Assessing the Effectiveness of Entrepreneurial Training Programmes: Findings from a Critical Incident Analysis

摘要

This paper proposes the Critical Incident Technique as a valuable tool for the assessment of the effectiveness of an entrepreneurial development program. The peculiarity of the study is that it involved active entrepreneurs and not potential entrepreneurs, and it investigated the whole process and not just its outcome. The proposed methodology aims to guarantee the understanding of participants' perspective in the program, thus assuring a "customer-based" orientation towards the evaluation of its effectiveness. The study was carried out using a qualitative interviewing approach: 18 entrepreneurs participating in a three years program called TechFrame were interviewed and were asked to describe in detail specific incidents encountered during their experience. Implications of the study for the design of future programmes are discussed.