Entrepreneurship is understood as the set of characteristics and traits of an individual that, when interacting with each other, generate a unique behavior, driving them to creative ideas and changes, assuming risks and allowing them to achieve a differentiating or successful performance. Clarysse, Tartari, and Salter (2011) define entrepreneurial capacity as the ability to perceive, assimilate, and take advantage of opportunities that, when integrated, favor transformation and innovation actions that are differentiating and unique.
In this context, the main essence of these potential entrepreneurial capabilities allows an individual to detect, recognize, and absorb opportunities to be able to generate behavior oriented to the materialization of ideas in a real environment of economic development (Tarrats-Pons, Mussons Torras, and Ferràs Hernández, 2015; Díaz–Casero, Hernández–Mogollón and Roldan, 2012, Shane and Venkataraman, 2000, Clarysse, Tartari, and Salter, 2011); boosting their ability to perceive and analyze such initiatives for the exploitation of new ventures, with deep commitment that leads them to use all their resources to respond in a timely manner to the idea discovered and thus makes the entrepreneurial activity a reality, as pointed out by Cabana-Villca, Cortes-Castillo, Plaza-Pasten, Castillo-Vergara, Álvarez-Marín (2013).The aforementioned argument imports elements that are key to strengthening entrepreneurial potential, such as personal traits, social skills, and attitudes toward risk (Alvarez and Busenitz, 2001), which in turn strengthen the identification process to face opportunities within an environment by assessing risks and situations of uncertainty (Koellinger et al. 2007). This construct has been raised as a trend that articulates with authors and researchers such as Timmons (1994), Busenitz, and Barney (1997), Palich and Bagby (1995), Lezana and Tonelli (1998), Shane and Venkataraman (2000), Volery and Mazzarol, (2015), Thrane, Blenker, Korsgaard, and Neergaard, 2016), Eckhardt and Shane, (2003), Filion and Gilles (1996), Loli et.al. (2010), Leite (2000), Zahra and Garvis (2000), Barba-Sánchez & Atienza-Sahuquillo (2011) and Varela and Bedoya (2006), which is related to the ability to transform and break with routine that has been described by authors such as Varela and Bedoya (2006), Zahra and Garvis (2000), Barba-Sánchez & Atienza-Sahuquillo, (2011), Lezana and Tonelli (1998), Fernández-Mesa, A, Alegre-Vidal, J, & Chiva-Gómez, R, (2012).
Entrepreneurial Skills and Factors Associated with their Development
The concept of potential and effective entrepreneurial skills has been based on the interaction of internal and external elements that play in the entrepreneur’s actions. In this regard, Shapero and Sokol (1982) establish as determinants of entrepreneurial intention the perceived desirability, perceived feasibility, and behavior in risk situations; addressing the relationship of situational and sociocultural conditions that make an entrepreneurial event occur as a result of situational impulse on the person whose perceptions and values are in turn determined by their experiences and sociocultural representations, which is also supported by Soria-Barreto, Zuniga-ara and Ruiz-Campo, (2016); Tarrats-Pons, Mussons Torras, and Ferràs Hernández, (2015), and by Elfving, Brännback, and Carsrud, (2009).
After Shapero’s theory, a new approach arises by Ajzen (1991), who proposes the Theory of Planned Behavior, in which the attitude toward oneself, a certain degree of social influence, and the degree of self-control over the results obtained are established as determinants of entrepreneurship. This is taken up by Soria-Barreto, Zuniga-Jara, and Ruiz-Campo, (2016); Tarrats–Pons, Mussons Torras, and Ferràs Hernández, (2015) and by Elfving, Brännback, and Carsrud, (2009).
Along the same lines, Krueger and Brazeal (1994) proposed an entrepreneurial potential model (EPM) where credibility plus entrepreneurial intention determines the potential capacity, which is converted into action by the occurrence of a triggering event, which can be both positive and negative. The ideas of Shapero (1982) and Azjen (1991) were considered to generate this model, and elements from both authors were integrated such as perceived viability and desirability; incorporating the notion of credibility, necessity, and viability of behavior, in this case, entrepreneurial behavior. Similarly, the concept of self-efficacy developed by Bandura (1986) and to which Davidson (1995) included skills, need, opportunity, values, and attitudes related to the entrepreneurial concept as such was also incorporated (Soria-Barreto, Zuniga-Jara and Ruiz-Campo, 2016).
Thus, potential and effective entrepreneurial capabilities will depend on personal subjective and/or social factors resulting from the interaction of cultural, familial, work related, and economic elements, which positively or negatively affect the way in which the person faces the possibility of entrepreneurship. Also, credibility plus entrepreneurial intention will determine the entrepreneurial potential that directly impacts entrepreneurial intention and also develops the ability to recognize a new opportunity (Durán-Aponte and Arias-Gómez (2016); Krueger and Brazeal (1994); Clarysse, Tartari, and Salter (2011)).
In general terms, while one strand of researchers tends to emphasize individual traits such as experience and opportunity recognition skills as critical explanations of entrepreneurial activity, other studies have predominantly focused on social environmental factors to explain entrepreneurial behavior. As Clarysse, Tartari, and Salter, (2011) argue that while the mainstream entrepreneurship literature attributes a central role to individual differences followed by social context in explaining the trend to become an entrepreneur, the ability to recognize opportunities is the determining variable in the concept of entrepreneurship, unlike Shane and Venkataraman, (2000) who consider individual differences to be the most important element in becoming an entrepreneur.
Moreover, the systemic entrepreneurship theory proposed by Tarrats-Pons, Mussons Torras, and Ferràs Hernández (2015) integrates constructs related to training; personal variables; competencies and skills that are related to the knowledge acquired and the competencies developed, as opposed to the recognition of opportunities in their context and which can be positively or negatively influenced on entrepreneurial intention andare added to variables such as age, gender, family references, and socioeconomic profile.
The theoretical contributions described above show that although previous models developed on the subject of entrepreneurial skills have focused mainly on the adult population, we cannot ignore the fact that the creation of entrepreneurial subjects begins with the identification of those potentialities that are waiting to be developed from an early age, in order to generate a change in the medium- and long-term. Therefore, this research makes a theoretical contribution by trying to correct an existing gap, generated by prioritizing the study of entrepreneurial skills in the adult population or in university training processes, seeking with this study to answer the research question: How do potential and effective entrepreneurial skills interact in the adolescent population?
Thus, the aim of this article is to interpret how potential and effective entrepreneurial capabilities in adolescents are related to the key factors for their development: personal, social, and educational; and thus contribute to the literature by analyzing how personal traits are connected and complemented by social skills to form the basis of potential entrepreneurial capabilities, while at the same time delving into the degree of influence that sociocultural and educational factors have as mediating elements on the process of transforming entrepreneurial capabilities from potential into effective.