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DIGA - Digital Innovations for Growth Academy

The Role and Use of Digital Technologies – A Multi stakeholder Perspective of

Entrepreneurs, Enterprise Educators/Trainers and Entrepreneurial Learners

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DIGA - Digital Innovations for Growth Academy

The Role and Use of Digital Technologies – A Multi stakeholder Perspective of

Entrepreneurs, Enterprise Educators/Trainers and Entrepreneurial Learners

Report prepared by DIGA Project partners: - B.Hynes; Y. Costin; Kemmy, Business School, University of Limerick, Ireland; - L. McMullan; L. Anderson; H. Millane; A. Price; The Women’s Organisation, Liverpool; - S. Gavez; M. Karničnik; T. Rugelj; J. Šest; Economic Institute Maribor, Human Rescource Development Centre, Maribor, Slovenia; - A. Kisieliene; L. Mecajeva; Social Innovation Fund, Lithuania; - C. Martínez; Inercia Digital S.L.; C. Luna, University of Huelva, Spain; - N. Dermendjieva; S. Bezuhanova; Bulgarian Centrе of Women in Technology, Bulgaria - E. Fabry, M.Sangiuliano, European Centre for Women and Technology - ECWT Drammen; Limerick, Liverpool, Maribor, Huelva, Kaunas, Sofia, August 2015 Disclaimer: This publication has been produced in the frame of DIGA (Digital Innovation for Growth Academy) Project. The project has been funded with support from the European Commission, ERASMUS+ Programme. The information contained in this publication reflects only the author’s views and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein. Sole responsibility lies with authors.

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Table of Contents

Page

Executive Summary 5

Terms of reference and definitions 6

List of Tables and Figures 9

1.0 Introduction 11

The emerging role of digital technologies - a multi stakeholder perspective: 17

A review of the literature

2.0 The Policy Context 18

2.1 Enhancing ICT, Digital Skills Capabilities – the SME Policy perspective 18

2.2 Enhancing ICT, Digital Skills Capabilities – the Higher Educator Institution (HEI) 27

- policy perspective

3.0 The Role of Digital Technology in the Education Sector 32

3.1 Understanding the profile of the digital learner 32

3.2 Understanding the profile of the digital educator 40

4.0 Digital Technology and its adoption by entrepreneurs and owner-managers 45

5.0 Concluding Comments 55

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Empirical Investigation - Results from Entrepreneurs, Enterprise Educators/Trainers

and Entrepreneurial Learners 58

6.0 Empirical Investigation Research Methodology 59

7.0 Entrepreneurs Use of Digital Technologies – Key Research Findings 63

7.1 Respondent Profile - Personal and Enterprise Profile 63

7.2 Digital Technology Practices and Uses for Enterprise Activities 67

7.3 Establishment of goals for digital technology, measuring impact and planned

future use of digital technologies 75

7.4 Skills, Competencies and Training in Digital Technology 84


8.0 Enterprise Educators Use of Digital Technologies - Key Research Findings 100

8.1 Respondent Profile and Experience of Enterprise Education and Training 100

8.2 Digital Technologies Practices, Barriers and Benefits for Enterprise Education 102


9.0 Entrepreneurial Learner Use of Digital Technologies – Key Research Findings 118

9.1 Respondent Profile and Experience of Enterprise Learning 118

9.2 Respondent Familiarity of Digital Tools and sites 123

9.3 Digital Training Need and Preference for Digital Programme delivery 129

9.4 Synthesis and Concluding Comments, Entrepreneurs, Enterprise Educators and

Entrepreneurial Learners 132

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10.0 Bridging the Digital Competency Divide - Developing E Leadership Skills for

Entrepreneurs and Owner-Managers 134

10.1 A Roadmap for Successful Digital Competency Development - Developing 134

E Leadership Skills for Entrepreneurs and Owner-Managers – Key criteria/ building

blocks for digital skills enhancement


References

Appendices

Appendix 1 - Copy of surveys for Entrepreneurs, Enterprise Trainers /Educators and

Entrepreneurial Learners

Appendix 11 – List of Enterprise Subjects on offer

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Executive Summary

The proliferation of digital technologies in personal and business contexts, most notably in

the advent of social networking platforms generates new modes of social interaction,

dialogue, exchange and collaboration in different situational contexts, for instance between,

individuals in a personal family and social capacity; the learner and educator; individuals as

consumers and how they interact with business; businesses (public and private institutions)

and how they engage with their consumers and other stakeholders. Digital is a pervasive

force that is driving innovation and new opportunities by bringing individuals and

organisations into an interconnected and ever changing digital realm.

Within the business domain businesses of all sizes are transitioning to a ‘go digital’ mode of

behaviour with ‘e’ elements becoming an essential component of modern business. Trends

such as virtualisation, cloud computing and social networking are likely to intensify in their

presence in the ‘go digital’ process adopted in business, education, learning and social

contexts. Accordingly, government policy focus is shifting from promoting ecommerce to a

more holistic view of e-business and the development of associated e-leadership

competencies and capabilities, enabling the productive use of digital technologies across

and between business functions.

Given the strong impact of digital technologies in business and its creation of new business

opportunities it is increasingly important that young people are equipped in a relevant and

appropriate manner to engage and work in a more digitalised economy, society and

workplace albeit it be in an existing organisation or through creating their own business.

From the educator perspective educators are now dealing with a very different cohort of

learners who ‘speak the language’ of digital technology fluently, spontaneously and can

navigate the virtual and physical world seamlessly as it has been part of the norm for them.

Therefore, the role of the educator and educational institutions must be considered as to

their role and competency in preparing a more competent graduate for a more digitalised

workplace environment.

The DIGA research presents key trends driving the increased use of digital technologies from

the dyadic perspectives of the enterprise educator/trainer and the entrepreneurial learner

encompassing aspiring and established entrepreneurs. The changing role of the net-

generation of learner is examined and their learning preferences and expectations will

identify factors to consider when developing or incorporating digital technologies into the

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curriculum. This information is compared with the insights obtained from the enterprise

educator/trainer who determine strategically the value placed on digital technologies and

how they are resourced from a financial, technical and educator training and development

viewpoints.

Terms of reference and definitions

Digital Innovations for Growth Academy (DIGA) Project

This report is an intellectual output of the Erasmus+ Strategic Partnership Project Digital

Innovations for Growth Academy (DIGA) [2014-1-UK01-KA202-001780]. It presents research

and analysis to inform the development of the DIGA training programme to enhance the

digital competencies of enterprise educators and trainers.

Digital Innovations for Growth Academy (DIGA) meets the strategic need defined in the

Bruges Communique to improve the capacity of Vocational Education and Training (VET) to

respond to the changing requirements of the labour market. A fundamental capacity for VET

practitioners is to keep pace with shifts in new technologies, work organisation and

internationalisation with a particular emphasis on the deployment of digital tools, ICT and

the internet. Thereby enabling them to effectively help SME learners to become digitally

competent and to be able utilise digital knowledge and skills within business processes.

In addressing this need the DIGA project aims to enable the enhanced deployment of digital

and ICT tools by VET enterprise trainers and educators and improve their digital

competencies in order to address the key needs to:

1. Develop the ICT and digital skills, knowledge and capacity of VET trainers to enable them

to support learners within SMEs more effectively and encourage greater adoption of digital

and ICT tools.

2. Develop VET programmes to support the changing needs of the EU workforce/economy

in particular through the integration of ICT and digital literacy.

3. Ensure that VET programmes are equally open and accessible to women and men

learners.

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Digital Innovations for Growth Academy operates as a Strategic Partnership from seven

member states. The partners are from the social, private and public sectors. Through the

testing and piloting of the programme materials the project will include 120 enterprise

trainers and educators from five partner countries.

The following are the definitions of digital capacity, digital pedagogy and digital literacy that

guided the research and consultations undertaken:

Blended learning: a teaching approach that combines online and in-person learning,

allowing a higher degree of personalisation and learner autonomy.

Digital Capacity: The skills, competences and attitudes that enable people to work, live and

learn in a complex world that is increasingly digital” (National Forum Strategy Meeting,

January 2014).

Digital entrepreneurship: Digital enterprises are characterised by a high intensity of

utilisation of novel digital technologies (particularly social, big data, mobile and cloud

solutions) to improve business operations, invent new business models, sharpen business

intelligence, and engage with customers and stakeholders. They create the jobs and growth

opportunities of the future.

Digital Pedagogy: ‘the seamless integration of technology (digital tools/websites/hardware

etc.) with great pedagogy’ (Hawker, 2010)

Digital Literacy: digital literacy defines those capabilities which fit an individual for living,

learning and working in a digital society” (JISC, 2014).

Digital Subscriber Line (DSL): Digital Subscriber Line technologies are designed to increase

bandwidth available over standard copper telephone wires. Includes IDSL, HDSL, SDSL,

ADSL, RADSL, VDSL, DSL-Lite and xDSL.

E-business: defined by the OECD as "automated business processes (both intra- and inter-

firm) over computer-mediated networks", with the imperative conditions that "the process

integrates tasks (i.e. a value chain) and extends beyond a standalone /individual application"

and that "the processes should describe functionality provided by a technology, not a

specific technology per se".

E-learning: learning conducted via electronic media, typically on the internet.

Electronic Commerce (e-Commerce): transactions conducted over IP (Internet Protocol)

based networks and over other computer mediated networks. The goods and services are

ordered over those networks, but the payment and ultimate delivery of the goods or service

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may be conducted on or offline. Orders received via telephone, facsimile and non-

interactive emails are not counted as electronic commerce.

Enterprise Trainer/Educator: individuals delivering vocational education and training in the

fields of entrepreneurship and business development; and acknowledge they may be

working in colleges, universities, training organisations or business support organisations

Extranet: a secure extension of an intranet that allows external users to access some parts

of an organisation’s intranet.

Intranet: an internal company communications network using IP-based communications

within an organisation.

MOOC: stands for “massive open online course”: massive, since there is generally no

participation limit, so thousands can enrol for the same course; open, as courses may be

accessed free of charge by many different kinds of learners who normally register with their

provider without having to satisfy any formal entry requirements; and online because the

whole course, including its assessment and additional services, is delivered online (even

though personal contact with tutors or other participants is possible)

Social Media: use of social media refers to the enterprise’s use of applications based on

internet technology or communication platforms for connecting, creating and exchanging

content online with customers, suppliers, partners or within the enterprise. Enterprises

using social media are considered to be those that have a user profile, an account or a user

licence depending on the requirements of the social media type. Social networks e.g.

Facebook, Linkedln, Xing, Viadeo, Yammer, etc; Blogs or microblogs e.g. Twitter; Multimedia

content shared websites e.g. YouTube, Flickr, Picassa, SlideShare; Wiki based knowledge

sharing sites e.g. Wikip

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Tables and Figures

Figure 1.0 Digital Entrepreneurship Framework Dimensions (Digital Entrepreneurship Forum

(2014)

Figure 2.0 Dimensional shifts describing youths in the digital age

Figure 3.0 The relationship between context and eLearning - Management in HEIs 2010

Table 1.0 EU Enterprises use of Social media, 2013

Table 2.0 Breakdown of Respondents

Table 3.0 Age profile of respondents

Table 4.0 Industry Sector Business Operates in

Table 5.0 Type of Service /Product Officering by Country

Table 6.0 Existence of a website in the enterprise

Table 7.0 Website Content

Table 8.0 Frequency website is updated

Table 9.0 Digital and social media tools used in the enterprise

Table 10.0 Business activities conducted via Digital Technologies

Table 11.0 Usage of Digital media over the next year

Table 12.0 Social Media practices – agree or disagree

Table 13.0 Participation in digital/social media training

Table 14.0 Interest in Digital Technology Training

Table 15.0 Digital training topics

Table 16.0 Perceived Opportunities from Digital Technologies

Table 17.0 Entrepreneurs Key Concerns about use of Digital Technology

Table 18.0 Digital technologies dominating small businesses over the next 2 years

Table 19.0 Respondent Profile

Table 20.0 Use of Digital Tools in Enterprise Education

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Table 21.0 Objectives for the use of Digital Technology in Enterprise Education

Table 22.0 Barriers Encountered with Digital Technology Usage

Table 23.0 Participation in Digital Training

Table 24.0 Areas highlighted for training

Table 25.0 Good practice examples of digital technology for Enterprise Learning

Table 26.0 Digital technologies influencing the role of the enterprise educator

Table 27.0 Respondent Profile by Country of Origin

Table 28.0 Age profile of Respondents

Table 29.0 Sample of Enterprise Modules completed by learners

Table 30.0 Tasks Digital Tools Used for in Learning

Table 31.0 Digital Training Needs

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1. Introduction

Digital advancements are building social as well as work (business) networks which are

closely aligned and linked for sharing ideas and information (Ontario 2008; Tanuri 2010)

across and between personal and business contexts. Socially, digital technologies are

increasingly embedded in individual’s lives and viewed as a central appendix or a natural

part of communication and conversation, how people behave in family, work and

educational contexts.

This changing profile of learner has consequences for the educational provider. The so

called net-generation of learners are immersed in a networked world of digital technology

which is an entrenched part of their culture and society; behave differently; possess

different social characteristics; adopt different ways of using and making sense of

information and have different expectations about life and learning and thus this places new

pressures and challenges for educators at the individual level and for educational

institutions at a more strategic level. Educators need to embrace the use of technology and

how it influences programme content, design, delivery and assessment and how they

engage with digitally or otherwise with the net-generation learner. At the educator level

resources must be afforded to making the necessary technological applications and

platforms available to educators and learners.

From the business perspective and in particular the small firm arena, digital technologies

hold potential for the creation of new businesses and opportunities including, innovation,

new ways of engaging with customers, higher revenue streams, faster times ‘to-market’,

enhanced service provision, reduced costs and increased productivity. While small firms are

increasing their digital footprint and are more active in website development, they are less

active in integrating and capitalising on the potential of the ever increasing array of digital

technologies, in particular engaging in e-commerce; selling to international customers via e-

commerce and mobile marketing, thus missing out on market expansion and sales

opportunities (Ettlie and Pavlou, 2006; Kohli and Grover, 2008; Rai et al. 2012).

Overall, the ever increasing digitalised economies, driven by a more mobile and digitalised

consumer and broader societal trends are creating pressure on entrepreneurs and small

firms to develop ‘E’capabilities and competencies encompassed under the umbrella of ‘e-

leadership’ skills and further to acquire resources suitable for conducting business in the

‘Digital Era’ or in an increasingly Digitalised Society. Recommendations on how small firms

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can develop e-leadership skills are debated in current literature and are highlighted as a

priority area for action in national and EU industry and Information Communications policy

documents.

In recognition of the necessity to enhance the digital capabilities and competencies of

entrepreneurs and owner-managers the DIGA project will identify and develop interventions

to improve the eleadership capacity and capabilities for the deployment of digital tools and

strategies in small firms. The DIGA project will design, test and implement a digital skills

competency for VET trainers to enable them to support learners within SMEs more

effectively and encourage greater adoption of digital and ICT tools. Furthermore, it builds on

and extends the learnings of a previous EU funded Transfer of Innovation collaborative

project, e-Business Enterprise Learning for Women (e-BEL) whose objective was to evaluate

the use and application of Information Communications Technology (ICT) in female owner-

managed small firms. This cross-cultural study comprised of partners from United Kingdom;

Slovenia; Norway and Ireland. The results of the research informed the design and

development of more appropriate and targeted ICT training interventions, which were

tested and delivered to a selection of female entrepreneurs at varying, stages of business

development. The findings feed into this study and whilst the focus of e-BEL was on female

entrepreneurs it will be interesting to determine if similar digital and ICT usage and

adoption issues emerge across a non-gender specific sample of entrepreneurs.

The strategic imperative for a composite set of e-skills and e-leadership competencies poses

challenges for educational and training institutions, trainers and consultants who work with

emerging entrepreneurs to identify the most appropriate digital competency programmes

that have impact at the personal and business performance levels. To ensure that the supply

of digital training content is relevant, timely and appropriate for the needs of the small firm

and the personal needs of the entrepreneur requires an understanding of both their current

digital practices and what digital technologies will impact on their future business activities.

Furthermore and related is a determination of the current status and adoption of digital

practices by educators and trainers when delivering enterprise related modules as a means

of identifying their capability to deliver digital training to entrepreneurial population.

Therefore, to develop appropriate digital content and devise the most appropriate delivery

mechanisms educators need to understand the profile, mind-set and indeed expectations

of the learner or their ‘learning identity’ – the more composite profile of the learner beyond

demographics to include their digital persona. Given the claims made about the net-

generation of learner and their demands from educators there is a clear imperative for

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educators and policy-makers to investigate these assumptions further to remove conjecture

and perceptions of what is said about the net- generation of learners. This evidence must

make a deeper connection with the role of the educator and what is relevant and necessary

learning to prepare learners for the world of work as the drivers of the use of digital

technologies as opposed to being a follower of technologies.

The DIGA project research adopted a two-tier approach investigating both theoretically and

empirically the role and practices of digital technology amongst a tripod of inter related

stakeholders, namely, entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs as learners and enterprise educators

(those engaged in the teaching, training and competency design and delivery to small and

medium firms).

The first tier involved a comprehensive theoretical review of the extant literature and policy

initiatives which draws attention to contemporary perspectives on the changing landscape

of digital technology and its impact on how, when and where business transactions are

undertaken and their subsequent consequences for entrepreneurs at the various stages of

their entrepreneurial journey of business start-up and growth. Furthermore the results of

the review highlighted the primary issues that merited investigation in the empirical study.

The second tier, the empirical multi-country study is an important mechanism of reaching

out to stakeholders in the entrepreneur, educational and learner arenas as a means of

establishing their current and future needs and provides detail for the components of a

digital competency framework.

Building on the foundation presented from tier one of the study an empirical multi

stakeholder perspective was decided upon to elicit feedback from entrepreneurs,

entrepreneurial learners (future entrepreneurs) and enterprise educators/trainers. This first

hand contact with these stakeholders provides a more nationalised first hand understanding

of what is happening in the small firm in relation to digital technology. The inclusion of

respondents at various stages of the entrepreneurial journey, entrepreneurs as learners and

a mix of early stage and established entrepreneurs allowed for capturing differences that

might exist with individuals at the various stages of the digital-continuum spectrum or

between the ‘digital native’ or the ‘new millennium entrepreneurial learner’ categories.

This is important as any competency training programme will need to balance content and

delivery amongst and between the digital native and digital immigrant spectrum.

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This report combines the aggregate findings of the literature review and the findings of the

multi-stakeholder empirical study and is accordingly presented in two main sections. The

first section presents a comprehensive review of the literature and policy documents on the

role and emergence of digital technology in the entrepreneurial, educator and

entrepreneurial learner context. The literature review commences with an overview of

major policy imperatives which have emerged primarily from EU level giving direction to and

informing the application of digital in broader business, educational and learner contexts.

The next section of the report examines the profile, characteristics and requirements of the

net-generation of learner and presents the challenges enterprise educators face as these

learners and their accompanying technology cross the classroom threshold. The business

stakeholder perspective is reviewed from the early stage entrepreneur and established

small firm context and determines what is known about the status and use of digital

technologies in existing and start-up businesses and the challenges they encounter as they

engage with a more digitally tuned market place. The small firm is subject of the research

given their economic and social significance and that entrepreneurs and established small

firms require assistance in this area primarily due to a lack of digital knowledge, digital skills

deficiencies and a lack of appreciation of the contribution that it can make to their business

as suggested by further research (Digital Agenda for Europe: A Europe 2020: European

Commission 2010); (ACCA 2010); Williams et al., (2010); ICT, E-Business and SMEs (2006);

National Digital Strategy for Ireland (2014)).

The second section of the report commences with the research methodology describing the

stages of the design, administration of the surveys, the analysis of the data and the issues

and learnings accrued from the process of undertaking a multi stakeholder holder survey

across seven countries. This leads into the presentation of the summary results from the

entrepreneurs survey which explores themes such as the use of digital technologies, their

objectives if any for social and digital media; allocation of budget to digital technologies;

their planned use of digital tools; the benefits accruing from digital media; their approach to

measuring and capturing the performance of digital media activities; their previous

participation in digital training; digital topics they would like to develop competencies in and

how they prefer such training to be delivered. Subsequently, the results of the supply side

or the educator, defined in the broader sense to include individuals who are engaged in

training, mentoring, education of entrepreneurs at various stages of the entrepreneurial

start up and business growth continuum are presented. The focus of this survey was to

ascertain the use and adoption of digital technology in their professional role and to

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determine what extent they perceived it as a benefit to programme delivery, obtain insights

into the barriers and challenges they encounter with digital technology and identify if they

had received training in the area of digital technology and, if they were interested in having

their skills and knowledge in digital technology enhanced and if so, what was their preferred

mode of delivery of such training.

The next section of the report presents the findings from the younger enterprise

entrepreneurial learner – or more closely aligning with the digital native to determine their

digital technology practices in a personal and as an entrepreneurial learner capacity;

identification of what technologies they use, perceived benefits arising from their use, the

challenges they encounter in their use and what they perceive as trends in digital which will

impact on their professional entrepreneurial career.

This multi stakeholder approach adds value and novelty to the research as it provides a

composite understanding of the needs of different related groups to identify common

themes emerging, areas of diversion and issues at the demand and supply levels of digital

training.

Moreover, the research adds a contribution to the supply side of digital training and

competency development domain as this stakeholder is central to the development of

relevant and appropriate e-leadership skills and competencies for entrepreneurs but yet are

a relatively under researched topic and one which merits attention if the necessary digital

competences are to be developed in the entrepreneurial population. Furthermore, the

findings provide a method of conducting a training needs analysis in digital technology for

enterprise educators and trainers which is lacking to date in the literature.

Finally, the multi stakeholder perspective endorses and supports a call in policy for

‘cooperation between enterprises and higher education as the development of digital skills

relies on the interplay and multiple stakeholders within and external to educational

institutions to feed in and inform what digital skills and knowledge entrepreneurial learners

require and to direct educators in digital programme design, delivery and assessment’

(Digital Agenda for Europe: A Europe 2020; European Commission 2010; ACCA 2010;

Williams et al., 2010; ICT, E-Business and SMEs 2006; National Digital Strategy for Ireland

2014).

The feedback from the empirical study will indicate if there is a digital bridge or divide

between the net- generation of leaner and the educator and if so, it will propose how the

bridge can be managed. Finally, the review of the literature will also determine what are

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the barriers and challenges faced by entrepreneurs in adopting digital technologies across

their business functions as a means of promoting remedial training and development

interventions to enhance the e-leadership skills and competencies amongst the broader

population of entrepreneurial learners.

The report concludes with some suggestions to help enterprise educators effectively meet

the needs of the net-generation of entrepreneurial learners while preparing them for the

21st century workplace. The learnings from the small firm sector will inform the design of

policy interventions and will identify for trainers and consultants what type, level and

content of digital training and mentoring assistance is required by entrepreneurs to become

more efficient digital users.

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The emerging role of digital technologies - a multi stakeholder

perspective: A review of the literature and policy

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2. The Policy Context

2.1. Enhancing ICT, Digital Skills Capabilities – the SME Policy perspective

With the rapidly ever-changing business and technology landscape, the need for digital skills

and literacy is imperative and how these can be developed is emerging as a more prevalent

or voiced topic in EU and National policy documents. Digital literacy consists of the ability to

access digital media and ICT, to understand and critically evaluate different aspects of digital

media and /media contents and to communicate effectively in a variety of contexts. Digital

competence, as defined in the EC Recommendation on Key Competences (EC, 2006)

involves the confident and critical use of ICT for employment, learning, self-development

and participation in society. This broad definition of digital competence provides the

necessary context (i.e. the knowledge, skills and attitudes) for working, living and learning in

the knowledge society.

Initially initiatives on digital technology were incorporated into the broader agenda for

enhancing the use of ICT in small firms from an infrastructural hardware domain and the

necessary skills, competencies or ‘soft skills’ perspectives. The European Commission

believes that the 'smart' use of information and communication technology (ICT) by

companies is a critical factor for success in innovation, competitiveness and growth and

recognised that smaller companies have to follow suit or risk being left out of digital supply

chain of activities. More recent EU policy initiatives focus specifically on digital

competencies and a focus of efforts on building ‘Digital Economies and Societies’ which

emphasize the emergence of digital as a more pervasive influence on the social

environment in addition to economic and commercial perspectives and from the

entrepreneur and enterprise viewpoints.

The following provides a brief overview of the trajectory of policies developed relating to

advancing ICT and digital technology and improving digital literacy in business, with a

particular emphasis on entrepreneurs and small and medium firms(SMEs) and secondly, in

the educational arena.

In 2001, the European Commission launched the Go Digital initiative, ‘Go Digital’ (2001-

2003), an umbrella policy covering many activities to support SMEs in using ICT for doing

business and to increase the use of the internet as a manes of conducting business. The Go

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Digital initiative specifically focussed on identifying the obstacles encountered by SMEs in

adopting ICT and ecommerce and proposed specific actions to help SMEs increase their

adoption of ICT. These support interventions were implemented with the assistance of the

European Information Centres network at national and regional levels and concentrated on

three action initiatives which contained a number of sub actions. The three actions focussed

on, firstly, creating a favourable environment for electronic commerce and

entrepreneurship; secondly; increasing the take-up of electronic commerce amongst firms

by generating more awareness of the benefits of ICT and developing skills in this area;

thirdly, developing ICT skills and competencies by supporting industry-led initiatives for new

ICT curricula and mentoring for ICT adoption in SMEs.

In tandem with the above policy, The European e-Business Support Network (eBSN)for SMEs

ran from 2005 to 2012 as an open policy coordination platform for e-business that brought

together over 200 decision makers and renowned experts in the field to improve the

effectiveness of public SME policies in fostering competitiveness by promoting the

innovative use of ICT. The outputs from eBSN recognised the need for SMEs to make smart

use of information technologies to integrate into global industrial value chains and the need

to improve inter-operability and other framework conditions to make it easier for SMEs to

connect with their customers and suppliers along a sector’s value chain. Since 2005, the

policies have focussed on encouraging market forces to accelerate ICT enabled change in

specific manufacturing and service sectors and increased participation in global digital

supply chains.

The report ‘Doing business in the Digital Age (2013)’ engaged in intensive dialogue with

stakeholders to determine the role of digital technology and the challenges in its adoption in

SMEs. The report identified 'five pillars' that describe the key factors influencing

entrepreneur’s adoption of digital that require attention in policy. The five areas of action

incorporate:

- reinforcing the digital knowledge base;

- catalysing a digital business-friendly environment;

- easing access to finance;

- promoting digital skills and talent;

- reinforcing a digital entrepreneurial culture

A broader level EU analysis ‘Europe 2020’ strategy, an overarching vision of Europe's social

market economy for the 21st century, identified that ICT issues and challenges to be

addressed are no longer about fostering the mere adoption of ICT by enterprises, but about

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promoting and enhancing the smart use of digitally based applications by removing existing

barriers. The EU 2020 policy initiative signalled the radically changing global business

environment, where technology, ICT and skills were becoming increasingly important for

international competitiveness as international value chains become increasingly

interconnected.

