Browsing by Author "Lobetti, Francesca Maria"

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    A case study investigating the effects of an Entrepreneurial Development Programme on the business sustainability of its beneficiaries’ pre- and post-Covid-19
    (University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2022) Lobetti, Francesca Maria; Robert, Venter
    Entrepreneurship in South Africa is complex and multi-faceted. This statement refers specifically to the operational aspects that are indicative of both economic growth and development. This case study investigated the impact of one hotel group’s entrepreneurial development programme on the businesses of its beneficiaries in South Africa. The impact was examined across three primary themes, these being: economic success, employment generation capabilities and long-term business sustainability on the existing businesses of entrepreneurs who have successfully completed the programme. The value of this study was to determine if this particular entrepreneurial development programme has proved valuable to the beneficiaries in growing and sustaining their businesses and creating employment opportunities. As the hotel group’s entrepreneurial development programme provides the fundamental business operational knowledge to the beneficiaries, one aim of the study was to identify the effect of the Covid-19 pandemic on the businesses of the beneficiaries and what measures were put in place to ensure that the businesses were resilient and survived. To date and in the English literature, the impact of this programme had not been properly investigated. The study followed a mixed methods approach and research data was collected using both questionnaires and interviews. The study population consisted of 49 beneficiaries from the hotel group’s entrepreneurial development programme actively operating in different business sectors who had completed the programme between 2005 and 2018, allowing the 2018 beneficiaries to develop their businesses for a two-year period post completion of the programme. The questionnaire data was analyzed with measures of central tendency and presented with graphs and tables. Interview data was analyzed through content and thematic analysis and was also presented with the use graphs and tables. The information gathered in the interview process provided a degree of context to the questionnaire data, which also allowed for complementary analysis where conclusions were drawn between the two data types. The findings indicate that post completion of the programme, a majority of the businesses were on track to be sustainable with the possibility of business growth and expansion. However, during the Covid-19 pandemic, the same conclusions cannot be drawn. The entrepreneurial development programme will need to refocus their main goals and objectives to be more aligned with businesses in the post Covid-19 environment. The ramifications of the effects that the virus has had on the economy will continue to be present and businesses may need to adapt their operations to the new ‘normal’. These changes are expanded upon in this study and recommendations for the hotel group’s entrepreneurial development programme are discussed