CROATIAN CHAMBER OF ECONOMY

Human Resource Development Centre

Phone: + 385 1 45 61 514
Fax:
+ 385 1 48 28 380
e-mail:
potencijali@hgk.hr
http://www.hgk.hr

Zagreb, September 2009

THE TRAINING
NEEDS ANALYSIS IN SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES WITH PARTICULAR
STRESS ON ENTREPRENEURIAL SKILLS
SUMMARY
Croatian Chamber of Economy realised through its County Chambers on-line survey on the
educational needs in small and medium enterprises with particular stress on entrepreneurial
skills. The survey was performed during March 2009.
The poll covered the area of the whole Croatia with proportionally representation of all
economic sectors. The questionnaire was responded by 858 enterprises what is 18% of total
sample. The analysis is done by four main categories for comparison. The sample consists of
62% micro enterprises, 26% small enterprises and 12% medium big enterprises. The analysis
showed that export orientation is closely positively correlated with the size of the enterprise,
while the business trend is not related to the size of the enterprise.

Ownership Structure and Size of Enterprise (in %)

2009., Croatian Chamber of Economy, Zagreb, Rooseveltov trg 2

The share of enterprises according to the various criteria (in %)

In micro and small enterprises is better educational structure of employees in comparison

with medium big enterprises.
Educational structure per sectors (in %)

2009., Croatian Chamber of Economy, Zagreb, Rooseveltov trg 2

Regardless on the sector, the director in most cases deals with educational tasks and human
resource management.

Structure of human resources and educational activities according to the size of the
enterprise (in %)

Around in four fifth cases financing of human resource development is realised from the
enterprises source. Interviewed firms in most cases do not use governmental (state)
subsidies for development of employees. According to the indicator the number of days
spent on education and training, business leaders spent most time, on average double than
experts and operators. The size of the enterprise has influence on co-operation with other
firms and educational sector, so smaller enterprises more often co-operate with other firms,
while with the enlargement of the firm mentioned share decreases.

2009., Croatian Chamber of Economy, Zagreb, Rooseveltov trg 2

Frequency of co-operation with other enterprises and educational sector (in %)

By ranking the characteristics of employees for future results of enterprises, business leaders
value orientation towards the result, persistence and efficiency in the work; readiness and
openness for the improvement of business processes in the framework of current activity of
enterprise and personal responsibility and readiness for the risk taking for own initiatives in
the work, while other employees respect loyalty and readiness to stay in enterprises even
during business difficulties and readiness on the introduction of the technical and
technological innovations and improvements in the business.

2009., Croatian Chamber of Economy, Zagreb, Rooseveltov trg 2

Ranking knowledge and skills that should be improved through educational and skilling
programmes (in %)

1
2
3
4
5

Enterprise leaders
Knowledge and skills

Business decision making

Communication skills
IT knowledge and skills
Motivating
Defining the business goals

80.3
80.3
80.2
80.1
77.6

68.8
65.7
61.4
60.4
59.6

70.5
70.0
70.0
69.9
69.8
68.4
67.9
67.8
67.7
65.3
63.6
63.2
62.9
61.9
59.2
58.3

Following the Croatian legislation

Human resource management
Managing the changes
Following EU legislation and directives
Business analysis and controlling

33.5
31.7
31.1
30.6
29.3

Business negotiation
77.2
Presentation skills
74.9
Marketing and sale
74.6
Team leading
74.0
Written and oral communication on
10 foreign language
72.6
11 Quality management
72.0
12 Human resource management
70.6

24
25
26
27
28
29

Finance and book-keeping (accounting)

Managing of business processes
Organisation and delegation
Project leading
Strategic management
Risk management
Information and general culture
Communication with environment
Conflict solving
Business analysis and controlling
Time and stress managing
Written and oral communication on
mother foreign Croatian
Managing the changes
Following the Croatian legislation
Following EU legislation and directives
Supply and logistic
Mathematical-numerical
knowledge
and skills

