Preferencie vysokoškolských študentov v profesionálnom živote a ich predstavy o vlastnom podnikaní

The entrepreneurship of young people belongs among the priorities of present. It is supported also by European Commission – entrepreneurship is considered as one of the possibilities how to solve the problem of unemployment, poverty and social exclusion. The entrepreneurship has not long-term tradition in Slovak Republic; interest in it has increased since 1989, but the economists, politicians and others are focused especially on the external conditions of entrepreneurship. That was the motive to realize the research analyzed in this study. The aim of the research was to examine the preferences of university students in the work, especially their entrepreneurial intent. The research sample consists of 298 university students of four Slovak universities. The questionnaire composed by CERAG was used as the research method. We found out that in the work area it is important for students: interesting work, career growth, opportunity to realize own dreams, to have free time for relax, family and friends. We have observed the differences from the point of view of gender, domicile and branch of study. The main outcome of our research is the finding that only 10.4 percent of students manifested categorical intent to do own business - the statistic analyses did not supported assumption about differences between men and women, technique and economic students. Only rural students manifested stronger entrepreneurial intent. The university students realise the advantages and disadvantages of entrepreneurship. There are also differences from the point of view of gender, domicile and branch of study. The research showed, the students with entrepreneurial intent evaluate their own abilities for business more favourably (r=0,457 p=0,000). We did not investigate dependence between parents’ entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial intent of their children.