The Europe 2020 strategy document specified seven flagship initiatives and three of these

initiatives still have links with ICT-related challenges and objectives and can thus be seen as

the continuation of earlier information society policy strategies. The three initiatives are the

“Digital Agenda”, the “Innovation Union” and the “Industrial Policy for the Globalisation

Era”:

1) The ‘Digital Agenda for Europe’ (DAE), launched in 2010, is a key strand of the

Commission's EU 2020 strategy. Its aim is to establish the conditions for sustained

digital growth in Europe and to deliver ‘sustainable economic and social benefits from a

digital single market, based on fast and ultra-fast internet and interoperable

applications’ (Commission's EU 2020). Fragmented digital markets, as well as a lack of

inter-operability, are identified as barriers to be removed in order to achieve this. On 19

April 2012, the Commission launched a dedicated social media platform to prepare and

gather input for the review of the DAE. This platform was the central hub of a broad

approach for stakeholder engagement around the DAE, which aimed to:

- Reach out to and engage with stakeholders, including those not normally involved in

EU policy;

- Facilitate contact and collaboration amongst stakeholders; and

- Stimulate discussions and summarise results to generate meaningful policy input for

enhancing digital expertise.

2) The Innovation Union states that ‘perhaps the biggest challenge for the EU and its

member States is to adopt a much more strategic approach to innovation’ with

innovation becoming an overarching policy objective. This views ICT as an enabler of

business activities and addresses ICT and digital technologies in a more strategic

companywide perspective as opposed to being a function on its own. In essence ICT and

digital technology are facilitators and enablers that help to deliver innovation.

3) Industrial Policy for the Globalisation Era initiative sets out a strategy that aims to boost

growth and jobs by maintaining and supporting a strong, diversified and competitive

industrial base in Europe offering well-paid jobs while becoming more resource efficient.

Linked to this is the need to develop digital skills and infrastructure.

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These initiatives are thematically linked with the underpinning themes launched by the

eBSN reflecting the consistency and ongoing focus afforded to the development of digital

technologies in small firms.

In 2014, under the umbrella of the Entrepreneurship 2020 Action Plan, the Strategic Policy

Forum on Digital Entrepreneurship was inaugurated in Brussels. The Digital

Entrepreneurship Forum reinforces the importance of dialogue between industry, and the

scientific and political communities, with the aim of shaping an ambitious EU vision and a

European roadmap that will fuel digital entrepreneurship in Europe. The Forum advises the

Commission on policy issues and actions to foster digital entrepreneurship and will promote

the development of policy by EU countries at national and regional level. The scope of the

Forum covers topics such as:

- new business opportunities for jobs and growth;

- a favourable digital business environment;

- the digital transformation of traditional industry;

- access to finance;

- e-leadership skills;

- digital entrepreneurial culture;

- national and regional digital entrepreneurship policies.

It is expected to deliver an intermediate report in 2015 that will include the state of play,

new business opportunities, challenges, and a strategy to enhance digital entrepreneurship

in Europe. It is clear that the emphasis is currently on digital technologies and their role and

impact in the broader business context and ever more so in the small firm as is highlighted

in the Digital Entrepreneurship Forum 2014.

The Digital Entrepreneurship Forum (2014) and Digital Entrepreneurship Monitor focus on

the increasing importance of digital entrepreneurship, which is described as all new

ventures and the transformation of existing businesses by creating and using novel digital

technologies. Digital enterprises are characterised by a high intensity of utilisation of novel

digital technologies (particularly social, big data, mobile and cloud solutions) to improve

business operations, invent new business models, sharpen business intelligence and engage

with customers and stakeholders.

The Forum proposed a framework providing an overview of the areas where policymakers

should provide support in for the development of digital enterprises leading to the “Doing

Business in the Digital Age” initiative. The initiative was based on the findings of research

completed in a comparative analysis of national strategies and private initiatives to foster

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digital entrepreneurship in the United Kingdom, Sweden, Berlin/Germany, Silicon Valley/US

and Singapore. The study proposed a five pillar strategy framework and a categorisation of

13 areas or components for policy intervention. The resultant Digital Entrepreneurship

framework model is presented below:

Figure 1.0 Digital Entrepreneurship Framework Dimensions, Digital Entrepreneurship Forum (2014)

The following expands on the primary action items planned under each pillar:

Pillar I: Digital knowledge base and ICT market

- Support all businesses to embrace digital technologies and transform the way goods are

made and delivered.

- Foster innovation by promoting the visibility of digital technologies and

commercialization of new digital services and ideas.

- Encourage the start-up and up-scaling of digitized enterprises and new innovative

businesses.

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Pillar II: Digital business environment

- Improve the ease of doing digital business to facilitate entry to markets and stimulate

demand and the supply of digital technologies.

- Develop and enhance ICT infrastructure, trusted electronic payment systems, trust

marks and trademark registration systems to boost the use, ease of access and trust in

digital markets.

Pillar III: Access to finance

- Enhanced access to finance will assist the creation, survival and growth of digital

entrepreneurs.

- Traditional and innovative forms of lending should be developed to supports

entrepreneurs.

- Fiscal and tax frameworks should be enhanced to enable all businesses to embrace

digital technologies.

Pillar IV: Digital skills and e-leadership

- A supportive education system that focuses on ICT and e-skills will strengthen the digital

entrepreneurial environment.

- Increase the mobility, quantity and quality of high-end, multi-disciplinary digital skills

and entrepreneurial talent.

Pillar V: Entrepreneurial Culture

- A supportive entrepreneurial culture is fundamental to the development of digital

entrepreneurs.

- Enhancing the digital entrepreneurial culture will improve the image of digital

entrepreneurs and promote their role in society.

These actions provide an underlying logic for digital intervention to support all

entrepreneurs and small firms and not just digital entrepreneurs in becoming more

digitalised across business functions. Additionally, the interventions adopt a holistic and

integrated perspective emphasising that digital technologies as a cross functional

application, a source of innovation and efficiencies and a means of generating closer

engagement with the marketplace. For these reasons it is important to identify the best

mechanisms for developing digital and e-leadership skills within the entrepreneurs and

owner-managers of established small firms.

Additionally, as part of this Forum, the Digital Entrepreneurship Monitor was devised to

collect and communicate information about initiatives and policies, relevant statistical

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indicators, opportunities and framework conditions for digital and ICT application success.

The Monitor has the further objective to collate the key technological and digital market

trends, emerging digital business opportunities, new business paradigms and their impact

on the European economy. The information feeding into the Monitor will provide important

and useful benchmarking outputs to gauge the progression of digital technology in SMEs

across Europe.

Consistent amongst the policy initiatives is the recognition that as small firms are

increasingly relying on information and communications technology (ICT) and digital

expertise to operate their business processes; to innovate in the design and provision

products and services; enhance their productivity and competitiveness and therefore the

use and responsibility for the use of digital technologies must be distributed across more

than one person in the enterprise. To fully leverage and maximise the benefits of digital

technologies, small firms accordingly need to develop corresponding and appropriate e-

skills and competencies which requires time, effort and resources to be deployed across all

individuals and functions in the business. These relevant skills are increasingly promoted

under the umbrella of e-leadership skills and competencies as is highlighted in Pillar 4 of

Digital Entrepreneurship Framework Dimensions (as presented in Figure 1.0).

Managers, entrepreneurs and business executives must have e-competences to grow,

export and be connected to the global digital markets. In a digital economy, e-leadership

skills are essential’ (Catinat, 2014) and as noted in contemporary EU Digital related policy

documents. According to E-Skills for Jobs 2014, e-leadership comprises a body of

knowledge and a set of competences which an individual requires for initiating and guiding

ICT-related innovation at all levels of enterprises, from the start-up to the largest of

corporations and from private to public institutions. E-leadership capabilities are needed to

exploit opportunities provided by ICT, notably the Internet; to ensure more efficient and

effective performance of different types of organisations; to explore possibilities for new

ways of conducting business/administrative and organisational processes; and or to

establish new businesses (E-Skills for Jobs 2014).

The European Commission DG Enterprise launched the ‘LEAD – E-leadership Skills for Small

and Medium Sized Enterprises’ in January 2014. This Commission initiative is

complemented by the ‘New curricula for e-leadership’ and focuses on entrepreneurs,

managers and advanced ICT users in SMEs, start-ups and gazelles. These initiatives develop

targeted actions for start-ups and fast growing SMEs to provide them with relevant e-

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leadership skills and qualifications for entrepreneurs, managers and advanced ICT users that

are recognised trans-nationally.

Additionally, a series of initiatives are in place, which firmly endorse EU policy objectives to

enhance the digital, and e-leadership competencies of small firms such as:

A major pan-European awareness raising campaign and e-mentoring ecosystem to

catalyse and support new business ideas. The objective is to sensitise entrepreneurs on

the changing business landscape and the new business opportunities offered by novel


European e-mentors ecosystem to inspire and support new entrepreneurs and

intrapreneurs. Activities will include training, advice and hands-on coaching on how to

do business in the digital age and match-making events among stakeholders to explore

new partnerships. This action started in January 2014 and will run for two years.

Completion of studies to analyse competences and e-leadership skills, focusing on

scientific and creative disciplines and managerial and entrepreneurial skills to address

new technologies and markets.

Specific actions for Web entrepreneurs such as: i) a Start-up Europe Partnership to

unlock expertise, mentoring, technology and services; ii) a Web Entrepreneurs Leaders

Club to bring together world-class web entrepreneurs and strengthen the web

entrepreneurial culture in Europe; iii) a European network of web business accelerators;

iv) work with European investors in order to increase the flow of venture capital and

crowd-funding into web start-ups; and v) Fostering web talent by stimulating the

emergence of Massive Online Open Courses (MOOC) and the setting up of platforms for

mentoring and skill building.

Establishment of a pan-European awareness raising campaign (Watify) and an e-

mentoring ecosystem (Euro-mentors Association for Digital Entrepreneurs) have been

set up to help European entrepreneurs catalyse and support new business opportunities

offered by digital technologies. An awareness-raising campaign baptised 'Watify' ('What

if I…?') aims to help all types of companies to overcome the doubts they face when

launching their digital business or when transforming their traditional business using


The Euro-mentors Association for Digital Entrepreneurs: The Euro-mentors Association

for Digital Entrepreneurs will inspire and support new entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs.

Activities will include training, advice and hands-on coaching on how to do business in

the digital age and match-making events among stakeholders to explore new

partnerships. The initiative is supported and funded by the Commission as part of its

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strategy to stimulate digital entrepreneurship. The ecosystem will bring together

Europe’s most prominent individual mentors and mentoring organisations.

In summary, the ever increasing digitalised economy, driven by a more mobile and

digitalised consumer and broader societal trends, is creating pressure on entrepreneurs and

small firms to develop capabilities and competences and acquire resources suitable for

conducting business in the ‘Digital Era’ and to operate in an increasingly digitalised society.

Accordingly, EU small firm policy has provided a number of initiatives to embed the

necessary key e-leadership competencies and capabilities at the enterprise as opposed to

individual level, signalling the imperative for country specific interventions which need to be

tailored to accommodate in the first instance, the state of advancement and the digital

infrastructure in existence and, secondly, the level of adoption of and associated influencing

of digital technologies by emerging entrepreneurs and established small firms. These

interventions must be guided by empirical feedback from entrepreneurs and owner-

managers on what their specific needs are.

Whilst it is imperative to build digitalised capabilities and competencies at the entrepreneur

and owner-manager level, it is consequently necessary to ensure that employees or aspiring

entrepreneurs possess the relevant digital skills across the functional areas of the small firm

to enable them to successfully grow and innovate in the ‘Digital Era’.

In essence, EU policy imperative strives to input innovative transformation of the provision

of education and training to promote objectives of Europe 2020 strategy on digital

technology. Central to the ethos of the Europe 2020 is the objective for economies to

achieve ‘smart, sustainable and inclusive growth notably by equipping citizens with skills

and competences which the European economy and European society need in order to

remain competitive and innovative, but also by helping to promote social cohesion and

inclusion’ (Europe 2020). This objective calls on educators to rethink and reconfigure the

content, mode of teaching and learning to incorporate relevant digital knowledge and

competencies which are transferable into the tasks required for starting and growing small

enterprises. Thus, a review of the policy remit for the educational sector is undertaken to

determine what initiatives exist to enable the educators to deliver the digitalised graduate

the workplace demands and digitalised skills for an entrepreneurial career.

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2.2. Enhancing ICT, Digital Skills Capabilities – the Higher Educator Institution (HEI) Policy

perspective

While education remains the responsibility of individual EU Member States, the European

Commission provides funding and works on several macro and strategic policy initiatives

which are aligned with employment generation and enhancing the skills base of graduates

and the workforce to accommodate those required by the changing workplace

environment. Evident in the recent educational policy documents is the focus on ICT needs

of pupils and learners up to 16 years of age and more general population of educators

expanding into higher educational institutions. Less attention in policy is afforded to how

educational institutions accommodate the digital and ICT needs of learners from 18 years

onwards, adult learners, vocational education or lifelong professional development learners.

This research (DIGA project) will focus on the dual role of, firstly the digital needs and

behaviours of young people, aspiring entrepreneurs and the comparison of the role and

adoption of digital technology by educators in Higher Educational Institutions in the design

and delivery of enterprise and entrepreneurship programmes. The imperative for a more

digitalised small firm workplace heightens the importance of ensuring graduates are

prepared and equipped to secure employment in such a workplace or engage in an

entrepreneurial career or act in an entrepreneurial and innovative manner. The following is

a synopsis of the EU policy initiatives considered relevant to increase the practices of digital

technology in teaching and learning in Higher Educational Institutions.

In December 2006, the European Parliament and Council produced the results of five years

of research defined eight key competences required by graduates to engage in a more

productive manner in the workplace. Amongst these competencies as listed below is the

need for digital competencies.

- Communication in the mother tongue

- Communication in a foreign language

- Mathematical competence and basic competences in science and technology

- Digital competence

- Learning to learn

- Social and civic competence

- Sense of initiative and entrepreneurship

- Cultural awareness and expression.

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The report stressed that all these competences should be regarded as equally important,

since each can contribute to a successful life in the knowledge society and to some extent,

they overlap and interlock as they play a role in developing competencies enabling

individuals to perform a more productive and valued role in work and society in general. In

September 2011, the European Commission published a new agenda for modernisation of

Europe's higher education systems (COM, 2011) which identified several areas for reform in

the area of education and training as follows:

- Increasing the number of higher education graduates;

- Improving the quality and relevance of teaching and researcher training, to equip

graduates with the knowledge and core transferable competences they need to succeed

in high-skill occupations;

- Providing more opportunities for learners to gain additional skills through study or

training abroad and to encourage cross-border cooperation to boost higher education

performance;

- Strengthen the 'knowledge triangle', linking education, research and business;

- Creating effective governance and funding mechanisms in support of excellence.

These tasks link into and contribute to the goals of Europe 2020 to increase employability of

learners and recognise that the skills required must address and accommodate industry

needs which are increasingly digitalised in nature.

In its ‘Communication on e-Skills for the 21st Century and the Digital Agenda for Europe

(2012)’ the Commission presented a long-term EU e-skills strategy. Central informant in this

strategy was the findings that there are still 21% of European workers who believe that their

ICT skills are currently insufficient for them to change job within one year. Additionally, the

European Commission released in April 2013 two reports on ‘Towards a European Quality

Label for ICT Industry Training and Certification. The second report was on e-leadership

skills, titled ‘e-Skills for Competitiveness and Innovation: Vision, Roadmap and Foresight

Scenarios’. Consensual amongst these reports was the necessity to up skill and prepare

learners for ICT and a digitalised workplace.

More recently, the Digital Entrepreneurship Forum (2014) (as discussed in the previous

section) incorporated in a general sense into its pillars of success, the need to develop

greater digital and e-leadership skills which can be achieved through a supportive education

system that focuses on ICT and e-skills and increasing the mobility, quantity and quality of

high-end, multi-disciplinary digital skills and entrepreneurial talent. It also considers the role

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of higher education institutions in informing and equipping individuals for the digital

transformation of the workplace.

The Europe 2020 strategy acknowledges that a fundamental transformation of education

and training is needed to address the new digital skills and competences that will be

required if Europe is to remain competitive, overcome the current economic crisis and grasp

new opportunities (Breckie and Puine, 2014). Indeed, the importance of education is

highlighted as a priority area in a number of initiatives contained in the Europe 2020

strategy, i.e. the Agenda for New Skills and Jobs, Youth on the Move, the Digital Agenda,

and the Innovation Union Agenda, and also in the latest EC Communication on 'Opening up

education' (Breckie and Puine, 2014; European Commission, 2013a).

Building on the ongoing focus on how best to develop digital skills the Digital Agenda firmly

recognises the revolutionary potential that information and communication technology

(ICT) offers to boost growth, increase productivity and improve the welfare of citizens,

consumers and society. It proposes seven key strategic imperatives as listed below and

within these are a number of tasks aimed at operationalising and implementing

programmes to enhance digital skills:

1. Digital single market.

2. Inter-operability and standards.

3. Trust and security.

4. Fast and ultra-fast internet access.

5. Research and innovation.

6. Digital literacy, skills and inclusion.

7. ICT-enabled benefits for EU society.

Within the frameworks of the Bologna Process and the European Union Modernisation

Agenda for Higher Education, the European Union's High-Level Group on the Modernisation

of Higher Education was established with a view to making recommendations to improve

the quality of teaching and learning and to achieve access and equality in the provision of

education (Modernisation of Higher Education Report, 2014). This report highlighted that

the landscape of learning has changed dramatically with increasing opportunities for open

and distance learning as technological capacities are evolving with increasing rapidity when

it comes to the speed, interactivity and potential reach of new technologies and online

platforms. These changes are viewed as an enabler for and can underpin efforts towards

more learner-centred teaching. This report emphasised that with technology comes positive

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opportunities for educators who have at their disposal a wide range of materials in a variety

of formats, which can improve the quality, and diversity of the curriculum.

A key recommendation from this was ‘that the integration of digital technologies and

pedagogies should form an integral element of higher education institutions’ strategies for

teaching and learning. Clear goals and objectives should be defined and necessary

organisational support structures established to drive implementation’. This

recommendation provides central foundations on which sustainable digital teaching and

learning strategies are embedded in the broader higher educational institution strategy,

resourced at institutional level and takes cognisance of the need for educators to be up-

skilled in the necessary digital skills and competencies.

Implementing digital technology is an important first step in its indoctrination/ inculcation

into the culture of the institution, however the sustainability of such efforts is very much

dependent on up skilling and training educators to understand its diverse uses and

applications and should be encouraged to extend beyond using the technology per se, but

digital as a process and content. Additionally, resources, financial and technical, need to be

allocated for the digital technological infrastructure. The Modernisation of Higher Education

Report (2014) included recommendations at institutional and educator level to successfully

and sustainably engage with digital technology in the learning experience of the learner.

These recommendations are as follows:

- National authorities should facilitate the development of a national competency

framework for digital skills. This should be integrated into national professional

development frameworks for higher education educators.

- All staff teaching in higher education institutions should receive training in relevant

digital technologies and pedagogies as part of initial training and continuous

professional development.

- National funding frameworks should create incentives, especially in the context of new

forms of performance-based funding, for higher education institutions to open up

education, to develop more flexible modes of delivery and to diversify their learner

population.

An overriding conclusion across all EU policy documents is that the success and

sustainability of policy objectives is dependent on the cooperation between enterprises and

higher education, reinforcing the belief that the development of digital skills relies on the

inter-play of multiple stakeholders within and external to educational institutions to feed in

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and inform what digital skills and knowledge entrepreneurial learners require and which can

be used to direct educators in digital programme design, delivery and assessment.

For the purposes of the DIGA research, three stakeholder groups are considered, the

educational/trainer stakeholder, the entrepreneur who is core to the debate and the

entrepreneurial learner perspective. The role of the educator/trainer is reviewed in the

context of a very changing profile of the learner with a greater focus on imparting skills

which go beyond subject specific skills removing educators from their comfort zones. The

role and response of the educational institutions is assessed to determine the institutional

vision and commitment to a digitalised curriculum, provision of technical resources and

contribution to the professional development of the educator to be sufficiently competent

to deliver digital skills and competencies.

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3. The Role of Digital Technology in the Education/Training Sector

3.1. Understanding the profile of the digital learner

The greatest adopters of the advancements of digital technologies are children, teenagers

and young adults who more eagerly use this technology as part of their lifestyle. Thus, from

the digital providers’ perspective these groups are an increasing source of interest and

research to better understand how they behave with technology. These learners, referred

to as the Net-Generation (Jones and Shao, 2011; Bennett, Maton and Kervin, 2008), also

known as the New Millennium Learners (OECD, 2008) or New Millennium’s have grown up

in a digital culture and lifestyle that impacts on their learning styles and preferences. The

net-generation is able to intuitively use a variety of digital devices and navigate the internet

as it has been a natural part of their growing up and thus expectations and perceptions of

the role and value of digital technologies is viewed as part of their identity. While containing

many similar characteristics, the net-generation of learner is not a homogeneous group and

can be categorised according to their familiarity and use of digital technologies, which is

reflected in a spectrum of digital natives to digital immigrants. The term digital native is

used to describe people born after 1980 (Prensky, 2001) and applies to a new group of

learners who are ‘native speakers’ of the digital language of computers, videos, video

games, social media and other sites on the internet. The digital native has never known any

other way of life and innately behave, speak and communicate, as they only know how

(Spear, 2007). Digital natives are characterised as having access to networked digital

technologies and the skills to use those technologies as parts of their lives and daily

activities mediating social interaction, friendships, civic activities and hobbies.

Similarly, White and Le Cornu (2011), Ramanau, Cross, and Healing (2010) highlight that the

rapid technological advances, most notably, in the advent of social networking platforms,

enable sharing, promoting and discussion about products and services on social channels to

a wide community in real time. The cultural effects of the social hyper connectivity brought

about by social media and mobile devices are often masked by shallow assessments of

technological functionality and the apparent capability of specific groups in consuming ‘new’

technology (Weinberg, 2009) as is the case with the digital native.

Other classifications of the digital user are described in terms such as the ‘digital settler’ and

‘digital immigrant’. While settlers grew up in an analog-only world, they have helped to

create and shape the digital world’s contours. They can be quite sophisticated in their use of

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these technologies, but also rely on traditional forms of analog interaction. Digital

immigrants are much less familiar with the digital environment. They may have learned how

to write emails or use social networks late in life but they are rather insecure in the

everyday use of more advanced digital technologies.

Although it is helpful to classify the nature of the digital learner as a precursor for

understanding their behaviour, it is noteworthy that these neat classifications are not

identical or homogeneous between or within the groups of ‘digital natives’ or within ‘digital

immigrant’ classifications. In addressing this, Helsper and Eynon (2009) analysed the

different aspects of what a digital native is by exploring whether it is determined by age,

experience, or breadth of digital use. Similarly, Kennedy et. al, (2008) indicated that it was

important not to ignore the role of factors such as gender (Selwyn, 2008) and academic

discipline on the difference between levels of familiarity and creative application of digital

technologies within the digital native cohort of the net generation. Bennett, Maton and

Kervin (2008), for example, described some accounts of digital natives as having an

academic form of a moral panic or distaste for technology and thus concluded that

generation or age solely does not explain differences in how learners use technology and

other proponents of the digital native personal must be considered as to their impact on the

adoption of digital technologies. White and Le Cornu (2011) draw attention to the

difficulties that a language-based analogy introduces when describing or stereotyping youth

behaviour to the possession and use of digital technology.

An interesting deliberation put forward by Bayne and Ross (2007) was that there is a

paradox at the centre of this debate is that age makes a difference on how people engage

with digital technology because each person is fixed by their generational position - you

either are or you are not a ‘native’. This is in agreement with previous research (Maton and

Kervin, 2008; White and Le Cornu, 2011) who caution against adopting a homogeneous set

of descriptors to participants who by age fall into the ‘digital native’ classification.

Bearing these deliberations in mind and that as technology emerges then learner behavior

will change on an ongoing basis and will be impacted upon by individual specific factors and

external situational, institutional, cultural and social groups involved in. These dimensional

shifts are described in Figure 2.0. This Figure shows a set of dimensional shifts that describe

learners in the digital age. The dimensions are presented in turn, but they interlink with

each other creating a complex set of intertwined cognitive skills.

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Figure 2.0 Dimensional shifts describing youths in the digital age (Brown 2011)

In order to facilitate the needs of the net-generation, it is important to obtain an insight into

their learning styles and what they expect of educators. In delivering on these expectations

the characteristics of the net-generation of learners as put forward by Oblinger and Oblinger

(2005) are helpful. These characteristics are summarised as follows:

Digitally Literate

Having grown up with widespread access to technology, the net-generation is able to

intuitively use a variety of Information Technology devices and navigate the Internet.

Although they are comfortable using technology without an instruction manual, their

understanding of the technology or source quality may be shallow. The net-generation is

more visually literate than previous generations; many express themselves using images.

They are able to weave together images, text and sound in a natural way. Their ability to

move between the real and the virtual is instantaneous, expanding their literacy well

beyond text. Because of the availability of visual media, their text literacy may be less

well developed than previous generations.

Connected to a technology or digital device

As long as they've been alive, the world has been a connected place and more than any

preceding generation they have seized on the potential of networked media. While

highly mobile, moving from work to classes to recreational activities, the net-generation

is always connected. The particular device may change depending on circumstance (for

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example, laptop, cell phone, IPad etc.) but they are constantly connected and always on.

The degree of digital expertise is related to confidence in the use of technologies, the

use of the Internet as a first port of call for information, and the use of the internet for

learning, as well as other activities (Helsper and Eynon 2009).

Immediate- sense of urgency

Whether it is the immediacy with which a response is expected or the speed at which

they are used to receiving information, the net-generation require it instantly. They

multi-task, moving quickly from one activity to another, sometimes performing them

simultaneously. They have fast response times, whether playing a game or responding

to emails or texts. In fact, more value may be placed on speed than on accuracy. They

expect information and ideas to be shared openly and freely and created in multi-model

ways (Doren and Asselin 2010).

Experiential and experimental

Most net-generation learners prefer to learn by doing rather by being told what to do.

Net-generation learners learn well through discovery - by exploring for themselves or

with their peers. This exploratory style enables them to better retain information and

use it in creative, meaningful ways. They prefer reading lecture notes online and view

interactive media such as power point presentation and digital images. In addition, they

like to work in groups or team work. They need for instant gratification and short

attention span. Also they emphasize learning by doing through technology and trial and

error is the metaphor they use for learning like in computer games.

Social-technologically

The net-generation of learner is considered to be prolific communicators, they gravitate

toward activities that promote and reinforce social interaction - whether IMing old

friends, teaming up in an internet game, posting web diaries (blogging) or forwarding

joke emails. The net-generation displays a striking openness to diversity, differences and

sharing; they are at ease meeting strangers on the internet. Many of their exchanges on

the internet are emotionally open, sharing very personal information about themselves.

The net-generation has developed a mechanism of inclusiveness that does not

necessarily involve personally knowing someone admitted to their group. Being a friend

of a friend is acceptable. They seek to interact with others, whether in their personal

lives, their online presence or in class. Extroverts can make their circle of friends even

larger. The perception of ‘social’ is changing for the more digitalised user, who spends

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most of their time socialising via technology. Then when launched into the classroom

and there is a need for the learner to reduce the dependence on technology and engage

in a face to face dialogue, the learner may feel challenged and indeed the educator, who

has to work harder to get the learner to engage and converse as part of the learning

process.

These characteristics inform and shape learner behavior in the classroom and how they

interact with their peers and educators alike and they also exhibit learning preferences

which are listed below. These are closely related to their characteristics, which

consequently influence how educators deliver content.

