A Qualitative Exploration of Professionals’ Perceptions on Entrepreneurial Intentions: A Case of Lecturers at a South African University

Abstract

A professional is a person who is paid to undertake a specialized set of tasks and to complete them for a fee or a salary. The traditional professions were architects, medical doctors, engineers, lawyers, and commissioned military officers. Today, the term is applied to accountants; artists; educators; librarians; nurses, scientists, technology experts, social workers, and many more. An inevitable reality is that not all full time employed professionals; young and old; are satisfied with their salaries. Some do leave their jobs to start their own business, others do combine both. Most literature reveal that the self-employed individuals are more satisfied with their jobs because their work provides more autonomy, flexibility, and skill utilization and greater job security. The current study adopts a qualitative approach using in-depth interviews to examine the perceptions of professionals towards entrepreneurship. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted and recorded with 13 lecturers from one university in South Africa (Vaal University of Technology). An analysis of the transcripts yielded five themes, namely being risk averse or risk taker, time constraint and management, insufficient salary, family background and lack of financial support and resources. The results suggest that some professionals who are full time employed did take the opportunities to make extra income by embarking on their own business while others are still in need of support or need of being illuminated on what entrepreneurship is all about and its importance. Based on the findings of the study recommendations were made and further research is suggested. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2013.v4n6p315