Stepping stones: an examination of Irish tertiary level students entrepreneurial spirit

GUESSS stands for Global University Entrepreneurial Spirit Students’ Survey and is an international research project using a geographical and temporal comparison to investigate the entrepreneurial intention and activity of students. The results being presented here are the results of the survey conducted in Ireland on tertiary level students. This research has a number of primary and secondary goals attached to it. The primary goals are to examine the start‐up process; provide an insight into the organisation of entrepreneurship within the tertiary level institutions and to examine the characteristics that impact the founding intention and activity of students. The secondary gaols are to verify and establish the explanatory approaches at various levels for the investigation of the founding intent and activity of students. The project will enable researchers to reflect on their own country’s entrepreneurial spirit; along with observing the quality of start‐ups. Finally, the project aims to identify the hurdles and barriers faced by entrepreneurial students and to provide recommendations to over come these hurdles.