IT knowledge and skills

Communication skills
Communication with the environment
Motivating
Information and general culture
Written and oral communication on
mother language Croatian
Marketing and sale
Quality management
Presentation skills
Written and oral communication on
foreign language
Conflict solving
Time and stress managing
Mathematical-numerical knowledge and
skills
Team leading
Business negotiation
Supply and logistic
Defining the business goals
Organisation and delegation
Project leading
Finance and book-keeping (accounting)
Managing the business processes
Risk management
Business decision making

6
7
8
9

13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23

Others
Knowledge and skills

53.8 Strategic management

2009., Croatian Chamber of Economy, Zagreb, Rooseveltov trg 2

57.0
55.4
54.7
54.7
53.5
48.3
45.6
44.0
43.2
43.2
42.5
41.1
40.4
40.1
39.9
39.5
36.1
34.4

22.1

Ranked characteristics of the employees that are deemed important for future of the
enterprise (in %)

Business leaders

7
8
9

10

The characteristics of the employees

Orientation towards the result,
persistence and efficiency in the work
Readiness and openness for the
improvement of business processes in the
framework of current activity of
enterprise
Personal responsibility and readiness for
the risk taking for own initiatives in the
work
Loyalty and readiness to stay in
enterprises even during business
difficulties
Readiness on the introduction of the
technical and technological innovations
and improvements in the business
Readiness to take initiatives for the
discovering and proposing of new
solutions
Positive reaction on introducing of
changes and/or innovation in the
enterprise
Readiness and dedication to lifelong
learning
Positive attitude and readiness for work in
multiethnic- multicultural environment
Readiness and openness for increasing
and/or changing current activity of
enterprise

Other employees
%
95.5

The characteristics of the employees

Orientation towards the result, persistence
and efficiency in the work

%
90.9

93.5

Loyalty and readiness to stay in enterprises

even during business difficulties
Readiness on the introduction of the
technical and technological innovations and
improvements in the business
Readiness and openness for the
improvement of business processes in the
framework of current activity of enterprise

93.1

Positive reaction on introducing of changes

and/or innovation in the enterprise

85.0

93.0

Personal responsibility and readiness for the

risk taking for own initiatives in the work

81.7

94.6

93.6

92.3
90.1
85.3

84.1

Readiness and dedication to lifelong

learning
Positive attitude and readiness for work in
multiethnic- multicultural environment
Readiness to take initiatives for the
discovering and proposing of new solutions
Readiness and openness for increasing
and/or changing current activity of
enterprise

87.7

86.9

86.0

79.7
78.9
75.6

67.0

Although in the short time period one cannot expect some significant changes in
enhancement of education in SMEs with the special attention to entrepreneurial skills,
nevertheless it is necessary to consider and assume the reasons of weak use of
governmental (state) support for the human resource development. No doubt there are
many reasons and surely it is necessary in future questionnaires and researches dedicate
adequate attention to this issue. Possible reason could a lack of information about the
existence of the support. This is quite likely if one keep in a mind that the survey is about
micro and small enterprises which maybe subcontracting book-keeping activities. Maybe
business leaders are not aware of the existence of the support, while the responsible person
in charge of book-keeping is not willing to apply for them because of additional working
obligation. Furthermore, it is quite possible that the process for obtaining mentioned subsidy
is quite complicated and businessmen are not inclined to ask for the subsidy because it can
arouse authorized tax bodies for more considerate and detail investigation of their business
2009., Croatian Chamber of Economy, Zagreb, Rooseveltov trg 2

books, what probably to them is not beneficially. Finally, employers are mostly not willing to
invest in the education and training of their employees because of fear from poaching and
due to the logistical and financial difficulties of replacing employees who are being trained.

Project is financed by Ministry of Economy, Labour and Entrepreneurship

Prepared by:
The Institute of Public Finance
Predrag Bejakovi
Vjekoslav Brati
Petar Sopek
Croatian Chamber of Economy
Project manager, Vesna tefica

2009., Croatian Chamber of Economy, Zagreb, Rooseveltov trg 2