ASSESSMENT OF FACTORS INFLUENCING HIGHER EDUCATION GRADUATES SELF EMPLOYMENT: THE CASE OF WOLDIA TOWN

Abstract

In Ethiopia the number of higher education graduates is increasing from time to time and so does the graduate unemployment. Self employment is a mechanism which is recognized by different policy makers and entrepreneurial researchers for reducing unemployment among increasing graduate labor force. Thus, identifying the influencing factors for graduate self employment is important way of informing concerned bodies for promoting self employment among graduates. Therefore, the overriding objective of this study is to identify the factors influencing graduates self employment in case of Woldia Town. In order to achieve the objective of the study, the student researcher used a case study approach and focused on factors related to individual characteristics and personality traits, socio-economic factors, government policy and support, lack of formal employment opportunity, access to entrepreneurship education and training and self employed graduate satisfaction with their business. The study employed survey types of descriptive research design. The target population of the study was those graduates who are running their own business and those who are unemployed for half a year and above. During data collection process, respondents were accessed through non-probability sampling technique i.e. snowball sampling procedure. Although a total of 180 structured questionnaires were distributed for collecting primary data from sample respondents, 171 (86 from self employed and 85 from unemployed) were used for analysis. After it was edited and coded, the collected data entered the STATA version 12 for processing and analysis purpose. Different types of simple descriptive statistics were used to analyze the result. The result of the analysis indicated that willingness to take risk, positive attitudes towards self employment, need for achievement, need for independence, access to government policy and support, availability of starting capital and lack of formal employment option were found to be influential factors for graduates self employment. Finally policy makers and different types of concerned bodies are recommended to give due attention on identified influencing factors to enhance the participation of graduates in their own business thereby reduce graduates unemployment.