The Impact of Additional Education Programs on Entrepreneurs` Assessment of Their Intentions and Skills Necessary to Start and Develop Business in Russia

In 2020, in accordance with the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation dated July 21, 2020 No. 474 "On the National Development Goals of the Russian Federation for the period up to 2030", the Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation developed the project "Small and medium-sized entrepreneurship and support for individual entrepreneurial initiative". One of its areas is focused on entrepreneurial training. Also, in addition to government free initiatives, commercial products of additional education, including in the field of entrepreneurship, are actively being developed in the post-pandemic period. The development of forms of support for entrepreneurial training calls into question its effectiveness. To date, the scientific literature on the effects of entrepreneurial learning is concentrated on higher education programs (bachelor's, master's) or their individual courses. Moreover, scientific publications practically do not take into account the specifics of the Russian context: the number of works taking into account the peculiarities of supply and demand in the domestic education market is limited. Understanding the nature of the impact of education on the development of entrepreneurial competence can potentially stimulate the development of effective educational products to increase entrepreneurial activity in the country. Drawing up a model of the effectiveness of entrepreneurial training programs in Russia should begin with identifying the interrelationships of the educational process, its features and results. Among the issues of interest in the issue of effect are such important topics as entrepreneurial intentions and skills. Thus, the purpose of the study is to identify the relationship between learning (including taking into account its individual parameters and personal characteristics of students) and the change in entrepreneurs' assessment of their intentions and skills necessary for starting and developing a business in Russia. The questionnaire, compiled as part of an empirical analysis, was distributed through chat rooms and mailing lists of organizations engaged in research and implementation of entrepreneurship training (Sberbank PJSC, Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Russian Federation, ANO Organization of Social Entrepreneurs, etc.). A correlation analysis was conducted based on data from the responses of 71 respondents. According to the results of the study, a positive relationship was revealed between the completion of additional education programs and the assessment of one's own entrepreneurial competence and entrepreneurial intentions, regardless of the entrepreneurial status of students at the time of the start of the programs. It was also suggested that this effect can manifest itself regardless of the duration of the programs: short-term and long-term initiatives can be perceived by students with the same usefulness. In addition, it was found that increasing confidence in one's own entrepreneurial competence is associated with passing disciplines in such areas as data analysis, business plan and business model development, financial management, and international aspects of business, and among the forms of training, oral project defenses, business games and decision practice can potentially have the greatest impact case studies. According to the results of the study, the benefits of learning were noted, regardless of the presence of entrepreneurial experience among teachers. The results of the study can be used to build a promising model for evaluating the effectiveness of entrepreneurship training programs within the framework of the project "Index of Entrepreneurial Educational Activity" (since 2021, implemented by the Association for the Development of Financial Literacy together with the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia, Sberbank PJSC, the Chamber of Commerce of the Russian Federation, HSE, with the participation of the Centers "My Business"), which will allow to improve the quality of educational products for potential and existing entrepreneurs. Effective training programs, in turn, can have a positive impact on the state's economy by increasing entrepreneurial activity.