Preference for working in Teams

The net-generation often prefers to learn and work in teams. A peer-to-peer approach is

common, as well, where learners help each other. In fact, net-generation learners find

peers more credible than educators when it comes to determining what is worth paying

attention to and why so to.

Structure and Direction

The net-generation is very achievement oriented as a result, they like to know what it

will take to achieve a goal. Their preference is for structure rather than ambiguity.

Engagement and Experience

The net-generation is oriented toward inductive discovery or making observations,

formulating hypotheses and figuring out the rules. They crave interactivity. And the

rapid pace with which they like to receive information means they often choose not to

pay attention if a class is not interactive, unengaging or simply too slow. The net-

generation may need to be encouraged to stop experiencing and spend time reflecting

and learning from reflection.

Visual and Kinesthetic

The net-generation is more comfortable in image-rich environments than with text. They

will refuse to read large amounts of text, whether it involves a long reading assignment

or lengthy instructions. In a study that altered instructions from a text-based step-by-

step approach to one that used a graphic layout, refusals to do the assignment dropped

and post-test scores increased. The net-generation’s experiential nature means they like

doing things, not just thinking or talking about things.

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Things that Matter

The net-generation readily takes part in community activities and seems to prefer

working on things that matter, such as addressing an environmental concern or a

community problem. They believe they can make a difference and that science and

technology can be used resolve difficult problems. The social agenda is viewed as

important for them.

In summary, the net-generation learning preferences are described below in the following

three points:

Social based learning

Learners want to leverage emerging communications and collaboration tools to create

and personalise networks of experts to inform their education process.

Un‐tethered learning

Learners envision technology enabled learning experiences that transcend the classroom

walls and are not limited by resource constraints, traditional funding streams,

geography, community assets or even educators knowledge or skills.

Digitally rich learning

Learners see the use of relevancy based digital tools, content and resources as a key to

driving learning productivity, not just about engaging in the learning process.

Educators must therefore examine how they can best leverage technology to facilitate

digitally rich learning environments where learners have opportunities to learn

collaboratively, with peers and or educators, anytime or anywhere to a dynamic cohort of

learners. Given earlier discussions on the classification of ‘native’ or ‘immigrant’ digital

learners, they are not homogeneous groups and indeed are a diverse population of learners.

Therefore it is important not to lose sight of adult learners, early school leavers, learners

who emerge from socially and economically disadvantaged regions; the broader profile of

what becomes now the ‘atypical’ learner. Depending on regional and societal contexts there

are young people who do not have the levels of access or technology skills predicted by

proponents of the digital native idea. Also the learner population consists of adult learners

who are re-engaging with further education as a means of up skilling or are embarking on

education for the first time and their lack of expertise or confidence in technology must be

respected and accommodated for.

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So whilst these aforementioned characteristics assist to inform educators on the needs of

the net-generation, research would question if being part of this net-generation renders

them more adept to learning digitally?. For instance although today’s learners come armed

with digital skills, these arise primarily from personal use of social platforms. They may be

very fluent in using entertainment related technologies, but they need guidance to learn

how to use these technologies to solve sophisticated thinking problems or for workplace

applications (Bullen et al., 2011; Romero, et all., 2011; Kennedy et al., 2008; Kirkwood and

Price 2005). Learners need assistance and guidance in altering the use of technology to an

intellectual, scholastic or professional appropriate context.

There is without doubt an ever increasing array of digital tools and technologies available.

However, it is not the technology per se that should be the primary focus, rather research

would demonstrate that it is the central role users play in creating, rather than simply

consuming, the content that technologies contain that is so attractive to the Net

Generation. This facilitates the development and maintenance of social networks, or

communities of users which realise the attractive social dimension of the technology.

Therefore it is a challenge for educators to identify technologies with the potential to

provide these ‘social dimensions’ such as Web 2.0 technologies (Duffy and Bruns, 2006;

Alexander 2006; Bryant 2006; Evans and Larri 2006; Richardson 2006; Sandars and Schroter

2007).

Overall, the success of any digital initiative is anchored on the interest of the users and

support of the total work environment. Both internal and external contextual factors play

their role in setting a scene for the useful applications of information and communication

technologies (ICTs) in the learning environment (Stephenson, 2006, Khan and Nawaz (2013).

The contextual factors of an institution (includes community, culture and technology)

influence the e-learning practices, which must be understood by the developers and users

of e-learning (Stephenson, 2006, Nawaz and Kundi, 2010a, Zubair et al., 2013 ) as there is no

‘one-size fits all’ e-learning model.

39

Figure 3.0 The relationship between context and eLearning - Management in HEIs (Nawaz and

Kundi, 2010).

Looking to the future learner and educator environments, the use of "e" in e-learning should

be interpreted to mean "exciting, energetic, enthusiastic, emotional, extended, excellent,

and educational" in addition to "electronic." Parks (2013) suggested that the "e" should

refer to "everything, everyone, engaging, easy". These broad interpretations focus on new

applications and developments, as well as the emerging and common use of digital

language, which without explanation can be daunting for the non-technical person.

Thus for educators to keep up to date with the ever changing landscape of digital

technologies it is necessary to extend a focus beyond the characteristics of the net-

generation and pay attention on the implications of being a learner in a digitalised world in a

more work related situation Gras et. all (2012).

In summary, net-generation learners view digital technologies as something akin to oxygen;

they expect it, it’s what they breathe and it’s how they live” (Brown, 2011). So the challenge

and opportunities for educators is how do we ensure that the net-generation of learners has

the constant and relevant supply of oxygen to enable them to inhale and engage in adding

value to the digitalised workplace?

In addressing these issues, this research will examine how educators and trainers need to

obtain an improved understanding of the attitudes and competencies of the educator and

the issues surrounding the practical aspects of using technology in their learning

environment. This will allow the exploration of some options for engaging educators and

learners to become more digitalised.

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3.2 Understanding the profile of the digital educator

There is pressure from industry on educational institutions to produce graduates who are

capable of coping with workplace uncertainty and career ambiguity, are entrepreneurial in

thinking and behaviour and are creative problem solvers (Commission of the European

Communities 2006; CBI 2009; Forfas, 2012; Gibb 2011). Analogous to private enterprise,

they are undergoing a fundamental transformation in response to changing learner ‘buyer’

values, the internet, globalisation, shifting demographics and unprecedented economic

pressures. Therefore, role of the educator and educational institution is changing as is the

broader industrial and societal environment which demands a more flexible graduate.

Educators must distinguish what is the correct balance of knowledge between ‘expert’ and

‘local’ that graduates, irrespective of discipline, require (Yanow, 2004:12). The ‘expert’

dimension comprises explicit, theory-based, academic, professional, or scientifically-based

knowledge particular to a discipline or profession whereas the ‘local’ dimension comprises

forms of knowledge and ways of doing which are practice-based, deriving from experience

and interaction in a specific context, building the ‘softer skills’ of the learner. These skills

enhance graduate employability and professional identity as well as their ability to apply

their knowledge in a relevant discipline or profession (Rae 2009, Draycott and Rae 2011;

Gibb 2011).

As was highlighted from a review of EU policy documents, digital skills and competencies are

key skills required for individuals and firms to competitively engage in an ever-changing and

globalised marketplace. Most recently, curriculum development initiatives emphasise ‘21st

century skills’ (often referred to as ‘key skills’ or ‘key competencies’, ETA, 2010; OECD, 2005;

NCCA, 2008) qualities that prepare learners to live and work in a digital society. They include

skills such as critical thinking and problem solving, communication, collaboration, self-

regulation and information management (Binkley et al., 2012, Partnership for the 21st

Century, 2003, 2005). To successfully equip learners with the key 21st century skills

generates a discussion on the role of the educator and the educational institution as to how

learning will configure in the digital era to accommodate a digital learner and preparing

them for working in a more digitalised or technology intensive business or workplace

environment. Further, and concurrently, educators and trainers sometimes struggle to

connect these requirements with the complexity and messiness that comes with engaging

closely with and thinking deeply about digital education.

In order to reconfigure the learning environment to enable and facilitate e-leadership and

digital skills and knowledge acquisition, educators need to be more informed on what digital

41

skills and competencies are required in the workplace and have access to relevant resources

to create to improve learner learning processes, outcomes and assessment practices. This is

critically important as the learner identity is shaped by the learning environment and

impacted upon and shaped by curriculum, delivery and assessment methods and the

interaction with the educator and thus the educator must be mentally engaged with the

mind-set, behaviours and perceptions of the learner.

Educators, when engaging with the mindset of the net-generation of learner need to assess

their stance or status in relation to the use of digital technologies - are they within the

‘digital native’ or ‘digital immigrant’ classification or do they span both areas? Research on

the barriers to the adoption of digital technology by educators, indicates that one reason for

the lack of in depth use of digital technology by educators is that they struggle with

proficiency levels and their abilities to integrate technology into the classroom (Hicks, 2011).

It can be argued that the lack of proficiency is linked with resistance and fear of being

exposed or viewed as a ‘digital immigrant’ by the younger ‘digital native’.

Similarly, Kennedy et al (2008) found that educators were generally more skeptical and

unsure about the possible applications and benefits of digital technologies for supporting

teaching and learning and thus do not spend time on researching them for use in their

teaching. Additional evidence suggests that experimenting with new or untested digital

technology can be frustrating and complicated, some educators perceive there is a lot of

time required to keep up to date with advances in technology and as a result educators

forgo the effort to spend time on more readily acknowledged functions.

Therefore, if educators do not make efforts to understand the mindset and expectations of

the net-generation of learner then situations will occur where digital natives or a

combination of natives and immigrants are taught by digital immigrants and then both the

teaching and learning experiences and outcomes are compromised. In order to meet the

unique learning needs of digital natives, educators need to modify the traditional teaching

methods that are disconnected with the way learners learn today. It is important that

educators understand that with the challenges of digital technologies, that these digital

tools also can have a worthwhile, meaningful impact on both the learning and the teaching

experience.

From a pedagogical and learning perspective new technologies and communication

platforms allow for greater interactivity between the educator and the learner, and

between learners both inside and outside the classroom. Digital pedagogy, if resourced and

implemented effectively, enables and transforms teaching and learning to provide rich,

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diverse and flexible learning opportunities for a digital generation. It provides the basis for

engaging learners in actively constructing and applying rich learning in purposeful and

meaningful ways that align with their relationship with technology. While much of

programme content can be delivered through “self-administered” e-learning, educators can

concentrate on their role as mentor, developing with learners the skills of information

management, understanding and questioning, critical thinking and knowledge application.

Thus, digital media can facilitate more active, problem-based learning which has been

demonstrated to encourage greater learner engagement and leads to better learning

outcomes. Successful engagement in digital pedagogy requires educators to adopt a more

collaborative, interactive model of delivery. Instead of being the “sage on the stage,”

educators should be the co-pilot for learners as they explore and collaborate online to

acquire and use digital knowledge. Digital assessment tools can enable quick feedback on

learner progress to learners. Technology’s potential to free educators and learners alike

from the paper exercises of doing things can allow for greater flexibility in the timing and

location of delivery. Additionally, the use of digital technologies has benefit for the educator

as it is a means of overcoming educators’ isolation, breaking down their classroom walls and

connecting them to colleagues, mentors, curriculum experts and the global educator

community.

There is also evidence to demonstrate that in order for digital technologies to be effectively

used in teaching and learning at educational institution level, its use has to be part of the

institution vision and must be supported by specific national policies and strategies (Plomp

et all., 2008; Shear et al., 2010a; Shear et al., 2011). The commitment to the use of digital

technologies must be translated into the provision of resources to support the learner and

the educator and imperative is the professional development of the educator to ensure that

they are equipped with digital skills as well as digital pedagogy and assessment.

Is it all about technology!

So having reviewed both sides of the demand and supply side of learner and educator, a

number of issues require consideration in advancing the challenge of increasing the use of

digital technology in education. Technology already serves as an extraordinary tool to shape

and enhance the learning environment. It is also acknowledged that digital literacy skills are

necessary to ensure digital technology is used to supplement and not substitute high-quality

instructional and personal delivery methods. Undeniably, the instruments or array of digital

43

technologies per se are not as important as what they are used for (purpose) and how they

are used to effectively achieve that purpose and a determination on how they can help

shape the learning environment for learners who will work in a more digitalised personal

and work environment.

The net-generation of learners are more motivated by using technology as its part of their

lifestyle and in many instances it dictates what they do and how they ‘socially’ engage with

the world around them. Thus irrespective of the arguments about the negative social

aspects of technology, educators cannot ignore its prevalence and impact, or its role in

framing the mind-set and behaviour of the learner.

The educator needs to be in a confident and competent position to determine the relevant

role of technology in educating the learner for a digitalised workplace, albeit as an

employee, generating their own business, in a private or public or social enterprise context.

Further, educators should consider the belief put forward by Kennedy et al. (2008) in the

distinction between ‘living’ and ‘learning’ technologies. Living technologies are those that

people choose to use in their everyday life, mainly for social and leisure purposes. Learning

technologies are those that learners use for intellectual or study purposes – thus the

emphasis should be on learning about and through digital technologies with the purpose

and objective directing that use.

Additionally, the notion that educators mainly fall into the ‘digital immigrant’ spectrum is

assumptive and as with the ‘digital native’ learner classification we saw variations in the

level of digital proficiencies within this classification. Furthermore, there is most likely an

assumption that if the educator does not use digital technologies the reason is that they are

unfamiliar with it rather perhaps than not seeing its relevance in their particular subject.

Therefore, there is an onus on the educator to engage in conversations with their learners

on their stance on digital technology and its appropriate use for that particular subject area.

This type of debate and discussion helps the learner to understand the contextual role of


So the challenge for the educator is to maintain the credibility and quality of content, rigor

of delivery and assessment of the subject/discipline and then define how digital technology

can be an enabler or conduit in the delivery of same. Hence, digital technologies are

managed in parallel to content and should not necessarily be the driver of content. Equally,

it is important that learners understand the role of digital technologies in the workplace and

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how it differs from use in a personal context. Learners must be enabled to make the

transition from personal to professional use of digital technologies.

As was identified in the digital policy agendas the effective development of digital skills

requires collaboration between educational institutions and industry to inform the framing

digital skills competencies (Hallissy et all., 2013). The next section examines the role and

adoption of digital technologies in the entrepreneurial context as a means of gauging

industry perspectives.

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4. Digital Technology and its adoption by Entrepreneurs

The digital economy is developing rapidly worldwide. It is the single most important driver

of innovation, competitiveness and growth and it holds huge potential for European

entrepreneurs and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). New digital trends such as

cloud computing, mobile web services, apps, smart grids and social media are radically

changing the business landscape, reshaping the nature of work, the boundaries of

enterprises and the responsibilities of business leaders. These trends enable more than just

technological innovation. They spur innovation in business models; business networking

opportunities; the transfer of knowledge and access to international markets; spark a new

entrepreneurial spirit and increased choice for consumers and by extension a more intense

competitive landscape for businesses. Business leaders, whether entrepreneurs or

managers in established SMEs or larger organisations are pushed to adopt the role of e-

leader to ensure their organisations are innovative and competitive.

Le Cornu (2011) highlights the rapid technological advances made in the last ten years, most

notably in the advent of social networking platforms, sharing, promoting and discussion

about products and services on social channels to a wide community in real time. In fact,

the cross-cultural effects and opportunities of the social hyper connectivity brought about

by social media and mobile devices are often under estimated (Weinberg 2009). New

technologies are ever emerging which creates a more complex and varied array of

communication tools the entrepreneur or owner-manager must be aware of and engage

with to have conservations with their customers. This is particularly the case in the small

firm where the owner-manager is the business and is the primary marketer, sales person,

and company spokesperson. Social media channels are many and varied, from websites to

blogs, social networking sites (Facebook, Myspace), virtual social worlds (Second life), virtual

game world; wikis; podcasts etc. Despite the foray of tools available digital marketing is not

just about understanding and unlocking the underlying technology, but rather about

understanding people, how they’re using that technology and how it can be leveraged to

engage more effectively with people, internally in the firm and externally in the marketplace

(Ryan and Jones 2009). Therefore, the focus should be on the user not the technology as

technology is the enabler or the conduit engaging the company with the customer and vice-

a-versa.

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Social media is part of the digital technologies that enterprises exploit to increase their

presence on the internet, improve marketing opportunities, communicate and interact with

partners, customers and other organisations, and to facilitate collaboration and knowledge-

sharing within the enterprise to enable business to grow and innovate. The term social

media is primarily linked with interactive platforms via which individuals and communities

share, co‐create, discuss and modify user‐generated content (Kaplan and Haenlein, 2010).

Examples for social media platforms include blogs (Blogger, Wordpress), microblogging

(Twitter), collaborative wiki‐projects (Wikipedia), forums (Harley Davidson user groups,

Microsoft MSDN), professional networking sites (LinkedIn, Xing), and social networks

(Facebook, Google+) (Kaplan/Haenlein 2010; Cortizo et al. 2011). While the previously

named applications are dominated by the use of text, further applications are dedicated to

other forms of media, like photographs (Flickr, Picasa), videos (YouTube, Vimeo), or music

tracks (last.fm, ccMixter). Social media today has also expanded into virtual worlds (Second

Life) and online gaming (World of Warcraft, Farmville). Recently, a new field of applications

in social media is based on the usage of mobile data and the fast adoption of smartphones

(Nomad Social Networks, Foursquare). That said, it is important to acknowledge that digital

technologies go beyond marketing and sales and the diversity of social media tools have

potential to positively impact on all aspects and functional areas of the business to radically

transform and enhance the efficiency of traditional inbound firm process activities and

outbound distribution and customer service tasks.

It is without a doubt that the adoption of digital technologies has many and varied benefits

contributing to the small firm’s profitability and productivity and growth perspectives.

Digital technology has potential for reshaping traditional business strategy as modular,

distributed, cross-functional, and global business processes that enable business

transactions to be carried out across boundaries of time, distance, and function (Ettlie and

Pavlou 2006; Kohli and Grover 2008; Rai et al. 2012). Evidence suggests that with the aid of

technology, SMEs can go global more speedily and at a younger age as it enables firms to

work together in a seamless, global operation, despite being separated by time zones and

geography (Delouite, 2014). Aligned with this is the fact European SMEs grow two to three

times faster when they are empowered by digital technologies (Delouite, 2014). More

generally at the strategic business level digital technologies enable the formation of

different forms of dynamic capabilities suitable for turbulent environments (Pavlou and El

Sawy, 2006, 2010; Bharadwaj et. al, 2013) which are core to the survival and growth of any

small firm. The results from the e-Business Enterprise Learning for Women (EBEL) project in

2012 resonates with the aforementioned authors as the core driver for the adoption of ICT

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was ‘to improve communication with customers’ followed by the desire to improve

communication with suppliers. Another important motivating factor was the need to

develop more effective promotional material.

Extending the interaction and collaboration with customers and suppliers engagement in e-

business activities enhances procurement, production and sales processes as well as

logistics services supporting a more globally interconnected business. Thus in

acknowledging the many benefits (financial and non-financial) of digital technologies they

should be viewed as an organisational-wide strategy that enables and facilitates the

creation of a competitive differential, adding value in the marketplace. The rapid growth of

social commerce is mainly due to the rapid diffusion of social media tools and channels such

as Facebook and Twitter. Indeed, these tools can radically transform traditional firm

processes by providing a better customer shopping experience in real-time (Fisher, 2011;

Zhou et al., 2011) and a better channel for attracting and retaining online customers (IBM,

2009). Facebook can allow firms to ‘harness social capital’ in a context where retailers are

eager to tap into the tremendous word-of-mouth potential of digital technologies (Olso,

2011; Roberts, 2012). In the context of business-to-business (B2B) commerce, firms can use

social media tools such as Facebook and LinkedIn to communicate with customers and

suppliers, build relationships and trust, and identify prospective business partners in terms

of B2B selling (Michaelidou et.al., 2011).

The integrated e-marketplace provides a favourable environment that includes lower

operating and marketing costs, better opportunities to promote products/services and

enrich the overall marketing communications mix (Chong et al 2010) for example by

reducing search costs by facilitating comparison of price, products and services

(Kandampully, 2003; Bakos, 1998; Kaplan and Sawhney, 2000); improving production and

supply capability (Barua et al. 1997; Albrecht et al.2005); improving personalisation and

customisation of product offerings (Bakos, 1998); enhancing relationships with customers

(Kierzkowski et al. 1996); reducing marketing costs as compared to traditional marketing

media (Sculley and Woods, 2001); reducing numbers of marketing staff (Gloor, 2000);

operating 24/7 and around the clock over 365 days per year (Ngai, 2003).

Moreover the increasing and speedy availability of digital infrastructures, platforms,

software solutions or business process such as ‘cloud’ based services is commonly seen as

an opportunity for SMEs and for facilitating connectivity. Cloud computing is a milestone in

ICT and not least reflects the shift of traditional business relationships to a globalised,

flexible and network-oriented ecosystem. The ‘cloud trend’ combines several new

48

technologies and developments, such as virtualisation, standardisation, automation,

mobility, service orientation, industrialisation, shared-services concepts. Advancements in

cloud computing extensively meets the demands of small companies as it allows for the

more cost effective use of ICT services and e-business applications. As the cloud concept is

still an emerging and somewhat unknown or unused by the SME, issues and concerns

remain around security, compliance, network dependence and performance add to the

uncertainty for its application in the small firm.

In summary, new technologies and tools spawned by social media have altered the roles of

buyers and sellers and social media has given more control of marketing decisions directly

to customers with customers interacting with each other and influencing non customers

(Sashi, 2012). Digital technologies are and increasingly will be a major driving force

impacting on how, where and when business transactions are undertaken, from both the

customer and company perspective. Digital technologies will bring opportunities for small

firms that will allow speedier expansion and international growth. To avail of these

opportunities small firms need assistance to develop digital skills and competencies to be

better informed on what digital technologies are best suited to their business and how their

application will add value cross functionally, and not be limited to the marketing and sales

function.

The many benefits of digital technologies for the small firm are acknowledged at policy

level, as discussed in section 1.1 and echoes those discussed in the previous paragraphs. The

Strategic Policy Forum on Digital Entrepreneurship (2014) indicates the opportunities that

digital technologies hold for the creation of new businesses opportunities, for example,

innovation, new ways of engaging with customers, higher revenue streams, faster times ‘to-

market’, enhanced service provision, reduced costs, increased productivity and more

responsible management systems. How well and how quickly European entrepreneurs and

small businesses adopt digital technologies will be a key determinant of growth and job

creation in future years (Strategic Policy Forum on Digital Entrepreneurship, 2014). Although

many EU entrepreneurs are already leveraging digital technologies to create successful

businesses and significant economic impact that number could be increased (Strategic Policy

Forum on Digital Entrepreneurship, 2014). Although reports suggest that social media tools

really enhance the development of SMEs, there is little empirical research on their adoption

and usage by this category of firms (Dixon, 2010). The level ICT usage and e-commerce in

enterprises in EU countries is presented below, based on data from National Statistical

Authorities, 2013.

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Table 1 EU Enterprises use of Social Media %

EU - 28 30

Belgium 35

Bulgaria 31

Czech Republic 16

Denmark 40

Germany 33

Estonia 27

Ireland 48

Greece 34

Spain 31

France 19

Croatia 37

Italy 25

Cyprus 38

Latvia 15

Lithuania 38

Luxembourg 30

Hungary 26

Malta 55

Netherlands 50

Austria 39

Poland 19

Portugal 36

Romania 19

Slovenia 37

Slovakia 26

Finland 37

Sweden 45

United Kingdom 42

Source: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page/portal/information_society/data/database

50

In 2013, 147,000 of the 1.5 million enterprises in the EU-28 were surveyed. Of the 1.5

million enterprises, approximately 83 % were enterprises with 10-49 persons employed

(small), 14 % with 50-249 (medium) and 3 % with 250 or more (large). The survey results

showed that in the main, enterprises use social media for image building or for marketing

products but more generally in order to reach an audience in ways that the audience wants

to be reached. More specific results show the following:

Some 30% of EU enterprises used social media (e.g. social networks, blogs, content-

sharing sites and wikis) in 2013, with almost three out of four (73%) using such

applications to build their image and to market products.

Social networks were enterprises favourite form of social media.

Half of EU enterprises that used social media, especially enterprises in the

accommodation sector, reported using them to obtain customers’ opinions or reviews or

to answer their questions.

Among the enterprises that used social media, the size of the enterprise was not so

important in determining whether the firm used social media to attract customers: 72%

of small enterprises used them for image building or for marketing products, compared

with 79 % of large enterprises.

Within the EU nearly half of all Irish enterprises that employ ten people or more use some

kind of social media, according to the figures, primarily to connect with customers on sites

like Facebook. At 55%, Malta has the highest percentage of companies using social media

across the EU, while Latvia has the lowest at 15%. The average across the 28 countries of

the EU is 30%.

So whilst the adoption of ICT/e-business and digital media is improving, evidence suggests

that there is still a substantial ‘digital divide’ between small and large firms (Stimulating

innovation through smart use of ICT, 2013). While only about 40% of small companies use e-

business solutions, 80% of the large enterprises do. Among large companies, e-business is

increasingly becoming an integral part of their day-to-day business. In order to raise the

level of adoption of digital technologies in the small firm it is necessary to identify what are

the drivers and or barriers to their adoption to ensure remedial actions address the real and

practical needs of the SME sector.

Challenges to the adoption of digital technologies in the SME resonate internally and

externally and it is important to identify if they are personally embedded in the owner-

manager and staff level and are linked with skills deficiencies, ICT, and digital media

capability failures. Most SMEs cannot afford to employ ICT specialists and thus their

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respective e-business and digital strategies depend on the respective skills of the

entrepreneur and owner-manager. This requires ICT hardware and software, but

investments in the technology part can be insignificant compared to the ‘investments’ in

implementing the organisational changes. Further issues arise in the lack of understanding

of SMEs as to the benefits that social and digital media can return to their business in

marketing and beyond the marketing function. Related is the difficulty in measuring costs

and benefits of adopting e-business and digital media as small firms are reluctant to spend

scarce resources on digital technologies without the evidence of its impact.

These barriers align with those highlighted by respondents in the e-Business Enterprise

Learning for Women (e-BEL). These results emphasised that the primary internal barriers to

the adoption of ICT related to cost and budget constraints; followed by ‘lack of ICT

knowledge or its benefits by the owner-manager’. The barriers were discussed in the

context of more strategic and entrepreneur related issues, in particular ICT skills shortage by

the entrepreneur and their employees which resulted in the inability to manage and harness

data effectively. Interestingly, cost and lack of a sufficient budget for ICT was not viewed as

central barrier across all country respondents. Externally, factors such as the characteristics

of the industry structure and the business dynamics in their sector; customer behaviour and

access to and cost of ICT technology act as enablers or barriers to the successful adoption of

digital media respondent firms. An important external driver is the requirement of large

business partners which have significant negotiation power with companies needing to

respond to their requirements (Stimulating innovation through smart use of ICT 2013).

The following business challenges (EU 2013) have been identified as obstacles to the

adoption of digital media in small firms:

- A general lack of inter-operability between different ICT systems used for data

exchange. A main reason for this lack of inter-operability is the proliferation of

proprietary standards for e-business, initially developed and adopted by larger

companies (with very limited inter-operability), making it difficult for smaller companies

to exchange data with different large business partners.

- An untapped potential to further improve the efficiency of information flows through

the (smarter) use of ICT, translating into unexploited cost savings and lower than

possible productivity and competitiveness.

