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Entrepreneurial education has experienced exponential growth recently worldwide due to the recognition of entrepreneurship for economic and social wellbeing. Entrepreneurial education combines enterprise and entrepreneurship education to develop the mindset, behaviours and skills needed to create, identify and act on opportunities to generate value (QAA, 2018). However, how to effectively facilitate entrepreneurial leadership is an ongoing dilemma (Aluthgama-Baduge et al., 2023), leading to constant search for novel approaches.

Our conducted using offers insights into this phenomenon. It highlights the pedagogic significance of co-creating education experiences, a broader form of support that challenges the established notion of ‘independent learners’ and creating an experiential and interactive context to foster entrepreneurial leadership. In this blog post, we summarise our findings and the practical implications for entrepreneurial leadership development within UK higher education institutions (HEIs).

Co-creating education experienceÌý

Co-creative entrepreneurial education is an advanced form of pedagogical practice compared to the traditional, didactic methods where the teacher is perceived as an expert over learners. Co-creating education experience transcends student and educator to a broader form of knowledge construction that demands longer-term interventions with the involvement of wider stakeholders, such as entrepreneurs, policymakers and the wider community. This community facilitates entrepreneurial leadership development, advancing constructivist entrepreneurial education, which in some contexts still relies on student–teacher interaction (see Bell & Bell, 2025). Diverse actors facilitating entrepreneurial learning simulates the co-creative nature of entrepreneurship (see Karami & Read, 2021). The long-term interventions apply here as the focus should be on experiential learning that includes critical incidents such as to learn and recover from failure, which is an iterative process that emergers over time.

Handholding through the entrepreneurial process

Handholding exceeds the generalised support offered within HEIs. According to our study, learners need continuous and timely support throughout their entrepreneurial journey, and the educators go beyond classroom contact hours and job descriptions – for instance, supporting through informal interventions to facilitate this. This approach challenges current ontologies around ‘student support’. The popular discourse of promoting ‘independent learners’ seems to be lagging in providing required support within this realm. Handholding, however, does not mean that the students have insufficient independence but rather it offers them assurance of expert support as needed. Such support is essential where the social, psychological and emotional assistance is needed to navigate through the entrepreneurial process safely.

‘Handholding does not mean that the students have insufficient independence but rather it offers them assurance of expert support as needed.’

Facilitating an experiential and interactive learning environment

Our study foregrounds the underrepresented perspectives of educators in literature and affirms that the learning context significantly shapes the development of entrepreneurial leaders. There is an intentional effort from the subjects of this study to design a favourable environment for entrepreneurship that encourages learners to network with practitioners, work on real-world business issues and test their business ideas in a supportive setting (see handholding). This environment is complemented by the diversity of the entrepreneurial community with opportunity to learn both theory and practice.

Practical implications

Co-creative entrepreneurial education transforms the university environment into collaborative spaces that complements the socially constructed nature of entrepreneurship, adopting constructivist education philosophy. Educators should perform a hands-on role in designing the suitable environment for entrepreneurship and work as facilitators of co-creation rather than knowledge transmitters. However, individual efforts in doing so are challenged by the rooted philosophical positions of stakeholders (such as academics and practitioners) and other institutional barriers (see Aluthgama-Baduge et al., 2025). Hence, we propose a collective commitment from the university community to collaborate as mentors, co-educators, learners and facilitators rather than promoting superiority over others. Here, learners could contribute to the construction of knowledge and experience while developing the required mindset and skills for entrepreneurial action.

The combination of co-creation, handholding and an interactive/experiential learning environment presents a unique narrative of how entrepreneurial leadership development can be facilitated in HEIs. Broader support required for entrepreneurs should not be shaded by the current discourse of independent learners. The educators going beyond their role to support students is a positive phenomenon. This may be seen as crossing boundaries or disregarding policies/established norms. Therefore, policymakers, HEIs and educators should consider how such support systems could be incorporated into academia. This can be a challenging exercise due to current pressures on resources and philosophies of ‘support’ for students.

References

Aluthgama-Baduge, C., Rajasinghe, D., Ilonen, S., & Gilman, M. (2025). Facilitating entrepreneurship in higher education through practitioner integration: A closer look at the ‘entrepreneur in residence’ initiative. International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour and Research, 31(8), 2008–2026.

Aluthgama-Baduge, C., Rajasinghe, D., Mansour, H. F., & Mulholland, G. (2023). Educating for entrepreneurial leadership: From didacticism to co-creation. International Review of Entrepreneurship, 21(02), 295–320.

Bell, H. R., & Bell, R. (2025). Legitimizing new constructivist practice for entrepreneurship educators: Legitimacy as a framework to examine educators’ new practice in China. International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour and Research, 31(8), 1941–1960.

Karami, M., & Read, S. (2021). Co-creative entrepreneurship. Journal of Business Venturing, 36(4), Article 106125.

Quality Assurance Agency [QAA]. (2018). Enterprise and entrepreneurship education: Guidance for UK higher education providers. Ìý