University of Osijek: Developing Entrepreneurship Education from Scratch over Time

The objective of EE at the J.J. Strossmayer University in Osijek (SUO), Croatia, is to develop entrepreneurial mindsets and related skills. The curriculum consists of an undergraduate, graduate, a postgraduate and a doctoral programme in entrepreneurship. Key to programme development were the commitment and the personal skills of Prof. Slavica Singer who managed legal, economic and cultural barriers in a post-war and post-socialist environment. Applying the method of systems thinking, she built relationships with international universities and external lecturers, developed her own faculty staff and established local institutions for microfinance, training of entrepreneurs and policy development. Particularly notable EE practices include the SUO’s international doctoral programme, team teaching and the drama method. One of the main lessons to be learned from this case is that even in an unfavourable environment it is possible to build EE and a related ecosystem. The preconditions are that there is adequate human resource management, basic funding and autonomy to act. The approach might be transferable to countries or regions with comparable disadvantageous framework conditions.