- The still existing dominance of manual, paper-based processing of information in specific

industry segments, not only as a result of the mentioned problems, but also due to a

lack of basic ICT infrastructure in small companies, at least in specific segments (for

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instance in the textile industry) and due to a missing sense of urgency among many

companies.

- Challenges related to legal complications and requirements in cross-border data

exchanges.

- A lack of ICT skills and the time to deal with such issues in small companies that do not

have a dedicated ICT department. In particular a perceived lack of ‘a lack of time,

because management has to deal with day-to-day business’ was a very important or

somewhat important barrier for SMEs with regard to e-business adoption.

- Related, owner-managers experience challenges in preparing a compelling business case

and convincing SMEs to participate in pilot actions. While it may be perfectly rational for

a company not to invest any time and money into its ICT strategy and infrastructure, it

can also be the case that the benefits are simply not obvious enough, and therefore the

company takes a decision which is, objectively, wrong.

- In relation to e-business, many SMEs are not using e-business solutions because the

number of e-business transactions does not justify investments in such solutions. Thus,

e-business integration remains an important task and challenge for companies of all

sizes in order to raise its full potential.

The adoption of digital technologies requires more strategic rather than operational or

digital tool focus where a composite set of e-skills (incorporated under the umbrella of e-

leadership skills) need to be accommodated for by educators and training organisations. To

achieve this educators must understand digital technology uses and applications for aspiring

entrepreneurs and owner-managers, the user capabilities required to leverage the

advantages of digital applications, to inform the design of assessment and monitoring

mechanisms to determine the return on investment or the benefits of using digital

technologies across start up and established enterprise functions.

Fundamental to the delivery of e-leadership skills is the use of technology in teaching and

learning and thus the increasingly used term of e-learning or the use of electronic

educational technology in learning and teaching. There is a varied and multiplicity set of

abbreviations and terminology used to describe e-learning rendering it problematic to

source a one fits all descriptor of what e-learning encompasses. As described by Oblinger

and Hawkins (2005) e-learning ‘has morphed from a fully-online course to the use of

technology to deliver some or all of a course independent of fixed time and place. Learners

can be residential, commuting or at a distance’. E-learning is broadly synonymous with a

myriad of descriptions and techniques such as; instructional technology, information and

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communication technology (ICT) in education, EdTech, learning technology, multimedia

learning, technology-enhanced learning (TEL), computer-based instruction (CBI), computer

managed instruction, computer-based training (CBT), computer-assisted instruction or

computer-aided instruction (CAI), internet-based training (IBT), flexible learning, web-based

training (WBT), online education, virtual education, virtual learning environments (VLE)

(which are also called learning platforms), m-learning and digital education (Parkes, 2013).

For educational institutions this will encompass a need for broader flexible learning as well

as distance learning and the use of ICT as a communication and delivery tool between

individuals and groups, to support and improve the design, delivery and management of

learning beyond the walls of the educational institution. Furthermore, the practices of e-

learning offers personalised monitoring coupled with flexibility in the management of

learning and greater autonomy in the acquisition of knowledge for the learner and the

design and provision of learning programmes for the educator.

In summary, in acknowledging the advances in digital technologies and the more digitalised

profile of the learner, e-learning is emerging as an increasingly important component of

education because it provides opportunities for those who are unable to attend and those

who are unable to completely put their jobs aside to be on-campus learners (Zang and Lin,

2006; Hanafizadeha et al, 2011). Additionally, e-learning provides an interactive

environment for communication between learners and educators, providing platforms to

enable educators and learners to engage in collaborative and cooperative learning and peer

learning activities. E-learning also facilitates the generation of interactive resources;

provides tools for creativity and design, personalisation of information and learning material

and guidance for learning support. Further benefits of e-learning for learners include an

increased accessibility to information, better content delivery, personalised instruction,

content standardisation, accountability, on-demand availability, self-pacing, interactivity,

confidence, and increased convenience (Bhuasiri et al. 2012). From the educator

perspective, e-learning reduces costs, enables a consistent delivery of content for faculty

(Ruiz, Mintzer, and Leipzig, 2006; Zhang, et al, 2004; Bhuasiri et al 2012).

Advances in digital technologies should be aligned to a more dynamic and technically

engaged consumer or buyer. Consumers are increasingly characterised as being a more

‘wired’ – and more and more ‘wireless’ - generation using technology that is evolving every

day. Consumer segmentation is based on a classification of the buyer on a spectrum from

the digital native, the digital settler and digital immigrant or based on the speed of adoption

of users to digital media ‘digital leaders’, ‘digital laggards’. Overall the ever increasing ‘net-

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generation’ of consumers are so immersed in a networked world of digital technology, they

behave differently, have different social characteristics, different ways of using and making

sense of information, diverse approaches of researching and hold different expectations of

what products and services should deliver, thus placing new pressures and challenges for

small firms in terms of how they engage digitally or otherwise with the net buyer and

influencer in the purchase decision. Digital is now the first touch point for the consumer and

a channel where the consumer has greater control over what they see and when they see it.

With greater use of digital media greater discussion is afforded to the need to generate ‘a

digital footprint’ of the small company.

Entrepreneurs and owner-managers with restricted resources need to devise a digital media

strategy to capture, visualise and take action on the data gathered from digital interactions

and combine it with profile data, to create an even more accurate picture of real-time

customer needs in order to deliver contextually relevant marketing communications.

However research would suggest that small firms require assistance in this area primarily

due to a lack of digital knowledge, digital skills deficiencies and a lack of appreciation of the

contribution that it can make to their business (Digital Agenda for Europe: A Europe 2020,

European Commission 2010); (ACCA’ 2010); Williams et al., (2010); ICT, E-Business and SMEs

(2006); National Digital Strategy for Ireland (2014). Further, fundamental questions remain

on what is the impact of digital media marketing on generating sales.

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5. Concluding Comments

The present technology rich learning environment is characterised by a sustained use of

digital media, their integration into formal contexts and a shift toward personalisation of

learning. To take full advantage of new technologies, educators and policy makers need to

re-think approaches to learning and education and the relationship between education and

technology, recognising the influence of technology on learner identity, the role of the

educator and strategy of the educational institution. Learning and education is an ongoing

process and the notion of lifelong learning can be enhanced and made more accessible for

all learners. Learning digital skills not only needs to be addressed as a separate subject but

also embedded within teaching in all subjects.

With respect to the educator, it would appear in many instances that their proficiency in

digital technologies is limited by the narrow scope and lack of depth of their experience with

experimenting and using digital technologies which is compounded by insufficient skills and

knowledge and a fear of the unknown. Systematic digital technology preparation is needed

to help them learn more advanced technologies, classroom technologies, and assistive

technologies, and more importantly, to help educators make the connections between

technology and learning and to help them make the transition from digital-native learners

to digital-native educators.

Digital pedagogies must be encouraged, facilitated and supported by the educational

institution. Digital pedagogies are not subject specific and for learners to become more

laterally digital aware then its cross functional application must be demonstrated.

Consideration must be given to the integration of digital-literacy into programmes and how

to support digital literacy institutionally – not just as an add-on at the discretion of the

individual manager/course leader/department/faculty. Furthermore, it should be

embedded across and between modules and not linked with those which traditionally more

‘digital friendly’ such as the sciences etc.

Further, content must emphasise that digital awareness is about developing skills and

knowledge in digital technology as a process and set of skills as opposed to being

technology per se which can be a daunting aspect from both the learner and educator

perspective. Moreover, providing an opportunity to learn e-skills embedded with other

subjects would support the creation of interdisciplinary learning paths (technical + societal +

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business). This would prepare graduates and workers by equipping them with cross

disciplinary perspectives and collaboration skills, which in turn, would enable innovation and

creativity with digital technologies.

The delivery of digital technologies should not be driven solely by learner demands and

expectations and equally the learner must commit to the ethos of digital technologies as an

enabler of learning. Learners must acknowledge that educators are not all ‘digital

immigrants’ and respect their professional competency to know what level of digital

technology is appropriate for their subject discipline and that the lack of use of digital

technology is not the same as not having the technical expertise. To bridge the real or

perceptual digital divide between the educator and learner conversation between both

parties is necessary to bridge the gap. Educational interventions should be better developed

to reflect academic and practitioner accounts, with learners and educators as co-learners,

co-planners, co-producers and co-evaluators as they design, implement and continually

refine their work in progress to meet industry needs in a professional manner.

The learner needs to commit to more independent ownership for learning and not hide

behind the technology and thus blended learning is an option that requires more

consideration.

Educators must be careful that technology per se does not drive curriculum development or

pedagogy – rather it is an enabler, facilitator and a process of learning in a relevant and

added value context

So ongoing, the following questions require attention:

Rethink what people learn - we need to transform content and curricula to focus less on

‘things to know’ and more on ‘strategies for learning the things you don’t know’. As new

technologies continue to quicken the pace of change in all parts of our lives, learning to

become a better learner is far more important as part of life long learner culture.

Rethink where and when people learn - in the digital age, learning can and must become a

daylong and lifelong experience. National education initiatives should aim to improve

learning opportunities not only in schools, but also in homes, community centers and

workplaces.

Rethink how people learn - learners can become more active and independent learners,

with the educators serving as consultant, not chief executive. The internet will open up new

learning opportunities, enabling new types of ‘knowledge building communities’ in which

learners around the globe collaborate on projects and learn from one another.

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To conclude, advancements in digital technology are eroding all our lives and impact on how

we conduct personal and professional roles. In respect to the DIGA project, the impact and

consequences of digital technology on the educator, learner and entrepreneur are most

significant to investigate. Learning technologies and changing pedagogical methods are not

only changing the way educators teach and how trainers train but also how the learner

learns, assimilates and processes information and makes decisions. New and emerging

digital technologies have the capacity to redesign teaching and learning while also serving as

a catalyst for transformation and innovation with mutual benefits to the educators and their

diverse population of leaners in a specific context manner. That said, the research suggests

that digital technology integration is an area of concern in education primarily due to skills

deficiencies on the part of the educator and institutional resource constraints which results

in a lack of sufficient exposure of digital to the ‘digital native’ learner who expects

technology to be part of their learning journey. The necessity for enhancing digital

competencies is further highlighted when the research on digital practices are examined in

the entrepreneur stakeholder group and indicates important learnings on digital topics that

should be incorporated into a digital training competency programme for aspiring and

established entrepreneurs.

The second tier of the DIGA study proceeded to identify how the issues of the literature

review relate to digital practices in the educational, learning and entrepreneurial practices

in the DIGA partner countries to determine the inter-play or otherwise of these

stakeholders. The results will feed in and inform what digital skills and knowledge

entrepreneurial learners require and will direct educators in digital programme design,

delivery and assessment.

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Empirical Investigation - Results from Entrepreneurs,

Educators/Trainers and Entrepreneurial Learners

59

6. Empirical Investigation Research Methodology

The multi country study incorporated the administration of an email survey consisting of a

semi structured questionnaire to a sample of entrepreneurs, enterprise educators and

trainers (ETE) and entrepreneurial learners. The semi-structured questionnaires explored

how each of the stakeholders engaged with digital technology, their digital practices, the

challenges they encountered in using digital technologies, if they participated in digital

training and if they considered they had digital skills gaps they would like to receive training

in, and if so, what were the topics and what was their preferred mode of delivery of such

training.

The inclusion of a range of open ended questions to elicit comments allowed the voice and

narratives of respondents to come to the fore and provide more detail on topics such as

future digital technology areas of interest and information on digital training they are

interested in. The research methodology process involved an iterative process of designing,

refining and pilot testing the surveys, dissemination to DIGA partners for their feedback,

incorporation of feedback and re-sending to partners for final agreement and ultimate

dissemination to the three stakeholder groups.

The surveys were distributed through Survey monkey (www.surveymonkey.com) to increase

efficiency in the distribution of the survey and allow for simultaneous administration of a

multi country survey. The translated surveys were allocated a country specific link, were

accompanied by a standard covering note providing an introduction to the survey and a set

of instructions for its completion along with a partner contact name and details as a

reference point for any questions. (See Appendix 1 for copies of the questionnaires).

The completion of such a comprehensive survey, comprising of research participants

belonging to 3 distinct groups which had to be administered in 7 countries with different

languages set challenges and produced some useful learnings which will benefit the

research process of similar future collaborations. These learnings largely emerged from

logistics and time management of the process, which was less than expected as initial

project tasks had to be completed within a reduced timeframe than had been planned for

when devising project timelines. Despite these time constraints the tasks were achieved

within the timelines. However, additional time would have benefited the work process, for

example more time to discuss the topics emerging in the literature review and indeed for

http://www.surveymonkey.com/

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conducting the review of the extant literature; time to identify and collaborate with external

digital trainers and professional associations to develop the relevant questions for the

surveys and to gain their commitment for the study. For future projects this task of survey

design and editing would be more effectively and efficiently executed if it was undertaken at

a face to face meeting of partners, such as a partner meeting or a follow up SYKPE call. This

would have reduced the amount of ongoing communication via email and the need to seek

clarification and consensus on suggested question changes.

Pilot testing resulted in changes to phrasing of some questions and the inclusion of options

for responses to be able to provide comments as opposed to only ticking a box. Also country

differences on the meaning applied to the terminology describing digital technology and

variations in the interpretation of its definitions required some changes to the wording of

questions to ensure it was appropriate for the various stakeholder groups and less academic

for the non-educator respondents. To address the challenge it was decided to adopt one

definition or descriptor endorsed by EU policy and this set a common context for

respondents across all countries when completing their surveys. This definition was written

into the first page of the questionnaire and referred to again in the common covering note

that was sent to all respondents. Further, the consistency in the use of digital technology

definitions and the common covering note ensured that rigour and consistency were

continued into the analysis of the data. A valuable learning resulted from issue with

language and indeed attention in the use of terminology is an issue to note in the

development of the digital competency framework as similar interpretation issues may

emerge.

Response rates to the survey by 3 stakeholder groups and in particular the entrepreneur

was lower than anticipated in the initial stages. This necessitated partners to identify and

implement additional tactics and options to follow up with existing samples to encourage

responses. Further, partners had to source new samples of possible respondents and time

was spent on explaining the purpose of the survey and what the results would be used for.

When completing this type of multi-stakeholder survey in the future consideration might be

given to providing incentives to the respondents to encourage greater participation in the

survey.

Additionally anecdotal feedback from respondents indicated that in particular with the

entrepreneurs cohort that they are receiving a large number of surveys and do not have

time to respond to them all. Compounding this is the frequency of surveys which are being

administered as part of funded projects and in some instances with similar objectives.

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Given the above challenges, consideration should be given to how alternative survey

options to the email survey can be effectively executed to gather the information needed to

address the objectives of the research project. For instance the use of face to face

interviews, focus group interviews and case studies could be considered as an alternative to

provide the necessary information.

Overall despite the challenges encountered the partners are confident that the number of

responses received in each category to a detailed survey produced comprehensive and

consistent results has enabled rigorous analysis to be competed and the objective of

informing curriculum development has been achieved. Statistical analysis of the overall

aggregate number of responses and individual country responses was undertaken and

complemented by the inclusion of comments to the open ended questions in the survey.

It was anticipated that an empirical study would be undertaken in each DIGA partner

country, however it transpired that despite many efforts partners in Norway were unable to

obtain responses to the surveys. The Norwegian partner (ECWT) sent out the survey to their

Norwegian partners and a large database of entrepreneurs, small firms and relevant

educators, trainers and entrepreneurial learners. Despite receiving a number of registered

phone calls and expressions of interest in the survey there was no completed surveys

returned. In the absence of direct feedback from the 3 stakeholder groups, the Norwegian

partner has supplemented this research with evidence from related research projects

focussing on the role of ICT and digital in small firms. ECWT leads the INSPIREYOWUP

project, producing innovative training materials to inspire and empower young and women

to start-ups http://www.inspireyowup.eu/docs/Training_Needs_Analysis.pdf. In the project an

on-line survey was carried out in the partner countries (Norway, Cyprus, Greece, Ireland,

The Netherlands and Spain) which 891 people have answered through survey monkey of

which 62 were from Norway. The results of this survey will be incorporated in the most

relevant areas of the DIGA project and to guide the design of the digital competency

curriculum. The overall response rate for the 3 surveys is presented in Table 2.0.

http://www.inspireyowup.eu/docs/Training_Needs_Analysis.pdf

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Table 2.0 Breakdown of Respondents

Partner Entrepreneur Trainers / Educators

Entrepreneurs

VET Learners / Entrepreneurial

Learners

The Women’s Organisation (UK)

31 85 13

University of Limerick (Ireland)

35 36 35

EIM, HRDC – Economic Institute of Maribor, Human Resource Development Centre (Slovenia)

19 28 16

Inercia Digital (Spain)

19 38 7

Social Innovation Fund (Lithuania)

28 40 17

Bulgarian Centre for Women in Technology (Bulgaria)

9 12 14

Total 141 239 102

The results of the surveys are presented under a number of primary themes which

incorporate related questions as a means of reporting a composite and integrated

perspective of the findings and provide more in depth analysis. The consequences and

learnings from the findings as they apply to the development of a digital training

competency framework are discussed accordingly.

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7. Entrepreneurs Use of Digital Technologies – Key Research Findings

7.1 Respondent Profile - Personal and Enterprise Profile

The research investigated the use and adoption of digital technologies in a sample of

entrepreneurs and owner-managers at different points of the business start-up and growth

continuum and across a variety of industry sectors.

The majority of respondents, 56.9%, were in operation for more than one year, with 36.8%

of those being in business in excess of four years and a further 20.1 % operating between 1

and 3 years. This mixed age cohort shows an emphasis on the more established firm across

all countries. In Slovenia, the majority of their firms were in operation for in excess of 4

years as was the case in Lithuania (42% over four years in operation and 17% in operation

between 1-3 years) and Ireland 33% were in operation between 1-3 years and 30% were

over 4 years in existence. Bulgaria showed an evenly divided sample where 50% of

respondents were under 1 year in operation and the remaining 50% were evenly distributed

between 1-3 years and 4 years plus categories. Spain had 39% of their sample falling in the

creation stage and 13% less than one year in operation. A similar pattern emerged in the

United Kingdom sample where 37% of responses were categorised as in the creation stage

and a further 15% in the less than one year category. The findings are summarised in Table

3.0 below.

In line with these results the Norwegian respondents in the INSPIREYOWUP survey were in

operation for similar time frames with the majority of businesses in operation between 1-3

years and the second biggest group consisted of enterprises in operation for more than five

years.

Table 3.0 Age profile of respondents

Stage of business development Number of respondents (N= 239)

Response Percentage %

In the creation and early start up stage 71 29.7

Less than one year in operation 32 13.4

1-3 years in operation 48 20.1

4 years plus in operation 88 36.8

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As expected given the established nature of the enterprise, the average age cohort of the

respondent is between 33 and 45 years and this varied slightly by country where the

average age of the entrepreneur in the UK was 40 years; Bulgaria was 36 years; Slovenia was

45 years; Ireland was 39 years and in Spain the average age was between 40 and 45 years.

Entrepreneurs from Norway showed a similar average age bracket ranging between 40-46

years. The majority of individuals who responded to the survey were female (66.5%) which

is in keeping with the representation in the NSPIREYOWUP survey.

The varied age profile of respondents provide an interesting cohort for investigation as they

predominately fall within the late adopter of digital technology if age and gender

characteristics are applied as some of the literature promotes (Prensky, 2001, Helsper and

Eynon, 2009) and it will be interesting to determine how this transfers into the use and

adoption of digital technologies in their business context.

Moving on to the profile of the enterprise, data showed that the majority of firms were

categorised as micro (employing up to 10 persons) as was the case in the UK, Ireland and

Bulgaria where the vast majority comprised of micro firms with many employing less than

five persons. The Slovenian sample saw a more mixed cohort in terms of employee numbers

where some firms employed over 20 employees and a few employing over 100 persons.

The respondent firms across the survey and within each country predominately operated in

the service sector and in the main in general retail (22%) followed closely by firms offering

education and training services (20%). The depth of response on the service sector allows

for assembling more comprehensive understanding of the issues relating to this broadening

and increasingly important economic growth sector in all countries and moreover the use of

digital technology is more pervasive and critical to the successful growth of small service

firms.

Table 4.0 Industry Sector Business Operates in

Industry sector Number of responses (N=244)*


General Retail 54 22.0

Education/training 48 20.0

Software/information Technology

29 12.0

Financial services 24 10.0

Food/ Drinks 25 10.0

Electronics and engineering 15 6.0

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Industry sector Number of responses (N=244)*


Health and Wellbeing 29 12.0

Textile Manufacturing 8 3.3

Publishing and Printing 9 3.7

Other 3 1.0

*Note: a few respondents inserted an answer in the ‘other category’ in addition to one of the industry sector choices and thus N=244.

The diversity of service offering is highlighted by the fact that 12% of respondents managed

businesses in the high tech sector in the software and ICT domain and those sold more to

the commercial market than the previously mentioned retail sectors. The high tech sector

dominated the profile of enterprises in the NSPIREYOWUP survey. Within the above sectors

respondent firms offered a very broad range of services which are summarised by country in

Table 5.0.

Table 5.0 Type of Service /Product Offering by Country

Range of service offering by country

Slovenia

- Advising, counselling - Sales of construction materials - Sales of food - Hotel services - Transport services - Preschool services (kindergarten) - Printing of clothes - IT, software, server maintenance - Print services

- Mouth hygiene products

United Kingdom

- Legal Services - Pet sitting & dog walking service - Architectural design - Bespoke handmade chocolates - Domestic and commercial electricians - Jewellery, Bags, Scarves, Gifts & Home Decor - Bookkeeping and tax return service for sole

traders - Recruitment Agency - Coaching, holistic treatments, courses - Independent social worker - Weddings, birthdays, corporate, networking,

online parties, special occasions

- Accounting and taxation services

Bulgaria

- Event space - Design studio - Coaching, consultancy - Cosmetics - Research

Ireland - Manufacture a high quality range of fresh and

frozen sauces - Tourism events and PR for hospitability sector - Education and training - Quality artisan handmade chocolates

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Range of service offering by country

- Sales - IT start-up & web start-ups incubator, - Business development - E-trainings

- retail site for buying and selling sports gear and equipment

- Software, consultancy and training in Operations Management for wind farm through services and software solutions

- Online marketing solutions - Events and corporate outings - Business Consultancy/Mentoring, Research

and Tailor-made Business Training Programmes

- Mix of IT, Lean and Water Consulting services and products

- Food and Beverage compliance training

Spain

- Training services - Entertainment

Lithuania

- Consulting/ Training Services/Training Organisation

- IT training -computer graphics: Adobe authorised training centre

- Virtual and live consultations interior decorating questions visualization.

- Team experience: Working with a medium-sized (up to 300 jobs) companies, IT industry development, merging branches, work with international companies, IT equipment

- Accommodations - Advertising Agency - Cosmetics/Beauty services - Clothing - Tourism - Tomato paste imports from China, jars

imports from Belarus. - Trade/ construction - Flower growing, picking, sale, making

bouquets - Automation - Life insurance

- Interior decoration - Computer and information technology

services

Norway

- High technology product and services

The majority of enterprises sell into consumer markets and secondly to commercial

markets. The dominant prevalence of service entities targeting the consumer markets

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necessitates the possession of digital media strategies and digital competencies as research

strongly endorses that the social, cultural and business effects of the inter-relational hyper

connectivity via social media results in a more dynamic and technically engaged consumer -

a more ‘wired’ and ‘wireless’ generation of consumers (Weinberg, 2009; Sashi, 2012).

Therefore the results on the profile context of respondents provide useful learning on the

foundation and base point on which to position the answers provided to the subsequent

questions on digital practices of early stage and established entrepreneurs with a more

‘wired’ and ‘wireless’ generation of consumers as a means of determining their digital

deficiencies and the type of that training required to address these needs.

7.2 Digital Technology Practices and Uses for Enterprise Activities

This section presents the findings on the digital practices of respondents including the level

and depth of digital tools used, digital platforms and technologies applied and the tasks and

functions they are used for. This detail will provide an understanding of the digital

foundation in the enterprise and highlight what ‘building blocks of digital competencies’ are

required to up skill the entrepreneur and by extension transition the enterprise successfully

to its next stage of development and growth.

Overall 69% of respondents had developed a website for their enterprise and the country

breakdown is displayed in Table 6.0.

Table 6.0 Existence of a website in the enterprise

Have a website

Ireland UK Spain Lithuania Bulgaria Slovenia Response Percentage %

(of 207 respondents)

Yes 21 43 22 23 8 25 68.5

No 11 21 9 17 4 3 31.5

Responses did not show major differences in the existence of a website by stage of business

development but rather by the nature of their customer base. The following were some

reasons why respondents did not have a website for their business;

- ‘In progress’

- ‘Developed under focus social media as that's who I do most of my work for’

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- ‘Up and running shortly’

- ‘Not yet’

- ‘Currently in progress’

- ‘Currently holding meetings with Web Developers’

- ‘Too early’

- ‘In the process of deciding on which provider to use’

- ‘We have plans to develop one over the next year, depending on funds’

- ‘Yes definitely in the future’

- ‘Haven’t seen the need to invest in this’

- ‘Too busy working with clients on theirs! Also doing a lot of training in the last 3 years’

- ‘The website will host the product once launched’

Additionally, in some of the cases with an absence of a website many respondents were

using Facebook, LinkedIn and or Twitter as their primary landing page or source of contact

and interaction with their customers. The variations in the results brings to the fore a

discussion and debate on the view that the design of a website in the traditional sense is the

first best starting point for a digital media strategy, and if it’s the most relevant or

opportune tool or indeed if it is the most cost effective decision given the cost involved in

developing a professional website.

Of the respondents who had a website, in the majority of cases the respondent themselves

had an input to the development of their site but also employed external commercial

website developers to complete this task. To a lesser extent assistance from family, friends

or free sources of assistance in the development of the site was mentioned. A few (8

respondents) indicated that they used existing website templates such as Square Space,

Smiling Wolf and Google templates as a means of developing their sites.

The results demonstrate that the respondents were strong in their recognition that in the

absence of relevant website design skills that the engagement of an external consultant for

website development is necessary. That said, it is important that the entrepreneur seriously

considers the choice of external consultant so that it results in a relationship of learning

where the external consultant adopts the role as a one of guidance, enabler or coach on

social digital strategies where the development of a site is one task, as opposed to a single

task driven approach of designer, which is often the case. Equally, if an outside agency has

complete control over a business's digital media, the social profiles can lose a little bit of the

authenticity and further the constant engagement of the agency long term is generally not a

sustainable cost effective investment. A mix of agency consulting and employee dedication

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can be valuable and cost effective learning source about digital technology and will assist in

the ongoing management of the site and its integration with other digital media tools.

Indeed, prior to, or as part of the agency remit, is to determine what digital media tool is

most appropriate for the stage of the business and is suitable to customer requirements, is

it a website, or will other tools such as Facebook etc. satisfy as an interim or alternative to a

website? Additionally, arising from these findings and given the increasing role and

functionality of mobile technology a traditional website may not be the most appropriate

first step in developing a digital strategy and indeed upfront investment may be misguided if

business circumstances and market demands change. These questions have implications on

ensuring the design of a website is not rushed into without prior investigation as to what is

the purpose of the site, the stage of the business and the profile of the market it is selling

into.

