religious resources such as the Word of God and spiritual leaders. A case is made for a religious competencies category to complement entrepreneurial competencies in pursuit of opportunities in high religiosity contexts because of the far-reaching impact of faith on entrepreneurs and their enterprises. The study extends the understanding of entrepreneurial learning by demonstrating how gender role expectations and individual circumstances, such as family commitments, influence the way women entrepreneurs develop craftsmanship (i.e., technical skills) to launch their manufacturing ventures. Consequently, four learner types are suggested: knowledge converters, flexible enquirers, mission-inspired learners and strategic networkers. Reflection was a crucial part of competency development, with respondents pursuing one of four different actions relating to their technical skills after reflecting on their technical capabilities in relation to new opportunities: adopt, modify, relegate or elevate. The study further showed that respondents' entrepreneurial actions span beyond exploring and exploiting opportunities to include agency and family matters. The women entrepreneurs were reconfiguring how work is organised and their enterprises to address change agendas such as navigating gender-related challenges and fusing their faith with business.
Permanent link to this resource: https://doi.org/10.24384/1d1s-zc40
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Spio, Anthony Ebow
Supervisors: Adesola, Sola; Adderley, Simon
Oxford Brookes Business School
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