Building on the role of the website in the firm, respondents were asked to highlight what

topics were included into their sites. Generally, respondents appeared to use their sites for

a number of tasks as displayed in Table 7.0. The majority of respondents indicated that

‘product service description’ (65.3%) and ‘company background information’ (65.7 %) were

the core pieces of information included on their website. This was followed by ‘customer

enquiry forms’ cited by 42% and ‘information on key personnel/owner-managers in the

firm’ was included by 33.9% of respondents. It was positive to see that 30.5% had

incorporated ‘testimonials from satisfied customers’ which are an important and impactful

source of selling and promoting the business. Table 7.0 summarises the findings.

Table 7.0 Website Content

Information contained on website.

Ireland UK Spain Lithuania Bulgaria Slovenia Response Count

Response Percentage % (of 239)

Product service descriptions

22 54 23 25 11 21 156 65.3

Company background information

24 51 24 23 10 25 157 65.7

Information on key personnel/owner-managers in the firm and their expertise

16 35 11 5 4 10 81 33.9

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Information contained on website.


Response Percentage % (of 239)

Customer enquiry form

18 44 14 7 7 11 101 42.2

Online purchasing function

6 11 5 6 3 6 37 15.5

Online payment facility

7 12 4 6 1 2 32 13.9

Customer feedback/suggestion facility

11 19 6 7 5 9 57 23.8

Testimonials from satisfied customers

13 32 4 12 6 6 73 30.5

Collection of information on customer

8 11 2 6 5 3 35 14.6

Company online newsletter

7 16 7 4 3 8 45 18.8

You-Tube clips 6 15 1 2 4 3 31 13.0

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s) section

8 16 6 12 3 6 51 21.3

In-house videos 6 14 4 2 2 4 32 13.9

The information displayed or available on the websites was factual in nature and covered

the key profile and contact details and given the nature of the markets and emphasis on the

consumer would suggest that greater opportunities exist for more creative and active two

way engagement in marketing, sales and customer research with customers and other

external stakeholders.

While taking into consideration the need to recognise cultural differences the analysis

would suggest that the depth of use of the enterprise website beyond a promotional tool

requires attention to ensure respondents address market needs and be competitive in how

they showcase their business and, internally that they are recouping a return on the

financial investment spent on engaging consultant to develop their website.

The findings raise questions as to what is the perceived function(s) and capabilities of the

website, and how strategically are respondents utilizing or leveraging all promotional, e-

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business; e-commerce; selling and researching functionalities and capabilities that a website

can return to the small firm. These findings indicate the need for entrepreneurs to be

educated to view a website with the ability to ‘wear many hats’ or act as a multifunctional

marketing and selling tool. A website needs to not just exist, it needs to perform to attract

visitors, educate them and convince them to purchase and become advocates for the

product and business which necessitates integrating search, social media, content, blogging,

and other social media platforms.

The management of the enterprise website showed that the majority of respondents

updated them monthly (32.1%) as represented in Table 8.0.

Table 8.0 Frequency website is updated

Frequency website is

updated

Number of respondents

(N=168)

Response

Percentage %

Daily 16 9.5

Weekly 35 20.9

Monthly 54 32.1

Has not been updated in

the last six months

25 14.8

Sporadically 38 22.7

The majority of respondents identified that they updated their websites monthly (32.1%)

and secondly, 22.7% indicated that they updated their site sporadically. A near to an equal

percentage of respondents indicated that they updated their site weekly (20.9%). So whilst

responses on the content of the sites was relatively good and show that respondents are

committed to having a website, the responses on the frequency of updating their sites is

less encouraging.

This is significant and raises a concern about these enterprises who are predominately

operating in service and consumer businesses as to how current are their sites are and how

effective is their website being used as a promotional and selling tool. Entrepreneurs need

to understand that creating the site is only one step in managing the site and keeping it up

to date with good, relevant and topical content is critical in social and digital media

marketing to address the more digitalised consumer behaviour (Weinberg, 2009, Kaplan and

Haenlein, 2010).

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In addition to the existence of a company website respondents were asked to indicate what

social media tools they used. Similar trends were evident across all country responses

where Facebook and Twitter were the most frequently used tools. Twitter was more

popular amongst firms in the UK, while in Ireland, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Spain

LinkedIn came second to Facebook as the most frequently used tool.

Reasons for variations relate to the nature of the businesses as those in retail and personal

services (dominant in UK sample) used Twitter. This cohort is useful to review as they

demonstrate how Twitter can be used as an effective social media tool for service

businesses with a consumer customer base. This learning can also be extended to the use of

Instagram and Pinterest as their presence was highest with UK firms, who overall displayed

the greatest diversity and advancement in the adoption of contemporary digital tools (see

Table 9.0).

Table 9.0 Digital and social media tools used in the enterprise

Digital and Social Media tool Response Count * Response Percentage %

Facebook 157 65.7

Twitter 108 45.2

LinkedIn 113 47.3

Hootesuite 24 10.0

Instagram 45 18.8

Pinterest 33 13.8

Media Sharing Sites 54 22.6

Company Blogs 16 6.7

Wikis 14 5.8

Slide share 16 6.7

Discussion forum 13 5.4

Apps 20 8.7

None of the above apply 29 12.1

*The figure exceeds the total number of respondents as in a number of cases respondents cited

more than one element.

Consistent across all firms was the low level of adoption of blogs, slide share and wikis etc.

This suggested low level of usage highlights untapped potential that should be examined by

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entrepreneurs at any stage of business start-up and growth. This finding mirrors the

evidence in the literature (Dixon, 2010; Strategic Policy Forum on Digital Entrepreneurship,

2014). These outcomes suggest that greater attention should be afforded to moving

entrepreneurs from their comfort zone to the ‘go digital’ mind-set of exploring more of the

emerging digital tools with a view to aligning and integrating them with existing ones to

develop a cohesive and consistent marketing message. These findings concur with those of

the literature and are not unique to this cohort of entrepreneurs serving to further reinforce

the need to increase the digital capabilities of entrepreneurs and owner-managers

(Stimulating Innovation through Smart use of ICT, 2013; e-BEL, 2012). That said the

challenge is to create awareness of the broad array of digital tools relevant to entrepreneurs

but not frighten them with information overload or too complex technical terminology

when describing digital tools, but rather assist them enhance digital usage in a more

effective manner and not dilute impact by using too many tools in a fragmented manner.

Any training programme should ensure entrepreneurs are aware of and can best develop a

suite of social and digital tools from an increasing array of choices and be able to balance

the tensions between quantity and quality of tools and ones, which are appropriate to the

consumer needs and allow differentiation from competitors.

Another aspect of understanding the digital practices of entrepreneurs was obtained by

identifying what business activities they conducted via digital technologies. Digital tools

were used for a wide variety of business activities such as responding to customer queries

(44.3%), email marketing (36.8%) and online networking (35.6%) as presented in Table 10.0

Table 10.0 Business activities conducted via Digital Technologies

Business activities conducted via digital technologies/tools /social media tools.

Response Count * Response Percentage

%

Online selling /ecommerce 59 24.7

Responding to customer questions which emerge via the website mainly

106 44.3

Compiling reports on customers and developing customer database 56 23.4

Email marketing 88 36.8

Online press releases 61 25.5

Online networking 85 35.6

Sourcing new products 73 30.5

Marketing research 79 33.1

Webinars 37 15.5

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Business activities conducted via digital technologies/tools /social media tools.

Response Count * Response Percentage

%

Finding new customers 112 46.9

Monitoring Sales activities/ website visitors/ conversions 63 26.3

Maintaining customer database 71 29.7

Payment of invoices 83 34.7

Ordering stock and raw materials 82 34.3

Issuing invoices 72 30.1

Tracking payment for purchases 57 23.8

Online banking 115 48.1

Customer Relations Management (CRM) 48 20.1

Word processing 84 35.1

Spreadsheets 100 41.8

Stock control 43 18.0

Computer Aided Design for product design 24 10.0

Cost Control systems 21 8.8

Project management 51 21.3

Maintaining employee records 41 17.1

*The figure exceeds the total number of respondents as in a number of cases respondents cited more

than one element.

Essentially usage and adoption of digital technology emerged at two levels, marketing and

promotion and secondly at operational level. The former dealt with responding to customer

queries which was highly rated across all countries, online selling, which is a positive trend;

seeking new customers which is more dominant in the UK and Irish responses; and email

marketing which again is strongly rated in Ireland, UK and Lithuania.

Operationally, online banking and back office administration tasks such as payment of

invoices and spreadsheet generation for operations are being completed via digital

technology, which is positive to see, and these functions were more evident in UK, Slovenia

and Lithuania. These results demonstrate a positive commitment to digital technology use

albeit with a bias towards more general marketing functions. Today’s buyer wishes to

consume information when they want and how they want and often-times without the

involvement of a sales person. And more importantly, they want to be educated and not

sold to, which renders digital marketing, sales and new forms of inbound marketing content

(such as podcasts, blogging and social media) becoming influential in the consumer buying

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behaviour process. These trends make it necessary that small firms are more equipped and

have available online selling and payment capabilities and facilities to allow interaction and

as a means of establishing a relationship with consumers. The results of this survey point to

the need to develop more advanced digital skills which resonate with entrepreneurs’

inbound marketing and selling activities to assist them expand their online presence and act

as the ‘silent sales person’ or the means of conversing with customers and other relevant

stakeholders.

Having established the digital tools in use and the business activities they are applied to, the

research progressed to ascertain the objectives the entrepreneurs wished to achieve via

digital technologies and a determination of how the performance of digital media was

captured and evaluated.

7.3 Establishment of goals for digital technology, measuring impact and planned future

use of digital technologies

The commitment to a strategic approach of embedding digital technology into the firm is

better contextualised when the objectives, if any, the firm has for digital technology are

understood. Interestingly, overall, across the sample the majority of respondents indicated

that they did not have specific goals for digital media bar one exception where, in the UK

57% indicated they had specific targeted offline objectives. Responses in Bulgaria were

evenly divided where 50% of respondents had objectives and 50% had not objectives for

digital media. Whilst in comparison in Ireland 54%; Spain 67.74%; Slovenia 75%: Lithuania

72% of respondents indicated that they did not have objectives for digital media.

The reasons for lack of objectives were reflected in the following sample of comments:

- ‘Do not have time’

- ‘We just decide on social media choices as we go along’

- ‘Don’t know what to set or how to set targets as difficult to measure what we get from it’ ‘Follow competitors’

- ‘Mainly sell via sales reps and attending trade shows’

- ‘Haven’t given it any thought yet as just at the early stages’

- ‘Hope for organic growth’

- ‘No - all part of general marketing’

- ‘Early stage still‘

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- ‘We have not as we feel it is our distributor who will make contact with the end-customer’

- ‘Busy with training and mentoring side of business’

- ‘Not sure what goals to establish’

- ‘I haven't formulated a social media strategy’

- ‘At the start up stage of my business’

- ‘Business built on recommendation’

In addition to the above reasons were a number of citations of ‘not sure how to’; ‘not yet’;

‘time restraints’ ‘not relevant yet for my business’; ‘not very confident with social media’

which are clear markers of the practical time constraints and knowledge deficiencies of

what digital and social is about that educators need to take cognisance of in digital

competency programme design and in the delivery mode of the programme.

Additionally some useful learnings were obtained from the comments put forward by

respondents on examples of the type of objectives they had in place. These objectives were

predominately qualitative based and generic in focus and characterised by a lack of

quantifiable target driven outputs. Some examples of objectives are as follows:

- ‘Increase brand management’

- ‘Increase the number of people reached’

- ‘Increase the number of likes & shares on sites’

- ‘Improve image of the firm’

- ‘Get more interest in our business’

- ‘All our competitors are doing it so we need to promote on social media’

- ‘To gain a good reputation via social media’

- ‘To increase followers and engage followers in our activities and discussions’

- ‘Increase brand awareness’

- ‘Networking and gaining new customers’

- ‘Retaining existing customers’

- ‘More awareness and presence function’

- ‘Build company profile’

- ‘Get information on our customer base’

- ‘Increase business awareness’

This is a significant finding and provides insights into how planned or structured digital

technology is as part of the overall enterprises business plan. It would suggest that social

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and digital tools are independent and individual tasks completed without a real

consideration as to what is their purpose as part of the broader firm strategy or business

plan. The lack of objectives will render measurement and monitoring of digital and social

media difficult.

So it is reasonable to infer that without goals the activities and expenditure of resources

may not be utilised in an effective or efficient manner and thus may not be returning the

most optimum results for the entrepreneur. Moreover, given the lack of objectives it is

problematic for entrepreneurs to benchmark or compare the performance of digital

activities over time as a foundation or starting point is absent. This is a central function for

entrepreneurs to spend time on and while the respondents are practising digital, using a

range of platforms, engaging in social media and digital technologies for the completion of a

range of promotional tasks, the results also suggest that this occurs in many instances in

unstructured ad hoc manner without direction of measurable and quantifiable objectives.

This point is further elaborated upon and explained when respondents discuss how they

measure the performance of their digital and social media activities.

Respondents were asked whether or not they measured the benefits of digital technologies

across a number of metrics and activities. The vast majority of respondents indicated that

they did not measure the benefits or impact of digital tools adopted in their enterprise.

Indeed there was an overall low response rate to this question in each country which in

itself infers that it is a topic not highly engaged with by respondents which is a concern and

barrier to the sustained implementation of digital technologies endorsing the findings of the

literature and policy documents.

The area which had the higher rate of measurement included “hits/visits/page views” which

represents the beginning of the sales funnel - awareness, but is not diagnostic of purchase.

The following narratives were provided by the respondents as to how they measure and

monitor their digital media activities:

- ‘Marketing reports’

- ‘Ask where enquiries have come from’

- ‘Have used external source with limited effect’

- ‘Asking customers’; ‘only measure by any contact I receive via Facebook or twitter’

- ‘Facebook’

- ‘Record it on excel’

- ‘Marketing reports’

- ‘Enquiries generated’

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- ‘Person allocated to tracking all activities on website’

- ‘Track who is looking at site and follow up with any email queries’

- ‘Ask clients’

- ‘Ad hoc generally just ask people how they heard of us’

- ‘Review enquiries and number of people who looked at site and stayed on site’

- ‘Link in with personal enquiries received over the phone’

- ‘Track to source’

- ‘Review all levels of interactivity’

- ‘Keep eye on movement on site’

- ‘Check all sales to determine where they saw or heard about our services and why used us’

- ‘Have a weekly review of all new and repeated activity on the site’

The above comments demonstrate a general approach to measurement and the very sharp

absence of metrics, analytics relating to specific digital tools’ a lack of results or

measurement techniques and a dearth of criteria adopted to assess or evaluate the

outcomes of digital media activities. Essentially, it would appear that ‘one fits all’ or a very

general observation or scanning of the results of digital media takes place without a real

interrogation or benchmarking of the results to determine if they are cost effective and

productive. These findings when taken into consideration with the trends emerging in

relation to the lack of digital objectives have implications for how these areas are

incorporated into a digital competency training programme in a practical and user friendly

manner for the entrepreneur.

The low level and participation in measuring digital outcomes is not completely surprising

given that social media is a recent innovation that enterprises are quickly trying to

understand what and how to implement it to add to the revenue stream of the enterprise.

Therefore as a result it may not be apparently visible to respondents the key role that

measuring and tracking digital performance plays in the sustainable development of a digital

strategy and concurs with the findings of the literature (Boyd and Ellison, 2008; Culnan et al.

2010; Hoffman and Fodor, 2010). These findings are important in the context of the lack of

objectives as without objectives any measurement is problematic and it is difficult to

understand what is being measured and what action can be taken that will have

constructive learning and feedback to guide future more optimal digital decisions.

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These results indicate the need to educate entrepreneurs and owner-managers about the

ultimate value (financial and non-financial) of digital for their business as a means of

achieving a competitive position, generate knowledge on how to establish objectives and

determine what kind of tracking measures are required to implement before the

commencement of a digital media campaign. Objectives may include generating revenue,

reducing customer service costs, shifting brand sentiment, improving operational efficiency,

cultivating customer relationships or gleaning insight into target markets.

The reality of the imprecise science of digital tools measurement must be communicated to

entrepreneurs and that while they may not be able to predict the final outcome of the

digital activities, they should define the scope of components of the process of developing

and implementing and monitoring the digital tools.

To date the research has identified trends in the usage and adoption of digital tools which

demonstrate that nearly 70% have a website, which for the majority of respondents is

updated on a sporadic and monthly basis and the responsibility for the maintenance of the

site is allocated on a piecemeal basis across all levels of the business. Beyond the website

there was a positive engagement by respondents in digital tools. That said, concerns

emerge in relation to the lack of focused objectives for digital media, coupled with the

absence of clearly identified means of monitoring digital media performance or

understanding of where and how it contributes to marketing and overall firm performance.

This issue needs to be addressed as if entrepreneurs continue to ignore the return or

benefits of digital technology then no learning takes place. The results would suggest that

digital for many respondents is viewed as a silo activity, but it’s critical to align social and

digital tools with specific enterprise objectives coupled with clearly defined metrics and

measurement timeframes and timelines.

Therefore as digital is, and will become an increasingly important component of firms’

marketing strategies, it will also be more complex and time consuming and this requires a

focussed and planned strategy as opposed to digital emerging or being reactive task to

respond to competitive behaviour. This problem is not unique to this sample of respondents

who mirror what is frequently discussed in the literature and policy documents (Digital

Agenda for Europe: A Europe 2020, European Commission 2010; Doing business in the

Digital Age, 2013) which call for the need for entrepreneurs to become more capable and

competent in measuring digital and social media performance. However, in order to

implement effective and appropriate measures, objective and targets for digital strategies

need to be developed and embedded as part of the overall strategy of the enterprise.

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This issue is central to any sustainable and impactful digital strategy and thus entrepreneurs

must become knowledgeable in their abilities to set realistic and achievable digital

objectives and develop appropriate metrics and measurement techniques to intermediately

determine the return arising from digital activities.

To obtain an understanding of the future practices of digital technology in small firms,

respondents were asked to indicate their level of agreement with a series of statements as

to how they reflect on their business and additionally were asked if they would increase the

usage of a range of digital tools in the next year. This information would prove helpful in

identifying areas where skills and competencies will be required by entrepreneurs as

displayed in Table 11.0.

Table 11.0 Usage of Digital media over the next year

Digital Media Increase Decrease Remain the same Response %

Social media marketing 75 3 22 100

Ecommerce 49 4 47 100

Mobile marketing activities 58 2 40 100

Facebook as a marketing tool 59 7 34 100

Blogs as marketing tools 60 6 34 100

Online networking 68 5 27 100

Developing podcasts/blogs 60 5 35 100

You Tube marketing 54 4 42 100

Cloud Computing 50 6 44 100

This question produced an interesting range of responses which suggest an increase in the

usage of digital technologies or that they will at least remain the same. Depending on the

nature of the firm and bearing in mind that the majority of firms are selling into consumer

service markets then ‘maintaining the status quo’ is not progress and requires further

analysis as to why this might be the case. Indeed this issue is important to consider in

context of responses to the question on the existence of objectives for digital technology,

for instance, if objectives are lacking then what is the purpose, and how will digital and

social media activities be increased upon? Taking these results in conjunction with those

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from the previous question, if current digital activity is not sufficiently monitored or

measured, then why increase activity as it will be difficult to determine its benefits and

added value to the financial and non-financial aspects of the enterprise.

When taken into consideration with the next question on social media practices the

cumulative results provide interesting insights to give direction on digital skills acquisition

requirements.

From the results described in Table 12.0 an interesting point emerges in relation to the

percentage of respondents who indicated that they have a learning curve for digital

technologies and this is cited by respondents who are more active in their implementation

of digital tools. This could suggest that those who are engaged in and active in digital

practices are open to learning more about digital technology as a business and marketing

tool and indeed may more readily see the need for competency enhancement in this area,

relative to entrepreneurs who are not as active in the digital practices. Consequentially,

digital skills programmes should ensure programme content and outcomes are developed to

cater for the different digital user profiles and not by firm size or sector characteristics as

the primary criteria for participating in a digital competency training programme.

Table 12.0 Social Media practices – agree or disagree

The extent to which you agree with each of the following statements about social media in your organization?

Strongly agree

Agree Disagree Strongly disagree

Not applicable

The use of social media by our organisation will grow significantly over the next few years

48 32 9 2 9

The use of social media by our organisation is on a reactive unplanned basis

15 33 30 11 11

We have a specific digital and social media plan for my business

16 31 35 9 11

Using social media is integral to our overall company goals and strategy

27. 35. 21. 6.5 10.5

Our enterprise has a significant learning curve to overcome before we can utilize social media

19 25 32 11 13

It is difficult to see the value of social media for business purposes

11 22 34 24 9

Until we are able to clearly measure the impact of social media, it will not

15 17 37 19 12

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The extent to which you agree with each of the following statements about social media in your organization?

Strongly agree

Agree Disagree Strongly disagree

Not applicable

be taken seriously in our organization

Social media is an important component of our overall general marketing strategy

34 35 17 5 9

Capturing and analysing online conversations about our brand products/services is difficult to do

14 30 36 6 14

We do not measure the effectiveness of social media activities

21 30 28 11 10

So, whilst some divergent and perhaps contradictory perceptions are emerging from the

results, they provide important detail on perceptions and intended behaviour on the

fragmented nature of digital practices in small firms. Moreover, this mirrors what is

identified in the literature and policy documents (Digital Agenda for Europe: A Europe 2020,

European Commission 2010; Doing Business in the Digital Age, 2013).

The ad hoc and fragmented nature of digital media practices is built on when the results of

how digital media are integrated with offline media are reviewed. The respondents suggest

that they integrate online and offline media, for instance this was the case for 57% in the

UK; 58% in Ireland; 58% for Bulgaria and 68% in Spain. In contrast, 52% of respondents in

Lithuanian and 67% of respondents in Slovenia indicated that they did not integrate online

and offline media.

Of the respondents who indicated that they had integrated offline and offline media the

following were suggestions on how integration took place;

‘Via my webpage’

‘Business Cards’

‘Using both, more social media’

‘Direct customers to our Facebook and website from our flyers’

‘Use for press releases, project wins & news’

‘Use the logos for Pinterest, twitter and Facebook on posters etc. to encourage

people to connect’

‘Always market our social media addresses on leaflets or in emails’

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‘Always refer to your social media in your traditional i.e. name it in your advert, RSS

feed’

‘Yes flyers have our advertisements on with links to our social media sites’

‘Use social media to get people to sign up for regular emails’

‘Through social networks we communicate activities that are carried out’

‘Informing the target groups’

‘Our customers can see the description of our Services and references on the

webpage’

‘Sales mailings’

‘Links to fb from the Internet, from catalogues, flyers’; ‘Printing, radio’

‘Promotional products, various discounts’

‘After contacting the telemarketing customers come to view our website’

‘Direct marketing’

‘Mail marketing, hype, paid ads, events, articles’

‘In a way...all advertising has Facebook page on it’

‘To some extent’; ‘yes ...used to complement offline’

‘Online details included on our offline material’

‘Business cards etc.’

‘Links to YouTube clips from product manufacturers’

‘Yes, falls into what we do in traditional marketing and supports sales to the retailer’

‘Social and website is developed to address overall marketing objectives’

‘Only to a modest extent’.

This positive motivation and intention to increase the use and adoption of a more varied set

of digital technologies highlights the need to ensure that the resources, both financial and

non-financial are allocated. For more efficient allocation of resources to happen, the

entrepreneur needs to be more confident and comfortable in the use of digital, understand

where, how it can and should be used and develop clearly defined metrics to evaluate its

performance and contribution to the sales of the business. Whilst the majority of

respondents sourced external advice with the development of their website, only a minority

secured financial assistance in the development of their digital and social media. Those who

received finance did so from government agencies. Comments as to why individuals did not

secure funding included ‘we didn't apply for it’; ‘didn’t know it was possible’; ‘bad

experiences with financial support from the government’; ‘we didn't know how to apply

(procedure)’.

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Having established the trends and patterns of digital practices in respondent firms the next

series of questions asked respondents to reflect on what digital skills and competences they

considered they needed to develop in order to engage in a more comfortable manner to

execute more effective and efficient digital media strategies.

7.4 Skills, Competencies and Training in Digital Technology

A central objective and outcome of the DIGA project is the development of a digital

competency framework and resultant digital training programme so it was important to

obtain an understanding of the current or past engagement and experience of respondents

with digital training and the identification of their future training needs in this area. This

detail will complement the information on their digital practices and present a more

informed and integrated perspective into the personal and business aspects of digital

practices in the small firm. These questions commenced with identification if respondents

had participated in digital training programmes and the results are displayed in Table 13.0.

Table 13.0 Participation in digital/social media training

Participated in social media training


(N=205)

Response %

Yes 9 27 12 5 5 8 66 32.2

No 22 37 18 35 7 20 139 67.8

Of the 205 respondents to the question on training, 67.8% had not participated in any form

of digital technology related training which is worth noting given the increase in planned

level of activity entrepreneurs and owner-managers have for digital media.

Some common trends and themes emerged in the results of the 32.2% who had

participated in training, for instance most popular topics were Facebook; LinkedIn; Website

development, where programmes were undertaken on a part time basis. Of the

respondents who had participated in training, the most common mode of delivery was via a

blended learning approach which combined traditional classroom and online and followed

by traditional classroom and mentoring which indicates the importance of the one to one

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interaction of the participant with the person delivering the content. Generally, respondents

were very satisfied with their experience of the training (37% rating very satisfied and 41%

rating their experience as satisfactory). The training received was located and delivered

primarily from the trainers or consultants own organisation.

Of note is the trend towards individual topic or module specific courses as opposed to an

integrated programme incorporating a suite of related digital technologies and their

collective and interrelated use.

In terms of future digital training needs and preferences the following characteristics and

preferences were recorded by respondents. The majority of respondents in each country,

bar Lithuania indicated that they had a need for digital training as follows:

Table 14.0 Interest in Digital Technology Training

Country Indication of need Total responses

United Kingdom Yes 42

No 2.1

63

Slovenia Yes 17

No 11

28

Bulgaria Yes 9

No 4

13

Lithuania Yes 5

No 35

40

Ireland Yes 25

No 6

31

Spain Yes 22

No 9

31

In line with their previous experience in participating in training, the majority of

respondents showed preference of a blended learning approach combining online and in

class and closely followed by for a classroom and mentoring combination of delivery

emphasising the importance and need for personal induction and face to face interaction

with the trainer and educator. Similarly, the results from e-BEL, 2012 survey strongly

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endorsed the preference for a blended learning format of delivery where the role of the

educator and trainer were viewed as central point of contact for explanation of points and

to provide a mentoring as well as an educator role.

Whilst a variety of time periods were suggested, widespread preference was the ‘block’

format which did not consume full working days consecutively and therefore afternoon

sessions/ evening sessions or one day events were viewed as appropriate for delivery. The

responses to these questions should be placed in the context of the type of digital

technology undertaken to date which was mainly topic specific and thus would perhaps not

demand the longer time duration that a more comprehensive integrated and multi topic

digital competencies training programme necessitates.

This detail has value in informing the number of hours or time that should be allocated to

training programmes and its frequency of delivery which will be an important design

consideration to ensure the sustainable commitment of the entrepreneur to engage in and

complete a digital competency training programme. Furthermore, the duration and timing

of the programme can be aligned with and indeed may be influenced by the preferred mode

of delivery.

In order to ensure programme content is appropriate respondents were invited to provide a

list of digital related topics they would like to receive training in and a summary of the range

of themes emerging by country are listed in the Table 15.0.

Table 15.0 Digital training topics

United Kingdom

- All of it

- Facebook for Business

- How to maximise the use of social media

- Online marketing strategy

- Mailchimp

- How to use analytics

- Conducting promotions through social media

- Social Media for Business

- Twitter

- Website maintenance

- Wordpress

- LinkedIn

Slovenia

- Brand development

- Launching of new product

- Project management

- Sales skills

- Facebook

- LinkedIn

- Blogs

- Promotion

- Increasing of web traffic

- Finances

- Use of new tools, integration of them into work processes

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- Hootsuite

- How digital media can help to grow my business

- Internet marketing

- Online marketing

- Blogs, web sales

- Advanced computer technologies - CRM, BPM, PCM

Bulgaria

- Online marketing

- Digital trends

- Content creation and management

- Networking apps

- Google add word

- Facebook

- Marketing data science

- Webinars

- YouTube

- Website development

Ireland

- Online marketing strategy

- How to use analytics

- Social Media for Business

- Blogging

- Website maintenance

- SEO

- How to target customers better online

- Measuring results from online activities

- How to develop good content

Spain

- Web positioning, social marketing

- Web positioning and digital marketing

- To promote the use of RRSS in general terms, to the whole staff of the cia

- Digital dissemination for European projects

- Optimization of the SEO, use of design marketing software and web pages programming since we always depend on stencils and their external use without being able to act in this field as we would like to.

- Online marketing

- It's good to increase the competences

- Online marketing, measurement of the online means, SEO

- Servers maintenance

- Web pages design

Lithuania

- Know how to use new technologies

- Yes, I myself should be understood as running, exercise

- Training about their business benefits

Norway

- Financial management and investment readiness

- Opportunity recognition

- Business planning

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- Building competences

- Mentoring

The list of topics reflect the modular, topic focus of elements of digital technology per se

and do not extend to identify the more integrated or holistic strategic perspective of digital

technology in developing a digital strategy for their enterprise. The findings are informative

as to the perception and interpretation of respondents as to what is needed by their

enterprise and tend to align with the topics many have already received training in or reflect

the commonly used digital tools in use by respondents as identified in earlier questions in

the research findings section.

Therefore, taking into consideration the above listing, many of the related and similar topics

can be developed into themes for inclusion in a digital competency framework. That said it

is important and more so necessary to extend competency development beyond digital

topics to provide a more holistic and integrated digital training programme to include the

steps the entrepreneur should adopt in the final choice of digital tool to adopt, why and

how to measure each digital tool’s performance. These decisions must be driven and guided

by a set of objectives as to what they want to achieve from digital technology, what tools to

adopt on an integrated and interlinked basis; how they should be implemented and

resourced and their ultimate evaluation and monitoring to determine their return to sales

and revenue streams in an effective manner.

In order to ensure trainers are aware of and understand future digital business applications

contemporary and business related emerging digital technologies, respondents were

requested to suggest the digital opportunities, if any they foresaw for their business. The

narratives received contained a wide variety of comments which are displayed in Table 16.0.

Table 16.0 Perceived Opportunities from Digital Technologies

United Kingdom

Absolutely, younger generations find everything on-line.

Yes it gives a platform for small business to attract attention and build interest around the brand.

Digital technology does provide greater opportunities for SME but as I have limited knowledge of this media I am finding it difficult to exploit its potential

No business will be able to grow and exist without using the digital technologies available.

increase profile and achieve greater exposure with minimal expense

Yes but I have not started it yet so too early to say.

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Yes but not an area we are confident in at present

Yes definitely - it puts everyone on an even footing regardless of business size or budget

Yes I do but you need training and support to gain the knowledge and skills to develop your strategy

Yes, as networking is made easier and contacts can be made across the country and abroad.

Yes, by free promotion and connections

Definitely. Small business' need social media presence.

I haven't experienced any new business from digital technology but it has simplified my role and business

It's a relatively cheap way to reach a larger target audience.

Most similar businesses to ours use social media.

They allow us to connect with more people and reach out to people in different markets. They also allow potential clients to view our products and services online, without us having to be in the same geographical area.

Enhance personal interactions.

If it wasn't for my card reader that works though 4g I would have to turn customers away all social media and our website www.beanburst.com

Slovenia

Of course , since this is a very favourable option for the promotion of companies and necessary to

operate

Greater visibility

You can reach the target group easier / faster

I think that they are important and at the same time among the cheapest methods of promotion

Certainly. New businesses may take advantage of web technologies for its promotion

I doubt it

With small input you can use specific skills, activities

Of course

Absolutely. It saves time and money

Yes, because they enable them to operate with smaller costs and enable processing large amounts

of data, flexibility

Definitely because this is the cheapest way of communication between the seller and customer

Yes, mostly for promotion

Absolutely

Depends on the area that the company operates in

http://www.beanburst.com/

90

I don't know

Yes, however it depends on the work plans and desired goals

Ireland

Allows greater access to more customers and to get closer feedback from customers also means of

identifying new ideas for products

Facebook is good as so many people use.

I think they do but would like to hear about the specific benefits

I think they do depending on the company’s route to market.

Along with the typical focus on social media marketing I would like it if there was a focus on

customer management systems. mobile marketing and ecommerce, social networking and online

video

Of course. Can’t imagine a business where it doesn't.

Digital technology is a very very wide area ... it’s a little like asking does electricity offer opportunities

to grow the business!

Yes. Mobile applications such as Salesforce

Yes and no, as all depends in time and resources available in that particular small business.

Lithuania

All start-ups the reference, it is now very popular, and without it is impossible to run business

successfully.

Yes. I have colleague’s examples. Advertising through Facebook diversified their business.

Not. Only time will take away. Paying - yes.

Digital technology optimizes the work process itself. Since this can be done in many areas, there is a

wide range of activities of the establishment.

I think so, because the use of digital technology provides more opportunities to advertise and find

new customers, build relationships with partners.

Yes, it now looks quite different business world.

Helped me, so I created jobs for others.

Well, this trade developed after all the Internet. Without the Internet we cannot be successful in the

market

I do not have experience, but looking at what is happening in the world – helps

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Helps. But it's just a tool. Most important personal skill – entrepreneurship

It kelps for small businesses

Yes, I know practical examples of successful marketing via social networks

Yes. I have many years of experience in managerial positions and you would have the impact of

technology on business where I worked, I think the same will and walking along my business

I think that via digital way people get more information.

Yes, and it is on the beginning of the development, All people are more and more involved in it.

Yes, I think that helps to develop a business, create networks, and the people themselves are

beginning to show interest.

It helps to find new clients; services providers can share their activities.

It easier to expand networks; to share the work done

It is most important factor element of nowadays.

It is inevitable era factor

It is new era of the smart technologies. Especially smartphone

It not too much, do not have experience

Yes. There are a huge new opportunities for new generation, for young people.

Bulgaria

Yes. Technology will “eliminate” some expensive work positions (employees)

Spain

Without any doubt, in the technological era, we must to be fashionable and get to the consumer

when they surf on their tablet or computer

It is an opportunity and, at the same time, a threat since those who don't join to the Digital Tools,

are over.

Yes, in some cases

I believe I understand how the RRSS work and their role as a communication via in a close future for

some basis to be adapted and be part of the trends and ways of consumption of our potential

distributors. If we want to have a proper consumption experience, we have to dominate the way the

new generations are involved in.

They are the keys to do the SMEs more competitive

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The opportunities are where the society is. Most of them are nowadays on Internet and use any type

of digital tools and social networks, so it is necessary the sectors get adapted.

Yes, if they are provided since the digital tools are really useful to know the new entrepreneurial

projects based on the contacts from the social networks.

It provides a lot of advantages and a great savings of the costs.

Yes. It provides online marketing tools through the social networks and collaborative tools for the

edition of documents (GDrive, Dropbox).

I do see the importance to open to the online sales

It makes cheaper some things, as the necessity to have a physical store

Yes, it helps to expand and know ourselves

Yes, the online marketing is the future by its vast majority

When reviewed these comments have consequences for the development of a digital

competency training programmes on a number of fronts, such as it demonstrates the digital

language used and its level and depth; it demonstrates the vagueness of what digital is

about and what it can achieve in an entrepreneurial context; it highlights the level of

knowledge, or lack of understanding of the emerging digital tools and technologies.

Essentially, there is an acceptance that it is an inevitable aspect of business but not sure

what aspects are most relevant for them. Furthermore it brings to the fore the mixed

responses in that not all entrepreneurs view digital in an opportunistic positive sense and

thus will impact on their adoption of digital in the future applications of their enterprise.

Building on the level of comprehension of digital and their future attitudes and behaviours

with digital technology respondents were encouraged to describe their challenges or fears

of digital technologies for the next year. There are common trends emerging in terms of the

concerns entrepreneurs have about using digital technology across the partner countries

and these resonate on personal or resources constraints and with the technology itself and

its functionality as described in Table 17.0.

Table 17.0 Entrepreneurs Key Concerns about use of Digital Technology

United Kingdom

- Lack of Knowledge

- Lack of time

- No concerns

Slovenia

- Encouragement of passivity of customers, which can lead to passivity in other areas

- Security and privacy issues

- Complicated and non-user friendly tools

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- How much time I spend doing it.

- Keeping up with changing technology

- Confidentiality

- Reputation of the companyI need more info on the SEO side of things.

- To make sure the website shows up high in the search ranking

- I won't meet the target audience

- It will get lost if I don't pay £100's to google I don't have the money.

- Lack of time and money

- It's a minefield.

- Not to be overwhelmed by the technology and diluted in online marketing efforts.

- Lack of personal contact

- Misuse and leading of customers

- High maintenance cost

- Dependence on IT experts

- Lack of knowledge

- Lack of adaptability for specific needs of company

- Lack of transparency

- protection of personal data

- Many tools they are unfriendly and too complex to use

- Impersonality

- Abuses and deceits, and the use of online media to "marketing diversion" against competitors

- High maintenance costs, financial investment, lack of knowledge and Experience of providers, adaptation to the specific needs of companies

- Reaching the elderly population

- Loss of contact between people

- Too much information, including misleading

- Digital web tools relating to work are a necessity.

- In the flood of options to be able to extract the best option in terms of resources

- Digital preservation and custody, control of the Digital environment, the impact of social web tools

- Passivity of customers

Bulgaria

- Security, mistakes,

- Technologies reduce time spent on other activities,

- Too much information,

- Easy way for manipulation

Ireland

- Consistency, resourcing the social media strategy

- There are pros and cons to investing heavily and there are also very valid reasons for directing the effort to direct contact and relationships.

- A blended approach is good but for people based contracts personal contact remains a basic premise of winning trust.

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- Keeping up to date with all the changes

- Time and money to spend on technology

- Due to my lack of awareness I am not really sure....I tend to stick with what I know ......need to explore other tools ....getting the time is the problem

Lithunia

- It is not relevant to the scope of our business

- More time, more knowledge.

- Training for employees.

- These measures proof the real benefits

- Knowledge on web marketing, SEO, work with photo editing software

- Optimization employment opportunities for, as well as raising awareness

- Acquisition of smart technologies

- To learn how to reallocate the tasks to employees, to be able to check the results and assess the benefits

- Free tools

- Innovations

- Difficult to answer, if I knew it for sure will use.

- The funding

- I would like to interact with apps developers

- It is necessary to try more

- More information about their benefits

- LinkedIn

- Free access to Internet

- More projects on this topic for the elderly people

- The results of this survey

- News and Opportunities

- To improve the little things will come out.

- Concentrated and convenient news, and in the decisions of the discovery

- Currently no opinion, or time to think about it

- Global trends

- For me it is more interested in the matter, that the world is moving there, not for fun

Spain

- To have a meter and to measure the ROI

- Lack of time and planning. Lack of help in serious training

- That they don't work even with their quality

- The clients capacity to follow us or use the necessary tools

- Measurement for the correction of strategies

- The time to dedicate to it and that is not dedicated to the own enterprise production

- Get right with the focus: there are a lot of platforms and RRSS. Which one is the most suitable to get to our most potential consumers? That's the key. And once it is identified, How to manage them properly? All is a challenge.

- You need one person just for that. It takes a lot of time.

- The interest of the one who gets the information

- The index tools for browsers and social networks. Each time, the search algorithm changes so the best formula to appear on the timeline never gets clear.

- That they can get close to our users and potential clients in a proper way

- To know how to use them

- Get adapted to the necessity of the clients

- Media saturation

- Get updated on media and really useful resources and not those of few reliability that make us to waste our time

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- Workshops

- Mini-courses on how to use a wider range of measures

- The costs, time

- The quality of attention to the user

- Time

- The competencies, the costs

- The measurement for the correction of strategies

From the personal entrepreneurial perspective, challenges relate to a lack of people,

insufficient digital skills and the scarcity of the entrepreneur’s time to develop digital

content and to maintain digital platforms. These concerns are compounded by the lack of

knowledge about digital technology, exposure to information overload and their ability to

keep up to date with social and digital media advancements. In relation to the more

technical concerns, issues of security of information, payments, control of information,

manipulation of information etc. were mentioned. These need to be addressed and

alleviated for the entrepreneur to provide greater reassurance of the safety of internal and

external information contained on their site and in particular in relation to payment and in

the establishment of ecommerce sites which was an area in need of development cited by a

number of respondents.

The information obtained from this question has benefit in presenting again the language

adopted by entrepreneurs when discussing their concerns and presents the issues that may

restrict their engagement with digital over the next year which will need to be

accommodated for in the a digital training programme.

Finally, to obtain a more informed understanding of the language and planned practices of

digital, respondents were asked about what digital technologies they considered would

dominate their business over the next year. The comments obtained linked with and are

similar to those obtained in the previous questions on future trends in technology and a

summary of the comments are presented in Table 18.0.

Table 18.0 Digital technologies dominating small businesses over the next 2 years

United Kingdom

- Web, online learning, payment and inclusion of interactive learning technologies

- Linkedin, twitter,

- Website, social media & telecoms

- Blogging and YouTube

- Not sure

96

- LinkedIn ad Facebook

- business app

- The Internet. Facebook

- CAD, BIM, LinkedIn

- Facebook and Twitter Word and Excel Online banking

- Unsure

- Hopefully in the next few years we will have our own Sane Seven App.

- Blog, QQ (or Skype) and wechat.

- Twitter, facebook, blogging.

- website/social media and we would love to develop an app for our business.

- Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter

- Telephone mobile IT website Facebook Twitter and more.

- Blogging, social media and cloud/file sharing.

- All social media and our website www.beanburst.com

- Don't know what's next still trying to get to grips with the present

- Assistive technology for delivering services twitter face book linked in

- Cloud accounting

Ireland

- Mobile marketing and ecommerce

- Facebook, mobile marketing

- Ecommerce, cloud computing

- Selling and digital for international markets

- Facebook and mobile marketing

- Facebook /twitter

- SEO/ Cloud computing

- Cloud, twitter, LinkedIn

- Think it will be Facebook and twitter...worked so far!

- Facebook and twitter

- Cloud computing and online networking

- Due to my lack of awareness I am not really sure....I tend to stick with what I know ......need to explore other tools

- Getting the time is the problem

- Facebook

- Website and mobile technology as consumers going this way

Slovenia

- Difficult to predict

- Technologies, based on visualisation and smart interpretation models

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- Nothing special

- Modern information technologies

- Mix of technologies

- I think it will stay the same

- Visual technologies

- Modern information technology

- Mobile communications, web technologies Using web applications

- Facebook, LinkedIn and blogs

- Mobile

- Web technologies, optimization of online shops

- It is not possible to predict/ I don't know

- Digital, CRM

- The use of computers and the Internet, the development of sensors, digital photography

Bulgaria

- M-business

- E-business

- Cloud services

- Big data analysis software

- Social media

- Tools for online marketing

- Data science

Lithuania

- Social Networks

- Really nothing new or magical

- As we are a progressive IT company - activities dominate all accessible and compatible with the company's activities

- Technology

- Social Networks

- Mobile e-commerce

- Accounting software, electronic signatures, social networks and advertising

- Laptops and tablet computers, smartphones

- Online advertising

- Internet

- Here I find it hard to say I do not really communicate with principals. More use of the

- Not decided yet

- Mobile communications programs

- Here it is difficult to predict, things are changing very quickly

98

- I think a lot will be based on digital communication with the client

- Google make things even more particular include

Spain

- Web for smartphones and online commerce - The cloud - FB, Tw and some new apps that gets fashionable - Facebook - The collaborative tools and mobile apps design - The cloud and online marketing - U-tube - Facebook, Instagram, online Pinterest Marketing (with little relevance as purschase

chanel but so important from the point of view of communication) - Digital marketing. Cloud computing and social networks - Hangout - I guess that due to the lack of new social networks that stir up the communicative

market, we'll move on the classic ones: Facebook and Twitter - Innovation on telephony - Online payment of the services - Web - The clear advance of new digital communication technologies is difficult to foresee. - It would be an increase and perfectionism of the current tools, the different social

networks - Apps for smartphones

- Online means

The phrases used to describe the influential technologies centre on individual tools and

platforms and are dominated by single world and multiple repetitions such as Twitter;

LinkedIn; Facebook emerging as very popular as with the terminology and descriptions

adopted when describing concerns and trends. To a lesser extent the cloud, mobile

technologies, blogs, were mentioned as tools that would dominate.

In addition to the suggestions on the technologies that will dominate, a number of

respondents in each country also suggested that they ‘were unsure’ did not know’ what

ones would dominate their business over the next few years. Consequentially, the results

demonstrate somewhat narrow interpretation as to the emerging technologies and their

likely impact or benefits that they could potentially deliver to their enterprise. This is an

important learning from the results as it has impact on the need to increase the baseline

level of knowledge and understanding of the applications of emerging technologies in the

small firm context and how to leverage their potential.

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7.5 Concluding Comments

Entrepreneurs that adopt digital marketing techniques can gain from learning about the

benefits of a wide-ranging digital strategy. Generating a digital footprint, for the

entrepreneur and their business is an important part of any digital marketing strategy.

Overall, our survey shows that many small businesses are engaging with digital technologies

and demonstrate intent to increase their usage of various digital tools over the next year.

Further, respondents are engaged in a variety of digital tools beyond Facebook and LinkedIn

to extend into online selling, online networking and ecommerce to a lesser extent.

Moreover the majority of respondents indicated an interest in receiving training in digital

technology in a range of topics relating to digital tools per se. Whilst positive interest in

participating in training exists there was a lack of a strategic perspective of integrating

digital technology as part of the broader strategy or business plan for their enterprise. Social

media can be highly valuable and a comprehensive digital strategy can help drive long-term

small business success if leveraged to its full potential. Therein lies the gap and challenge for

the surveyed firm, how to more fully capitalise on the ever increasing opportunities

presented by social and digital technologies, whilst balancing the use of those most relevant

and appropriate ones to reduce a fragmented and piecemeal approach to achieving a non-

measured set of tasks.

The ability and need for integrating digital into mainstream business activities is an area

requiring attention and is a fundamental foundation on which any successful digital strategy

is built on. This would suggest that entrepreneurs decide on training on a haphazard basis

which may reflect the current or immediate needs of the entrepreneur and the stage of

their company rather than a holistic and future planned approach. These results indicate

that It is necessary to encourage entrepreneurs to adopt a more strategic long term

perspective as to the role and contribution of digital technologies to the next stage of

development and growth of their enterprise, as opposed to an add on function or on the

periphery and undertaken when needed.

Related is the weakness of the lack of clear measurement or tracking of performance and

outcomes from digital efforts and resources extended to digital media – this lack of

measurement perhaps is linked to the absence of a clear set of objectives and fear and

confusion as to the potential of digital for a small enterprise.

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Implementation and sustainability of digital media is central to build a community of

relationships with key stakeholders and this requires an understanding of what platforms to

use, why and how to leverage their financial and non-financial potential. The respondents

have identified areas for training, their preferred mode of delivery and timing of training.

These findings generate a more informed contemporary comprehension of the practices of

digital technology in small firms, their future plans in this area, the areas they require

training and suggestions on how this training should be delivered - all which direct to a

more targeted and focused design of a digital skills competency programme.

To ensure the programme when developed will be effectively executed and implemented to

accommodate the personal and business needs of entrepreneurs at various stages of

business formation and growth, the trainers and educators need to be suitably competent

and capable of delivering this programme. Therefore the research findings from educators

and trainers will provide the matching dyad perspective as to the practices and

understanding of digital technology as it applies to enterprise learning from the supply side

dimension.

8. Educators Use of Digital Technologies - Key Research Findings

8.1. Respondent Profile and Experience of Enterprise Education and Training

A combination of enterprise trainers, educators with third level institutions, mentors and

consultants combined the 141 respondents to this survey. The number of respondents by

country is displayed in Table 19.0.

Table 19.0 Respondent Profile

Country Number of Respondents Percentage response rate

%

United Kingdom 31 21.9

Spain 19 13.5

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Lithuania 28 19.8

Bulgaria 9 6.4

Slovenia 19 13.5

Ireland 35 24.9

Total respondents 141 100

The profiles of enterprise educator and trainer (ETE) varied in demographics and experience

and across the digital spectrum of digital native to digital immigrant. The majority of

respondents were female (63.8%) and the sample consisted of an even mix of respondents

aged between of 31-40 years (30.5 %) and 41-50 years (33.3%) with 24.8% aged 51 years

plus. Concurring with their age cohorts, respondents had accumulated extensive experience

in the delivery of entrepreneurship education programmes, where 30.5% had accumulated

6 to 10 years’ experience; 22% having acquired more than 15 years’ experience and 19.9%

had attained between 11 and 15 years training experience. This experience consisted of

delivering enterprise programmes to smaller groups, where group sizes of between 4 and 10

and 11 and 20 people were most commonly cited across the partner countries. The larger

groups of 51-80 and 81 above of entrepreneurial learner were more evident in full time

education programmes and at third level educational institutions.

Consistent with the variety of roles of the respondents they also displayed experience in

delivering a comprehensive range of enterprise related modules and programmes which

dealt with the start-up, growing and internationalising a small business. Experience was also

held in delivering related enterprise modules on functional aspects of the business

(marketing, finance, accounting for start-ups, project management, etc.). A list of the

enterprise related subjects delivered are contained in Appendix 11. Respondents

represented a variety of roles related to teaching, training, lecturing, mentoring, and

consultancy to mainly learners who were predominantly in the 21–30 years age cohort,

followed by entrepreneurial learners aged between 31 and 40 years. All respondents

indicated that they had experience of teaching and working with a mix of ages. The public

sector was the dominant employer of this group and while engaged by the public sector

some respondents gained experience of working with private sector training and

development companies to deliver enterprise training and education programmes.

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8.2 Digital Technologies Practices, Barriers and Benefits for Enterprise Education

Respondents indicated their use of digital technology in a number of tasks related to the

delivery of enterprise education and the assessment of enterprise programmes which is

reflected in Table 20.0 below. Given that there are multiple responses the analysis

represents the number of respondents from the 141 who answered the question regarding

usage of the various tools.

Table 20.0 Use of Digital Tools in Enterprise Education

Tasks use digital tools for in enterprise education and training

Response Count (N=141)


Distributing notes/reading material and notices about the subject/classes

123 87.2

Facilitating Online Learner to learner discussion (e.g. discussion forums)

67 47.5

For Class announcements 99 70.2

Completion of revision Quizzes 37 26.2

Allow for Online submission of coursework 73 51.8

Creating Online meeting room / Webinar 36 25.5

Digital videos of lectures 40 28.3

Creation of collaborative documents (e.g. using wikis, shared file space)

57 40.4

Plagiarism detection (e.g. Turnitin, SafeAssign, etc.) 28 19.8

Interactive learning materials (e.g. animations, simulations) 43 30.4

Develop and publish blogs relevant for enterprise subjects 43 30.4

Administration and completion of Online assessment 41 29.1

Use the web to download or publish podcasts (e.g. using Juice, iTunes)

33 23.4

Design and dissemination of Interactive Multimedia/CD-ROMs 17 12

Creating entrepreneurial learner to educator discussion forums

45 31.9

Have available Skype facilities for learner contact outside class times

53 37.5

Have created EBooks and eLearning material 45 31.9

Use the web for web conferencing 32 22.6

Developing/supporting “learning communities” 35 24.8

Develop podcasts 16 11.3

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*The figure exceeds the total number of respondents as in a number of cases respondents cited

more than one element.

The data presented in the table above would suggest that digital technology is used as a

conduit through which content and assessments are delivered and made accessible to

learners who in many cases are not attending full time education or training programmes.

Further, the use is one directional in nature using existing technologies as opposed to

developing personalised interactive and engaging digital technologies specific to a group or

enterprise programme (e.g. videos; webinars; podcasts; blogs etc.).

The minority of respondents who did not use digital in their enterprise programmes put

forward the reasons below as why this was the case:

- ‘Don’t have the time’

- ‘Not really suitable to my audience who lack access to technology outside the classroom’

- ‘Not see its relevance to enterprise as it’s about people’

- ‘It distracts the participant and me the lecturer when delivering content’

- ‘Don’t know enough about new technologies or their uses’

- ‘It hard to use in short informational workshops’

- ‘Lack of time, motivation, sometimes finances’

- ‘Entrepreneurs don't want it, they don't have access or time for this way of communication’

- ‘Lack of knowledge’

- ‘There is no reason not to use them – the system enables usage of digital technologies in study process; the professors are too lazy for establishment of active work in e-environment’

The type and level of engagement with digital media can be better explained by reviewing

the objectives educators had to guide their use of digital technology. A sample of objectives

with similar underpinning themes across the partner countries are presented in the

narratives contained in the Table 21.0 below.

Table 21.0 Objectives for the use of Digital Technology in Enterprise Education

- More effective work and cooperation with/between participants

- Availability of contents anytime, anyplace

- Adaptability towards participants

- Better reach of customers

- Establishment of interactive communication outside of specific class; encouragement for usage of digital technologies in seeking of information necessary for team and individual assignments; encouragement of teamwork in e-environment; encouragement for seeking and studying of

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good practices; testing before crucial tests; business simulation games

- Holistic insight into specific topic/class, encouragement of learners to search for relevant information, encouragement of innovative study approaches (for example: blogs for stating their own views on specific area which requires previous study and understanding of a topic)

- It’s Convenience/Access anytime

- Get Learn to use/ Comfortable with digital technology

- Supporting the learning experience of learner

- More enjoyable learning experience/Greater engagement

- Learning through the use of games and simulations, efficiency in online communication

- Decrease the administrative expenses for the course

- To increase competition

- To prepare young people for future work

- For better communication and involvement of co-workers

- To differentiate way of studies, to make it more attractive

- To make a work faster, more effectively

- To facilitate completion of business plans and financial forecasts

- To enable women to use the internet and social media to support their businesses

Digital technology was used with multiple objectives which focussed on the benefits of the

infrastructure of technology and secondly on using digital tools to enhance pedagogy and

learning outcomes for learners. Respondents focussed on the use of technology as an

enabler and means of communication and dissemination which was dependant on the

available infrastructure of digital technology to do this successfully. Technology was viewed

to increase educator efficiencies and create greater access to the entrepreneurial learner.

The pedagogical related objectives resonated on enhancing the professional skills set of the

learner such as generating confidence and greater experience in the use of digital

technologies that relate to the business needs. The findings reveal that while digital

technology objectives are in place they are traditional and relatively standard educator

ones and do not bring to the fore any creative aspirations for imparting more ‘digitalised

mind-set’ or knowledge into the learner.

The results have implications in terms of understanding how the educator is setting the

objectives, for instance are objectives defined in relation to desired digital learning

outcomes which drive the use of what technology to use and how it is embedded as part of

the curriculum; or conversely is it the opposite where the availability or lack therein of

digital technology dictates the objectives set for the enterprise education and training

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curriculum. If this is the scenario then technology and location determines the type and

depth or use and exposure learners gain in the application of digital.

The barriers to the use of digital technologies identified those connected with access to

technology and technical supports aligned with challenges relating to the lack of confidence

and skills in the use and trialling of digital technology in the delivery of enterprise training

programmes. The analysis of this question and its low response rate and the number of ‘not

relevant’ responses suggests that barriers are not a huge deterrent in the use of digital

technology. Of note is the issue in relation to time – reflection of respondents which could

be viewed as a contradiction or against the ethos of their core business of teaching which

requires time to learn on their part, but yet have little time to upskill themselves in what

they are educating other for and about.

So taking into consideration infrastructural and hardware issues efforts must be made to

ensure educators become more confident and comfortable in the use of digital technology

beyond the dissemination of notes. The barriers to learning about and engaging in the

adoption of enterprise relevant digital technology must be clearly communicated so that

educators comprehend that despite time being a barrier, that it will generate long term

professional and pedagogical benefits. Moreover, as educators will in the future be engaged

with a younger age cohort of entrepreneurial learner or one who is more digitally equipped

and competent then the educator must be capable and confident in meeting their needs.

Conversely, respondents were requested to identify how the adoption of digital

technologies benefited them in the delivery of enterprise courses. The benefits revolved

around how technology created greater access to more learners and allowed for speedier

and more seamless contact with the entrepreneurial learner and equally allowed the

entrepreneurial learner to have speedier and more direct access to the educator at all

times. This facilitated the adult or entrepreneurial learner who was not located in a

structured full time programme.

The positive aspects of digital technology are less obvious in areas such as developing

enterprising skills; the development of enterprise decision making skills, personal or

communication skills or providing flexibility to respond to a variety of learners which are

important points to consider in any programme development and design. How can we

ensure digital technology does not deter learners who may need more personal reassurance

or assistance and especially if undertaking a predominately distance or e-learning

programme for developing enterprising skills? Questions arise as to how can digital as a

conduit, enable the acquisition and development and indeed the testing of e-leadership and

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e-skills which are promoted by many policy documents. To achieve this in enterprise

programmes requires incorporating practice based assessment and practical

entrepreneurial related projects to allow the learner acquire skills in an applied and relevant

manner.

In considering these issues, decisions need to be made on how best to incorporate non-

digital delivery methods to complement and support digital technologies for the topics of

personal communication, decision making etc., and the skills pertinent and necessary for the

entrepreneur to possess in the absence of digital technologies in the business.

Having established the benefits and barriers of digital technology in enterprise learning and

education, respondents were asked to indicate the challenges they encountered in the use

of digital technology, broadly relating to the infrastructural and personal preference

perspectives. Table 22.0 highlights the prioritising of perceived problems and challenges

encountered.

Table 22.0 Barriers Encountered with Digital Technology Usage Problems/challenges in the use of digital technologies in enterprise training and education?

Yes No Response percentage %

Lack of clear policies or rules governing disputes which occur

online

36.9 63.1 100.0

Misinterpretation of information distributed via technology

when the educator is not available to explain

54.9 45.1 100.0

Concern about network security and privacy creates caution in

the use of digital technologies

43.4 56.6 100.0

Lack of educator control of where information id disseminated

once it is online

53.3 46.7 100.0

Erodes on personal space and private time of educator as

always accessible to the learner

47.5 52.5 100.0

Technology reduces the concentration and attention span of

the learner

29.2 70.8 100.0

Reduces the opportunity for personal development of the

learner

30.3 69.7 100.0

Learner will be distracted by the technology, not content 24.0 76.0 100.0

Does not allow for enhancing communication, selling and

negotiating skills which are critical enterprising skills

41.0 59.0 100.0

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Too much focus on technology deemphasises the importance of

personal role of the entrepreneur in the enterprise

30.3 69.7 100.0

The most frequently cited barriers relate to aspects of the technology itself, such as issues

about loss of control of the interpretation of content as it passes to the learner and how to

ensure safety and security of the information on networks, which point to the need for the

employing institution and organisations to have these issues addressed. The existence of an

overall institutional/organisation digital strategy should address these issues. This was a

topic emerging in the literature where Plomp et al., 2008; Shear et al., 2010a; Shear et al.,

2011 strongly endorsed that the commitment to the use of digital technologies must be

translated into the provision of resources to support the learner and the educator. It also

promotes the imperative for the professional development of the educator to ensure that

they are equipped with digital skills and secondly digital pedagogy and assessment and have

the necessary infrastructure in place to achieve appropriate digital learning outcomes.

To develop this point further, respondents were questioned on their knowledge of and the

availability of institutional/organisational digital strategies to guide and support digital

learning in their institutions. The responses indicated that from a strategic institutional

perspective it would appear that institutions positively endorse but do not mandatory

impose the adoption of digital technology with 39% of the 128 respondents indicating they

their institution had a clear strategy for encouraging and supporting technology enhanced

learning and programme design across all disciplines. Of note was the 26% who indicated

that they did not know if such a strategy existed in their institution/organisation – perhaps

reflecting somewhat on their interest and engagement with digital technology. The higher

level of awareness of institutional policies existed amongst the Spanish and Irish responses

and perhaps can be linked with the nature of the institution providing the enterprise courses

which are predominately universities. It would be expected that the larger public sector

organisations would need to have digital and ICT strategies to govern the use of information

technology in the broader sense. That said the barriers they encounter are at institutional

level and would thus question how developed or operational are the institutional strategies

or how aware are the respondents of the content of the strategy?

Beyond the technical issues, and those related to the personal role of the educator/trainer

is the view that using technology erodes on their time which may militate against its usage.

It is important to note and address these perceived barriers and provide a means of

addressing them, such as how to manage learner access times, devising a more structured

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and clearly defined timescale of activities, reporting and communication times in the

module outline which is given to the learner at the commencement of the enterprise

module. This forms a contract of learning to ensure both parties are familiar with the

parameters and boundaries of their learning relationship.

Given the nature of enterprise education and the constant challenge for educators on how

to get the correct balance of incorporating digital technology whilst maintaining the

personal interactive facilitation and peer learning exchanges, this cannot always be

optimally achieved via digital delivery solely. For the delivery of enterprise education the

respondents to this question (N=128) were consensual in their agreement (85%) that

technology should not be a substitute for the educator and used by the educator. When this

response is taken into consideration with the manner and reasons digital technology is used

in the delivery of programmes (distributing notes/reading material and notices about the

subject/classes; facilitating online learner to learner discussion; for class announcements); it

provides a deeper insight into the more traditional use of digital technology in the content

and also in its role in the delivery of entrepreneurship education programmes.

This finding suggests that educators are not fully capitalising on the functionalities or the

potential of digital in learning and delivery and it is important that technology per se on its

own is not the sole or primary driver of the delivery mechanism nor should the emphasis on

technology drive or be the main determinant of content, assessment or personal skills

development. As is the case in the literature, technology is the tool, or digital technologies

provide the conduit or platforms on which to develop a more digital savvy enterprise

learner and be in a position to more relevantly transfer this learning into starting and

developing a new business.

Given the pervasive use of digital technology in individual’s personal life and how this usage

may be linked with or reflects the broader use and attitudes to digital technology

information was sought on the frequency or balance of use of digital technology between

work and personal life. Of the 125 responses to this question 65.6% indicated that they used

technology mostly for work reasons and 32% highlighted that they used it for equal

amounts of personal and work reasons suggesting an interest and awareness of digital but

yet, it does not appear to transfer into enterprise education programme development and

delivery. As expected the majority of educators possessed an account with a professional

networking site (86.6%) with LinkedIn as the most popular site mentioned followed by

Facebook. Twitter was viewed as second most important and more so for United Kingdom

and Irish respondents.

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Having obtained an insight into educators digital practices and the challenges they

encounter in the adoption of digital technology for enterprise education information was

sought on the educators own participation in digital training and future needs for this type

of training.

Table 23.0 Participation in Digital Training

Received training in digital technologies


Response Percentage

%

Yes 8 5 13 4 3 4 37 28.7

No 26 15 6 24 6 15 92 71.3

129 100.0

Overall respondents were satisfied with the training obtained which was delivered primarily

via a blended learning approach. The training was completed on a voluntary basis which is a

positive reflection on their appetite for learning more about digital and their commitment to

give time to this learning. To develop these further, respondents were asked if they

considered that they had digital training needs and if so in what topics. The list of topics are

presented in Table 24.0.

Table 24.0 Areas highlighted for training

United Kingdom

- I would like to improve my knowledge and skills in using prezzi and survey / polling programmes. Also to learn about new simulation games etc.

- Numerous - as technology keeps moving forward while I struggle to keep up

- Film making

- Website Development and Search Engine Optimisation

- I need time to explore appropriate tools and funding to pay for platforms and tools that are useful. I need a leaner procurement process

Ireland

- e-commerce, selling online

- e-marketing, mobile technology,

- Yes - how to interlink different digital sources into one platform; how to create engaging content that offers choices to learners in how they learn;

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- Use of blackboard

- New tools to enhance the learner experience - specific examples of how others have integrated Technology successfully in their modules

- Interest in knowing more about how to develop content; SEO; Analytics; measuring social media activity

- Designing social media plans for small firms, website development; online selling and email marketing

- Twitter for business; ecommerce trends measuring social media impact

- Online selling, producing effective blogs, video marketing and online CRM

- How to track and measure social media activity and relate to costs of doing it; CRM via online methods; online networking

- Ecommerce; developing aps; effective content design

- Webinar development; SEO; Analytics; digital customer service

- Ecommerce and mobile marketing strategies

- Turn tin and Policies and procedures for assessing using digital tools.

- Training for online assessment and eLearning material design

- Ecommerce and e-business; cloud computing

- Mobile marketing and developing; SEO; Cloud computing

- Current trends and tools for social media and how to develop digital media campaigns

- eLearning systems and design of material for online delivery

Slovenia

- Learning of new approaches

- Social media

- New technologies

- New technologies, world trends

- Types of technology and its practical use

- Video

- Detailed presentation of (dis)advantages of all options which the e-environment provides

- Combination of different technologies, data protection in internet, advanced Excel

- Usage of video content, preparation of video materials for learning

- Combination of e-learning with learning in classroom

- Social media

- Innovation in technology

- Usage of different types of technologies

- Combining technologies

- Data protection on world wide web

- Microsoft Excel advanced level

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- The use of video content and preparation of these for learning

- Interactive materials

- Webinar

- Mailchimp

Spain

- Video, postcasts, apps

- Yes, teleformation

- eCommerce (prestashop)

- More entrepreneurial software I would like to teach the students with

- New programs knowledge

- Topics related to multimedia

- More than necessities, I have a lot of training "curiosities", but the problem is not to get the

information but to have the time to learn

- Digital tools for the management of time/elaboration of digital contents/gamification/resources

Languages, use of the networks for debates and exams

Bulgaria

- Podcasts

- Experiential learning,

- Educational games

- Content design for simulations

- Intellectual property rights protection

As with the responses from the entrepreneurs a broad range of topics emerge which are

related to the popular and commonly used digital and media tools. Further as with the

entrepreneurs suggestions were given on a single topic or digital subject basis and less

attention to receiving training on a more holistic perspective of digital marketing as it

applies across business activities.

As a means of identifying good practice and obtained examples which could be used as case

studies respondents were encouraged to provide examples of digital technology used in

enterprise training and those provided are contained in Table 25.0.

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Table 25.0 Good practice examples of digital technology for Enterprise Learning

- Webinar discussions of case studies and related theory provided in class and then discussed by learners online afterwards (not necessarily moderated by lecturer)

- Using FaceBook to converse with learners highlighting Videos and written content. This is where they are interacting, so this is where some content needs to be.

- Online learner to learner discussions forums

- Use of Webinars

- Creating a social media campaign in real time, not just theoretically, where learners have to manage the campaign and measure its effects.

- Submitting assessments and giving feedback via turnitin is the way forward with assessments. I also think presenting assessments via an E-Portfolio develops the learner’s online presentation skills as well as the specific subject matter. I have used online quizzes as a revision aid which I think worked well. Having e-books and online resources 'curated' for the learner facilitates flexible learning. Live streaming of lectures to ensure learning is

- Moodle Business simulations

- SIM Venture - a game that learners and their educators find engaging and useful.- software that allows virtual meetings / webinars with flexibility for different members of the group to take the lead and share their screen. It has the advantage of not requiring software download - which can be a barrier in some institutions.

- Southampton Solent University is a good example of how Moodle and Mahara combine to make the learner's journey as effective as possible.

- Www.teaching-entrepreneurship.com (see the resources utas learners)

- Colin Jones's Teaching Entrepreneurship: http://www.teaching-entrepreneurship.com

- Moodle is OK as long as it is used well, for example to provide current information via RSS feeds. I also find that Twitter and a Facebook Group can be excellent to spread current information to learners.

- We use Google+ Pages and Google drive to share resources and have created a website which includes downloads, information and discussion forum for learners on socialstartup.org.uk We're going to use Canvasser soon to share Business Model Canvases...and we use email a lot.

- webinars - interactive and recordable

- Using LinkedIn to improve networking opportunities

- the use of social media ... you tube as a demonstration tool LinkedIn develop business networking twitter to build

- VLE Platforms

- Blackboard

- Notifications, livestream, video, Skype, Facebook, on-line evaluation and progress

http://www.teaching-entrepreneurship.com/

http://www.teaching-entrepreneurship.com/

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monitoring

- Webinars,

- Thunderbird Online Certification Programs,

- Coursera,

- Certification for Barrett Values Centre

- LIFE - Learning Initiative for Entrepreneurs http://www.life-global.org/en

- INSPIREYOW project: http://training.inspireyowup.eu

The examples provided demonstrate the range of possible good practices which can be

further researched as a means of identifying topics for inclusion in a digital competency

training programme and more so issues in relation to delivery and pedagogy and ideas on

how digital can be incorporated to enhance the appropriate digital skills competencies and

practice for entrepreneurial learners.

Due to the rapid pace of advancements in digital technology the content of any digital

competency programme must address the emerging digital topics that educators will need

to have expertise in, which must be incorporated into the digital competency framework.

Therefore, respondents were asked to provide insights into their opinions on what digital

technologies they viewed would impact on their role over the next five years and the

common suggestions are listed in Table 26.0.

Table 26.0 Digital technologies influencing the role of the enterprise educator

United Kingdom

- Webinars, Skype

- VLE platforms will become easier to use and offer more tools and support than we can imagine now. Canvas is looking a good new tool.

- Video, mooch like delivery platforms

- Understanding communication (the more innovative something is the tougher it is to communicate effectively).

- If anyone can tell me that I would be very pleased to know!!!

- Mobile and tablet devices.

- All of them!! - video; downloadable podcast; interactive content

- Increasing use of social media

- wrist devices are moving forward

http://www.life-global.org/en

http://training.inspireyowup.eu/

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Ireland

- Cloud computing and technologies which are used in different cultures for international selling and marketing

- Technologies related to the tracking of Intellectual Property infringement by lecturers and delivers of education (not by the learners!)

- Cloud computing

- Online content becoming more important than core textbooks

- Social media technologies

- Cloud computing and also more options for social networking and online selling platforms ebusiness

- Mobile and smart technologies;

- Technologies being used by 16 year olds now as these coming into education system - more mobile and eLearning is becoming more important

- Google new products and platforms set the trend for other firms to follow mobile technologies more important as smart phone usage increases

- Mobile technologies; video conferencing;

- New and emerging variations of Google and more international eplayers into the market

- Ecommerce; measuring results of social media strategies

- Mobile and ecommerce will impact on small firm competitiveness

- Mobile and the role of the smart phone by the consumer

- Big data analysis

- Social media technologies s

- Google eLearning products and online learning platforms – free for usage

- Video conferencing

Slovenia

- Video

- Any technology which will enable a better relationship between teachers and learners at transfer of knowledge

- Mobile technologies

- Smartphones, tablets

- E-learning platforms which are highly connected with video lectures, tools for simplification of communication with learners; usage of video for promotion, personal presentation, lectures…

- Webinar

Lithuania

- Social media

- Large, because everything moves to digital technology

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- Distance Learning

- E-earning courses can be on the platform in real time

- Growing popularity of distance learning, perhaps the whole group in real time

- Laptops, tablets, computers, smartphones

- All technologies are inseparable from business training

- All existing ones

- Massive online courses

Bulgaria

- Social media,

- websites with games

- Simulations,

- google drive,

- Mobile apps

Spain

- To use a teleformation platform as moodle

- Simulation tools, gamification

- To do cases

- An example could be: the systems of multimedia videos/contents well edited and coherent contents but mostly those monitored and structured to a MOOC environment of self-study

- I am not too informed about the best practices in those means

- I have successfully used the creation of theoretical and practical tests with finances students.

- Goodle drive

- Include the contents TIC as an instrument or tool of the teaching, instead of as an "exceptional practice" or a task different from the rest, getting them in the materials and tasks programming. The idea is that the students must have competencies to work rationally with those resources daily. To know which tools exist, be able to integrate them in the context of a problem or a decision model, know the security risks in an entrepreneurial context...etc.

- The use we make of the eLearning platform

- GDrive, Calendar...

- UNIMOOC

- DRIVE, GOOGLE +, GOOGLE CALENDAR

- Skype

- Shared videos

- eLearning platforms as Moodle or Efront

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As with the responses from the entrepreneurial respondents a broad variety of responses

were obtained and were general in nature and topic specific. Of note was the receipt of a

number of comments such as ‘don’t know’; ‘too many’ and ‘unsure’ which highlights an

important issue to address as if educators are not aware of the emerging digital

technologies for entrepreneurs then the digital needs of the entrepreneur will not be

addressed in a sufficient manner. This finding, when taken into consideration with the

results emerging from the entrepreneurs brings to the fore the digital divide between

‘theory and practice’ which our research shows may be founded in the lack of skills and

competencies or insufficient knowledge of digital as it applies to the entrepreneurial context

of the educator. So irrespective of the digital needs articulated by the entrepreneurs in their

survey, if the entrepreneurial educator does not possess the relevant knowledge and skills

then the digital competency gap of the entrepreneur will not be bridged.

8.3. Concluding Comments

This research study generates some thought provoking questions in relation to the use of

digital technology in enterprise training and education and a determination if educators

who are charged with this remit are suitably capable in delivering on what the

entrepreneurial population require in terms of digital to start, develop and grow their

business competitively. So while yes, educators engage and adopt digital technology, they

consider themselves in the main to be confident and eager to try out new technologies the

evidence would not entirely concur in terms of the novelty and interactive nature of what

digital is and will be about for emerging entrepreneurs. So issues and questions arise about

how the current level and adoption of digital technologies in enterprise education prepares

enterprise learners to adapt, take on new roles and develop new opportunities in an

increasingly digitalised marketplace.

Moreover, these findings raise questions as the enterprise educator/trainer adopts a narrow

and topic driven understanding of digital technology, then, is this what is influencing current

digital training on offer to entrepreneurs? If so, then the provision of digital technology

programmes is driven by the educator skills as opposed to the needs and requirements of

the entrepreneur at the various stages of enterprise start up and growth. This empirical

study addresses that issue and the provision of the multi stakeholder viewpoints ensures

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that the ultimate client needs (the entrepreneur) are known and met through the provision

of a relevant digital training programme – a bottom up approach to digital programme

design and delivery. This bottom up approach is further informed by the inclusion of the

results of the survey of entrepreneurial learners on their digital practices and skills needs.

These results are presented in the next section.

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9.0 Entrepreneurial Learners Use of Digital Technologies – Key Research Findings

9.1. Respondent Profile and Experience of Enterprise Learning

An alternative and complementary perspective of digital practices in entrepreneurial activity

was obtained through the completion of a survey with enterprise learners, those who had

and were completing a range of enterprise related training and education programmes

which reflected the needs and expectation of what digital means for them when starting

and developing a new enterprise. The results from this survey were informative as they

provided insights into current adoption patterns of the digital or millennium learner, their

views about digital in a learning and personal context which will more readily transfer into

their expectations of technology in their professional roles and careers. Further, their

feedback on the type and level of engagement with digital technology as part of their

enterprise learning will draw attention to how enterprise educators/trainers are delivering

and promoting digital as part of the learning and assessment process. This will unfold the

gaps or opportunities that exist to advance the level of digital in the enterprise curriculum.

The results will be compared with the issues and trends emerging from the findings of the

educators’ and the entrepreneurs’ surveys which collectively will present deep and cohesive

insights to provide a foundation and set of guiding principles to inform the design of a digital

competency training programme.

The sample consisted of 102 entrepreneurial learners and the country breakdown is

presented the Table 27.0 below

Table 27.0 Respondent Profile by Country of Origin

Country Number of respondents

(N=102) Response percentage

%

Ireland 35 34.3

UK 13 12.7

Spain 7 6.9

Lithuania 17 16.7

Bulgaria 14 13.7

Slovenia 16 15.7

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The majority of respondents were female (64%) and the sample of respondents spanned

different age cohorts, employment categories and were in both full and part time

education. Just over 15% of the respondents were less than 21 years and 32% of

respondents were aged between 22 and 25 years with the remaining 53% over 26 years.

This age spectrum reflects individuals across the digital native classification, with the digital

native used to describe people born after 1980 (Prensky 2001), from the Net-Generation

(Jones and Shao, 2011; Bennett, Maton and Kervin, 2008) or also known as the new

millennium learners (OECD 2008). These learners are able to intuitively use a variety of

digital devices and navigate the internet as it’s been a natural part of their growing up and

thus expectations and perceptions of the role and value of digital technologies is viewed as

part of their identity (Jones and Shao 2011; Bennett, et al. 2008). The breakdown by age is

presented in Table 28.0.

Table 28.0 Age profile of Respondents

Age Profile Ireland UK Spain Lithuania Bulgaria Slovenia Number responded

(N=102)

Response %

15–18 years 2 0 1 0 0 0 3 2.9

19-21 years 9 1 1 0 0 1 12 11.8

22-25 years 16 1 3 2 2 8 32 31.4

26 years

plus

8 11 2 15 12 7 55 53.9

The analysis shows slight variation in age groups by country with the majority of younger

learners falling into the Irish sample of respondents. The mixed learner age profile

demonstrates the broad nature and diversity of age groups who are participating in

enterprise training and education and thus represent the needs of a target market for digital

competency training programmes.

Respondents possessed a wide variety of educational achievements across disciplines

beyond business and management. In reviewing the level of the awards held by

respondent’s cognisance must be taken of the country specific nature of the awards and

note that each country has its own accreditation and awarding bodies and thus the level or

how the awards are described will vary. The majority of respondents had completed second

level education and participated in on-going training or further education programmes.

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In addition to the more formal educational qualifications the respondents had and were

engaged in developing their entrepreneurial mind-set and understanding by completing a

range of enterprise related training or educational modules. The modules included

entrepreneurship as a focus and those where entrepreneurship was linked in with

functional specialist topics. The variety of modules completed, when examined in relation to

both the variation and heterogeneity of learner profiles and the type and mix of educational

providers heightens the increasing popularity and interest in entrepreneurship learning and

the need to increase access and availability to a multi participant sector and beyond the

traditional educational institution. Increasing access and the ability to customise

entrepreneurial learning to the diverse range of learners can be facilitated by the use of

digital technology. These findings are in line with those of the Modernisation of Higher

Education Report (2014) which highlighted that the landscape of learning has changed

dramatically with increasing opportunities for open and distance learning as technological

capacities have evolved creating the potential to reach more and newer target groups of

learners in more flexible manner.

A sample of the popular enterprise modules cited by respondents is displayed in Table 29.0

below.

Table 29.0 Sample of Enterprise Modules completed by learners

United Kingdom

- Business Administration, Sage, Basic Book-keeping, German for beginners

- Liverpool John Moores University World Of Work Centre Courses and Centre for Entrepreneurship Courses

- Excel online management course

- Social Enterprise Course

- Business chamber start-up course Social media for beginners

- How to start a successful business, Social media strategy, Meet the media, How to start a social enterprise

- Business Planning Course at The Women's Organisation

- PFS at The WO

- Planning for Success, Basic Bookkeeping

Ireland

- New Venture Creation, Enterprise Development and Business Consulting

- enterprise development, entrepreneurship (this module was mentioned on a number of

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occasions)

- Entrepreneurship, Creativity and Innovation

- Business Consulting, (this module was mentioned on a number of occasions)

- New Venture creation

- Creativity and Innovation

- Managing New Venture Growth

- Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Creativity (this module was mentioned on a number of occasions)

- Marketing and product and service development, product development and marketing for a start-up business

- Schools enterprise start own business programme

- Bord Bia - Business Development Courses, Brand Audit, PR

- Enterprise creation and development (this module was mentioned on a number of occasions)

- Learner enterprise awards module - start your own business

- Marketing research for a new venture Sales and Marketing

- New Frontiers stage 1, new venture creation

- Start your own business and finance for start-ups 5

- New venture creation and business consulting

Slovenia

- Currently enrolled in a tertiary programme in entrepreneurship (mentioned by10 respondents;

- Management

- Entrepreneurship

- Economics

- Marketing

- Sales

- Controlling

- Business finances

- HRM

- TEDex

- Corporate social responsibility

- Entrepreneurial innovation and creativity

- Marketing and market analysis

Spain

- UCIN Valdepenas

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- Comgraf S.L.

- Course for the use of social networks -Course to promo the Entrepreneurial Spirit –

Trainee student with Inercia Digital

- Courses: Workshops for the digitalization of the SME -Create your web; How to

elaborate your entrepreneurial project;

- Course "Entrepreneurial Strategies on the Web 2.0. Online Social Networks" 4

months as a trainee in Inercia Digital SL

- Entrepreneurship

Lithuania

- A lecture about business incentives

- Graduated 2 months. X-Culture-term business plan, as a global virtual team member, along with more than 2,750 learners from 92 universities, more than 40-countries

- Participant of entrepreneurship education project "Young Leaders Solutions (www.creazone.lt)

- Learner mentoring project "E-Mentoring: New Competencies and skills for new jobs"

- Participant of entrepreneurship promotion project "Smart Start" training "From the idea to the transaction"

- Graduated from KTU "JKM" Small and e-business organization studies

- 'Fundamentals of Entrepreneurship "," Corporate founding principles "

- ''Bea Cosmetics Marketing volleyball'' UAB Desmax "Inertia selling household goods. Avon network marketing. Oriflame network marketing, network marketing Amway.

- National and international seminars under EU projects

Bulgaria

- Start-up, business course, social media for business,

- Harvard business class,

- Executive MBA

- Authentic Leadership Global Management Sustainability & CSR Business Ethics

- Customer Experience Management Cultural Transformation Tools & Values

- Sales Performance, Negotiations, Talent Development.

The title of modules vary and when this variety is taken into consideration with the profile

of the learner, their age and prior educational awards provides a comprehensive foundation

on which to position the subsequent findings in determining the type of digital technology

they are accustomed to and what applications they apply in personal and learning situations

and their expectations for digital in an entrepreneurial context.

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9.2. Respondent Familiarity of Digital Tools and sites

As expected the vast majority of learners had ready and constant availability to multiple

technologies including laptops, tablets, MP3 players allowing greater flexibility and access

by learners to information and consequently to training. These results support the notion

put forward in the literature and policy that the net-generation of learner is tightly linked

with technology where it is a natural and expected part of their daily lives and thus will

naturally be used in their work life in the same manner (digital consumers think of digital

technology as something akin to ‘oxygen; they expect it, it’s what they breathe and it’s how

they live’ (Brown, 2011).

The constant use of digital technology is further endorsed when membership of a social

networking site is examined. Over 95% of respondents were members of a social

networking site where 72% of those were members of a site for more than 3 years and 22%

members for between 1 and 3 years, demonstrating that learners commence membership

of sites at younger ages. Additionally, respondents were members of more than one social

network site where results showed an equal distribution between membership of 1-3 sites

(48%) and equally 48% were members of between 4-10 sites with the majority (52%)

mentioning that they had between 1 and 250 members and 23% suggesting that they had

between 251 and 500 members on their sites.

The most commonly cited networking site for social purposes and lifestyle was Facebook;

followed in order of popularity by Twitter, Google Plus; Instagram, Pinterest and Snapchat.

In comparison the sites used in a learning and study context reinforce the popularity of

Google Plus followed by Facebook; Pinterest and equally by Twitter and YouTube. Taken

together the results show the consistent high use of Facebook as a social and a study tool

and also brings to the fore the range of digital tools entrepreneurial learners have both

exposure to and familiarity with. With these patterns of usage in mind the expectations of

this profile of learner will be increasingly focussed on digital as part of their daily routine

with less separation of its use for personal and professional or study roles.

When reviewed, the reasons motivating the respondents choice to become a member of a

particular site was dominated for the purpose ‘of communicating with and having access to

family and friends’ and secondly as a result of ‘peer pressure where their friends are on a

social site’. Indeed these two motivating reasons may be interlinked as peer pressure tends

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to dominate across the family as well as the non-family social spectrum underpinned by the

need to ‘belong and be part of’ a group which is enabled by social platforms such as

Facebook and Twitter. This reinforces the findings in studies which portray digital natives as

having access to networked digital technologies and the skills to use those technologies as

parts of their lives and daily activities mediating social interaction, friendships, civic

activities, and hobbies and social networking platforms enable sharing, promoting and

discussion about products and services on social channels to a wide community in real time

(Spear 2007; White and Le Cornu 2011; White and Le Cornu 2011; Ramanau, Cross, and

Healing 2010).

In comparison of the 4% who were not members of a social networking site cited the lack of

knowledge of what the sites entailed and a lack of interest in social sites, with and a number

of respondents indicating that prior negative experiences resulted in leaving the site and

were not interested in re-joining social site as reasons for not having membership of a social

networking site. The following is a sample of the comments received by those not

possessing membership of social networking site,

- ‘I don’t know what a social network is’

- ‘I am not interested in joining social networking’

- ‘I joined once, but I didn’t enjoy it’

- ‘It’s against my culture/beliefs’

Further analysis of the usage of social tools and platforms uncovered the type of personal

detail learners uploaded on sites and were willing to share with others, in many cases with

those who were classified as strangers. The respondents indicated that they provided their

real name (84%); equal amount of responses were received for sharing pictures as was the

case for email address (60%); very similar percentages were rated for popularity of sharing

hobbies (44%) and interests (47%). The uploading of learner status was shared by 52% of

respondents. The least shared topics were mobile phone numbers and religion. The detail

is standard information and related to the person and is linked with the motivation to join a

site – to keep in touch and contact with family and friends, sharing information and stories.

The time spent on using digital media varied and the majority of respondents 50% spent an

equal amount of time on digital for study and personal life, with 28% stating that they spend

more time on digital for personal uses as opposed to study and these collective results

strongly indicate the increasing prevalence of digital as a normal part of the everyday life of

the entrepreneurial learner. Expanding the knowledge base on the usage of digital

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technology was the classification of more specific usage of digital in their learning roles. The

results are shown in Table 30.0 below.

As was the case with the results of the educator survey, and indeed perhaps as a

consequence of, the use of digital tools for learning was traditional and narrow in focus and

centred on accessing notes and learning material (89%), secondly as a means of for

communicating with team members (79%) and using tools such as PowerPoint for

presentation purposes (74%). These trends were consistent across the findings in the

partner countries and the use of technology for communication with team members was

very strong. In addition technology as a learning aid or as a means of supplementing

learning using tools such as YouTube and videos were more commonly used in Lithuania,

Bulgaria and Slovenia. The emphasis or high rate of usage of digital as a means of

communicating with peers is consistent with the motivation for joining social sites and

concurs with the characteristics of the increasingly digitalised native learner and thus it is

important to consider these characteristics when framing curriculum content.

Table 30.0 Tasks Digital Tools Used for in Learning

Tasks undertaken using digital tools in enterprise learning

Yes (Count)* Yes (%) No (Count)*

No (%)

Seeking Class announcements 73 71.6 19.0 18.6

Accessing learning materials (e.g. copies of lecture notes/ reports , reading lists, links to websites)

91 89.2 5.0 4.9

Engaging in Online learner to learner discussion (e.g. discussion forums, chat rooms)

46 45.1 45.0 44.1

I complete revision Quizzes 41 40.2 47.0 46.1

Use the web to download or publish podcasts (e.g. using Juice, iTunes)

42 41.2 50.0 49.0

I submit coursework/ projects/assessments online

73 71.6 21.0 20.6

I use online meeting room / Webinars 29 28.4 60.0 58.8

I avail and use multimedia (e.g. audio, video to assist my understanding of a topic

50 49.0 41.0 40.2

I use PowerPoint / PREZI for presentations 76 74.5 15.0 14.7

I use it to communicate with team members 81 79.4 11.0 10.8

I use it to create collaborative documents (e.g. using wikis, shared file space)

52 51.0 39.0 38.2

I Develop and publish blogs relevant for enterprise subjects

26 25.5 64.0 62.7

I use Interactive learning materials (e.g. animations, simulations)

34 33.3 54.0 52.9

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Tasks undertaken using digital tools in enterprise learning

Yes (Count)* Yes (%) No (Count)*

No (%)

I access and use EBooks and eLearning material 55 53.9 39.0 38.2

I use You tube to supplement written learning material

46 45.1 43.0 42.2

I use available Skype facilities for contact with the educator outside class times

38 37.3 51.0 50.0

I use technology to check material for Plagiarism detection (e.g. Turnitin, SafeAssign, etc.)

40 39.2 47.0 46.1

I use technology to communicate with my enterprise educator to address questions on content and assessment

58 56.9 31.0 30.4

I have used technology to create learning communities where we share and help each other learn and revise

32 31.4 56.0 54.9

I design and dissemination of Interactive

Multimedia/CD-ROMs for projects/assessments

22 21.6 67.0 65.7

*The figure exceeds the total number of respondents as in a number of cases respondents cited more

than one element.

There is a need to identify suitable digital means for communication with learners through

the creation of a digital infrastructure for focussed peer and team learning via digital.

Interestingly the educator feedback highlighted that decision making and communication

skills were more problematic to develop via digital technology. These opposing positions are

important as attention must be afforded to how to balance the use of digital technology to

in some way leverage it to enable or facilitate, enhance and test communication and team

working skills relevant to an entrepreneurial context.

Overall respondents were satisfied with the level of access to digital technology (95%) in

their institutions and this is probably less a problem than anticipated given the free and

ongoing access learners have to multiple technologies as reported in this survey. This

positive trend was consistent across the partner countries.

Related to the above finding was the identification of the broader strategic institutional and

educator endorsement of the use of digital tools in learning as perceived by the learner. A

low response rate was obtained for this question and those responses received were

general in nature which in itself presents a sense of a lack of understanding if, and, what

institutional support exist, and further the lack of educator emphasis on digital supports to

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ensure the learner digital learning experience is positive. Some comments received are as

follows;

- ‘Email, Dropbox, Google Drive’

- ‘Yes, especially to introduce creative ideas in presentations and also for market research

analysis’

- ‘Yes and how to link it with technical product development aspects’

- ‘Sulis is used in UL for delivery and support of all modules’

- ‘Extensive use moodles type platform to disseminate class work and notes. Others use

youtube to present content and have office hours on Skype’

- ‘Yes, in all modules and in presentations - practical approach’

- ‘Sometimes ‘

- ‘Encourage it and more so in marketing modules’

- ‘Notifications and links for the interesting/necessary content’

- ‘E-College’

- ‘We are not encouraged’

- ‘Video content, e-materials’

- ‘Delivery of tasks, papers/projects – it is positive because it provides an auto reply, that

the paper has been delivered; YouTube clips’…

- ‘Materials and theoretic texts are available online and accessible from home’

- ‘Access to the materials is provided on the faculty’s website ‘

- ‘Yes – virtual classrooms, video clips, analysis, explanations, e-materials ‘

- ‘Yes – published study materials, delivery of papers with a set due date’ http://e.gea-

college.eu/’

Coincidently, the barriers to the use of digital technologies predominately resonate on the

lack of relevant skills and knowledge of digital in an entrepreneurial role. Over 32% of

respondents indicated that their lack of skills in the use of the technology was a barrier,

followed by 26% who reported that they were not sure of the possibilities or what it allows

in a learning environment. Similar results emerged from the entrepreneur and educator

surveys and thus have implications in terms of the design and supply of digital technology

programmes. For instance, the supply side or educators suggest that they have insufficient

skills in digital to deliver to a target audience who equally feel they do not have the requisite

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digital skills or competences for starting or growing a new business – clearly resulting in a

gap and lost opportunity in addressing entrepreneurial digital skills and competencies.

These findings serve to heighten the commonalities of the digital needs of the

entrepreneurial population and equally draw attention to the lack of skilled and competent

educators who understand the digital knowledge and skills requirements of the

entrepreneur – any suggested entrepreneurial digital curriculum must address the supply

knowledge and skills gap whilst addressing the needs of the entrepreneur.

The lack of technical support for learners was viewed as a barrier by 21% of the

respondents. These responses are interesting and a little surprising given the high level and

intensity of usage of digital tools as displayed in previous questions on the adoption of

digital and social tools. However, it calls to the fore that the use of social tools is somewhat

limited to personal use and in a learner learning context and does not extend to how and

where it can be used in a professional context- an issue which must be addressed in digital

competency training to ensure the balance between the personal and business digital tool

application is understood by the learner and applied in a professional manner.

Whilst the profile of the learner would suggest more digitalised use in personal and study

roles, it was interesting to note that they are not totally dictated to by technology in a

learning context. The role of technology in programme delivery was viewed that it should be

complementary to and part of the personal delivery mode of the educator as 67% of

respondents indicated a preference that ‘technology should not be a substitute for the

educator as I prefer ‘lecturer or tutor/ trainer’ with the remaining percentage equally

showing a preference for the ‘100% educator delivered learning and leave technology for

social networking’ option’ and ‘I prefer 100% learning by technology or online learning’.

Thus the personal preferences of younger learners are in alignment with the most popular

mode of learning cited by the majority of respondents in the educator and entrepreneur

stakeholder surveys. Of interest is the slightly increased preference for the option of 100%

learning by technology or online learning by this cohort which is reflected in their increases

use of social and digital media as part of their life and further is consistent with the trends

and characteristics of the next generation of learner as promoted in the literature (Jones

and Shao 2011; Bennett, Maton and Kervin 2008; OECD 2008).

The primary benefits perceived with the use of digital technology in programme delivery

were centred on creating speedier and greater access for the learner (91%) and another

90% suggesting that incorporating digital into learning created awareness of the broader

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use of technology beyond personal use and 91% indicated that it prepared learners for real

world of work where technology is in use. The results again were common across partner

countries and overall the responses showed that technology was very beneficial or

beneficial part of their entrepreneurial learning experience.

9.3. Digital Training Need and Preference for Digital Programme delivery

In looking to the future and addressing the perceived digital and social technology

requirements of entrepreneurial learners respondents were asked to indicate if they had

digital training needs and the variety of topics highlighted are displayed in Table 31.0.

Table 31.0 Digital Training Needs

United Kingdom

- Website development, advanced Microsoft office, Photoshop

- LinkedIn, twitter, Pinterest, snap chat

- Management tools such as prince

- No thanks.

- Twitter Facebook advertising

- Programming, privacy.

- Social media for my business

Ireland

- Web development; mobile marketing

- Learner use of Digital Technology

- E-business, mobile marketing and video /you-tube design and production

- Online selling and ecommerce

- Cloud computing and e-marketing

- Website design, using the mobile technologies to sell and promote

- Website design and how to attract customers to site and do research online

- Video production; mobile marketing and blogging

- Developing social media for my service business, website, online brochures and video or devising You tube/ videos

- Use of other sites other than Facebook and how to develop personal blogs

- E-business and online selling - how to set up website for online selling

- Blogs. Podcasts

130

- Social media platforms and how these can be used or which ones to concentrate on

- E-business and mobile marketing as this is getting more popular for consumers how online selling is Used for business markets cloud computing and how used in business

- Mobile marketing as this is important for equine also video marketing and design of blogs and online selling

- Facebook, LinkedIn and twitter and online networking

- Social media selling and marketing; website content design; how to use Twitter for business

- Twitter; brochure design and web design

- Engaging with customers and marketing online

- Selling online, creating a personal website; blogging

- website design; google alters and google metrics advertising online and selling online

- Using Facebook for business; how to develop online selling and branding strategies; website design and social

- Media marketing for children’s market

- How technology can be used to research the market and analyse the feedback

- google analytics and tracking

- E-marketing; social media tools; email marketing, online networking

- CRM and accounting platforms for small business

- Cloud computing; mobile marketing ; webinars ; digital selling;

- Web design; designing social media plans; email marketing online security

- E-marketing; website development ; cloud computing

Slovenia

- Design of websites (2 respondents)

- Programming (2 respondents)

- Work with pictures, Photoshop (2 respondents)

- ICT manners (usage of capital letters in emails etc.

- Usage of internet

- Projections, design

- Languages, new trends

- Preparation of presentations

- Management of internet banking, programmes/application for management of a company

- Web forums, Skype, virtual classrooms

- Marketing

Spain

- Google tools and contacts on the social networks

- E-Learning

131

- Design programs to increase the creativity and presentation of the projects.

- E-commerce

- Multimedia and statistical programs

Lithuania

- To address the current state of knowledge

- Use the camera

- Computer programs

- With computer software, camera

- Power point and others, computer graphical applications as well as professional camera.

- Corel Draw, accounting programs

- Accounting program “Pragma”

- I think it is important to combine technology with active learning methods, teamwork, “Icebreaker” and so on.

- I would like to get acquainted with the latest technologies

- IT

- IPad

- An interactive board (whiteboard)

BULGARIA

- Website development,

- Mail marketing,

- IT innovations

The broad and diverse range of topics cited indicates the somewhat fragmented perceived

needs of the entrepreneurial learners as was the case with the entrepreneur stakeholder

findings and indeed as was the case with educators. Common across the three cohorts of

respondents, educators, entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial learners was the presentation

of a range of topics and individual digital tools as opposed to a strategic perspective of the

use of digital technology. Further in reviewing the results it is important to note that a

number of respondents were unsure about what digital training they required ‘ not sure’

‘don’t know’ or wanted training on ‘all of it’ which is a reflection on their lack of

understanding of the extremely and ever increasing array of digital technologies emerging.

132

The level of unsure responses, whilst small, brings a more practical insight into the reality

that not all ‘younger’ learners are as digitalised as might be assumed and this needs

attention in digital curriculum development. Additionally, while digitally competent in a

personal context their ability to apply or in the first instance understand digital application

(what digital to sue; why and how to use it) in an entrepreneurial context is lacking and

compounding the problem and digital skills gap.

9.4. Synthesis and Concluding Comments – Entrepreneurs, Enterprise Educators and

Entrepreneurial Learners

Overall, some interesting perspectives from the learner survey emerge which confirm the

increasing use of digital technologies by younger age cohorts of entrepreneurial learners for

personal and study situations. The use of digital technologies in learning is still quite

mainstream and traditional and perhaps this is due to the educator influence and driven by

their level of knowledge and skills in this area. The results of the learner survey, when linked

with the entrepreneur survey present common findings in terms of the level of knowledge

of digital specific to an entrepreneurial context. The results of the educator survey suggest

that educators have a more general understanding of digital as it applies to the

dissemination of material and as a mechanism for the delivery and collection of learning

material as opposed to having digital as content which includes ‘learning about; for and

with digital’ for application in an entrepreneurial context.

Building on the previous point, educators must ensure that digital learning should not be

about technology per se or the array of digital tools but demonstrate what they are used

for (purpose) and how they are used (process and strategy) to effectively achieve that

purpose in an entrepreneurial business environment. The purposes relate to how digital can

be applied within and across the functional disciplines of the enterprise, most notably

marketing and sales, market expansion, branding etc.

The findings of the tripod of stakeholders, entrepreneurs, educators and entrepreneurial

learners more holistically identify the critical role of the educator and trainer who can be a

primary conduit, enabler and or barrier to digital skills and competencies development in

the entrepreneurial learner. If the educator or trainer is not equipped in the knowledge of

the ‘what’ or ‘how’ of digital technologies and their functionalities then the learner needs

will be not sufficiently addressed. Critically, the educator needs to be competent in

133

identifying and applying in a practical manner what digital tools are most relevant for the

entrepreneur at the various stages of start-up and growth of the enterprise and the

necessity for an integrated digital strategy as opposed to understanding what digital tools

exist independently. This necessitates that the educator and trainer knowledge is developed

on two fronts, firstly in terms of digital technology as a strategy and set of interdependent

components and secondly, made familiar with the entrepreneurial mind-set and the digital

requirements of the business from inception to growth and expansion.

Educators need to embrace the use of technology and how it influences programme

content, design, delivery and assessment and engage digitally with the net generation

learner. Aligned with this digital knowledge educators must become comfortable and the

use of digital should be about reducing fear, building confidence, practice, use, trial and

error, to ensure this confidence is infectious and passes on from the educator/trainer to the

entrepreneurs when they are delivering the digital training.

At the educational level resources must be afforded to making the necessary technological

applications and platforms available to educators and learners which in concurrence with

the literature and emerging from this study indicate the need to consider the following

characteristics of the learner to inform curriculum architecture and ethos and subsequent

content and pedagogy of a digital competency programme:

- Social based learning - Learners want to leverage emerging communications and

collaboration tools to create and personalize networks of experts to inform their

education process.

- Un‐tethered learning - Learners envision technology enabled learning experiences that

transcend the classroom walls and are not limited by resource constraints, traditional

funding streams, geography, community assets or even educators knowledge or skills.

- Digitally rich learning - Learners see the relevance of digital tools, content and resources

as a key to driving learning productivity, not just about engaging learners in learning.

Educators must therefore examine how they can best leverage technology to facilitate

digitally rich learning environments where learners have opportunities to learn

collaboratively, with peers and or educators, anytime or anywhere. The following section

will present suggestions on programme content and pedagogy to address the collective

needs of the entrepreneurs, entrepreneurial learners and the needs of the educators who

will be charged with delivery of such a programme.

134

10.0 Bridging the Digital Competency Divide - Developing E Leadership Skills for

Entrepreneurs and Owner - Managers

Entrepreneurs that do not embrace the digital technological revolution are unlikely to

maintain their competitive edge and may struggle to survive. This may impact some

industries more than others, but it is unlikely that any business will be able to ignore digital

technologies over the long term. The ever changing digital marketplace and more digitalised

consumer places pressure on entrepreneurs to scale up on their digital skills in order to

compete in an increasingly highly digitalised consumer marketplace. There are many low

cost digital and social media tools available to entrepreneurs which if used in an integrated

manner provide beneficial customer relationship management (e-CRM) systems that can

secure a competitive advantage and enable positive customer advocacy and customer

responsiveness strategies.

However, such tools must be managed and supported with a well-considered integrated

digital marketing strategy that is part of and is supported by the broader business plan or

strategic plan. That said with the benefits come challenges and fears which are embodied

predominately in a lack of knowledge and understanding of the array of digital technologies

available, their functionalities and applications and the benefits accruing from them or the

return on their investment. In addition to the lack of knowledge and perhaps as a result of is

the accompanying scarcity of digital savvy skills and competencies on how to apply,

implement, manage, monitor and measure the results and benefits of digital technologies.

Therefore capability and competency development are fundamental resources to enable

and embed a digital mind set and sustainable behaviour which equals the ever changing

digital consumer and buyer.

10.1. A Roadmap for Successful Digital Competency Development- - Developing E

Leadership Skills for Entrepreneurs and Owner- Managers – Key criteria/ building

blocks for digital skills enhancement

The design of a digital competency programme must incorporate a digital learning

pedagogy, which contains views on the ‘what’ and the ‘how’ of digital as it applies to an

entrepreneurial context, and which provides opportunities for the learner to experience and

135

learn ‘with’ and ‘from’ the entrepreneurial application of digital, thus instilling real world

and relevant digital ‘know how’.

The following are some points to consider in the design of a proposed digital competency

programme based on the issues emerging in the literature review and expanded upon by

the results of the empirical research from the entrepreneurs, entrepreneurial educators and

entrepreneurial learners. Prior to deciding on content some fundamental tasks require

consideration as follows;

- Establish the Context - internal context of the firm Review the personal and business

perspectives and define an overall strategic vision for the enterprise. This involves

identifying the stage of development of the enterprise. In conjunction with the

aforementioned questions it is important to ascertain the digital skills vision for the

enterprise. This analysis should be driven by the ethos of the entrepreneur, where they

want the business to go and within what time frame. This detail focusses the mind and

intentions of the entrepreneur and forces them to take a longer term integrated

perspective of where their business is going and what is required to take it to that next

level.

- Establish the context - The external context The development of a digital competency

framework must apply a broader external and internal stakeholder viewpoints to ensure

what is delivered is relevant not only to the entrepreneur but takes cognisance of the

emerging trends in digital media and technology which will impact on business and

consumers in the next few years. This will involve addressing the digital knowledge gap

by providing an appreciation of the digital landscape and array of digital tools and

techniques relevant and appropriate for the evolving stage of the enterprise. This

comprehension must include an explanation of the language, terminology and acronyms

adopted when discussing digital. It is important that language does not cause a barrier

or is viewed as a deterrent or results in a lack of understanding of digital as it applies to

the small firm context.

- Complete a digital knowledge, language, skills and practices needs analysis At

entrepreneur level and business levels. Once a vision has been established and future

skills requirements defined, the enterprise needs to conduct a self-assessment of their

existing skills. The aim is to compare existing skills levels to desired levels of proficiency

and determine the skills gaps - entrepreneur and enterprise level.

136

- It’s not just about tools and technology but tactics and strategy Adopt an integrated

perspective as to where digital technology as a process of interlinked and integrated

activities align and support the achievement of overall business objectives and

strategies. This involves generating objectives and goals, time frame and timelines for

their digital strategy.

- Content and topics - Digital ‘A La a Carte Menu’ – chose the best option The aim of this

programme is to develop competency in digital technology for application in an

entrepreneurial business context to enable effective entrepreneurial digital learning and

responding to the identified needs of entrepreneurs, learners and their educators. Thus

a Digital a La Carte menu of digital related topics can be chosen accordingly. A

developed programme content could include a comprehensive range of modules and

provide a roadmap to guide the enterprise trainer and educator to choose the best

option for the entrepreneur and the business needs. These dual needs will be identified

from the digital skills analysis undertaken and as described in previous point.

- Manage Monitor and Measure For many owner-mangers the value of adopting e-

business strategies is contingent on their being able to see direct benefits from any

investment in such technologies. This is particularly the case for very small firms where

the expectation is in immediate increases in sales or reductions in costs. Therefore key

factors to incorporate into skills development are manage, monitor and measure

- Delivering Digital Given the feedback from respondents it is proposed that the delivery

of the programme be offered via a blended learning format which combines lectures

and face to face briefing sessions with a focus on action and experiential learning

including interactive presentations, industry specific case studies, individual assignments

and business-related projects. The programme places emphasis on ‘challenge-based’

action learning.

10.2 Concluding Comments

Ultimately, and in agreement with (Stephenson, 2006, Nawaz and Kundi, 2010a, Zubair et

al.2013) the empirical evidence suggests there is no one ‘fits all’ e-learning training

intervention or programme and that the success of any digital initiative is anchored on the

137

interest of the users and support of the total work environment. Both internal and external

contextual factors play their role in setting a scene for the useful applications of information

and communication technologies in the learning environment. Therefore, entrepreneurial

learning digital interventions should be developed to reflect entrepreneurial educator and

trainer and practitioner accounts, with the entrepreneurial learner as co-learners, co-

planners, co-produces, and co- evaluators as they design, implement, and continually refine

their work in progress to meet industry needs in a professional manner.

138

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Appendix 1 - Copy of Surveys

144

Entrepreneurs Use of Digital Technologies

155

Copy of Entrepreneur Trainer and Educator (ETE)

Survey

167

Learner Use of Digital Technologies

177

Appendix 2 – List of Enterprise Modules delivered by

Enterprise Trainers and Educators

178

Sample of Enterprise Modules delivered by Enterprise Trainers and Educators

Business establishment

Business plan preparation

Business finances

Entrepreneurship

Marketing

Human resources

Computer training

Acquisition of soft skills (motivation, communication)

179

Fundraising

Intergenerational interaction

Teamwork

Resolution of conflicts

Creativity

Social entrepreneurship

Stress management

Promotion of health and wellbeing

Business Planning Enterprise Awareness

Cross curricular Enterprise skills Business planning

Business growth

Social enterprise development,

enterprise educator and training for enterprise trainers

Entrepreneurship & Enterprise - undergraduate module to develop enterprise skills using

social entrepreneurship as a teaching mechanism for engagement

Curriculum development for institutions, post graduate and early career researcher

development, Educator support and development and nascent entrepreneur support

Social media

Business advice to start -up businesses and existing businesses with high growth potential

Environmental scanning

Running the world's first undergraduate Venture Creation Programme at a university.

Teach: Marketing ,(Several levels)

Business Records & Transition Strategy on VCP Teach

Entrepreneurship on Business & Management

Entrepreneurship, innovation, growth and family businesses

Creativity and innovation

Idea generation and business opportunity assessment

180

Business model canvas; social

Media for small business;

Reflection and personal development

Extra curricular business support and enterprise skills development for students and

graduates interested in starting a business or becoming self employed

Business modelling, planning

financial modelling,

branding

lean methods

mentoring,

curriculum development staff development, policy, impact research, social enterprise. Or

STEM? Creative. Digital. Humanities, Social Sciences.

Business Start Up Support - Market Research,

Funding

Financial, Funding

Networking

enterprise and technology business planning for engineers innovation

Entrepreneurial leadership

business advice Business Workshops Engagement events

Staff Development - enterprise education Enterprise teaching Entrepreneurial Mindset

Employability workshops, enterprise competitions and enterprise promotional events

business advice and guidance for women looking to set up businesses and to grow existing

businesses

Management and leadership

Management of change

Organizational culture and business etiquette

181

Biomanagement and innovations

Coaching and leadership

Teams coaching

Communication and presentational skills

Strategic thinking

Emotional intelligence

Sales and marketing

Economic development

Web entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship

Business Planning

Support/Advice for Start-ups

HR

Marketing and Market Research

Strategy

New product development

Enterprise Development/New Venture Growth Creativity and Innovation;

Management of SMEs

Finance and Funding

Managing small firm gorwth

Business Canvas Model

Pitching for funding

the role and use of digital technologies a multi ... · the role and use of digital technologies...

Documents