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American Economic & Social Review  

Vol. 1, No. 1; 2017 

Published by Centre for Research on Islamic Banking & Finance and Business 

 

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Managerial Skills: An Imperative for Business Education in 

Enhancing Nigerian Dwindling Economy 
  

Lukman Suleiman1 

Mansur Saidu Adam2 

  Usman Dahiru Jibrin3 

Umar Buba4 

 

1+2+3+4 Department of Vocational and Technology Education, Faculty of Technology Education, Abubakar 

Tafawa Balewa University, Bauchi, Bauchi State, Nigeria. 

Correspondence: Lukman Suleiman, Department of Vocational and Technology Education, Faculty of 

Technology Education, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Bauchi, Bauchi State, Nigeria, Tel: + 

07037714353, E-mail: karshal.rahuljaiswai@gmail.com 

 

 

Received: September 21, 2017       Accepted: September 28, 2017      Online Published: October 2, 2017   

 

 

Abstract 

The main aim of this study is to determine the important of business education managerial skills in overcoming 

the problems of economic recession in Nigeria. Literature was extensively reviewed in relation to business 

education, managerial skills and economic recession, on that note the concept of business education was 

discussed by different literature. Furthermore, five (5) importance of business education were identified in 

relation to the economic development and the nation’s dwindling economy. The study went further and 

identifies different kind of managerial skills needed by business education students, these skills were found to be 

very essential in promoting the Nigerian economy and also serves as a way of eradicating the dwindling 

economy of any given nation.   

 

Keywords: Business Education, Managerial Skills, Dwindling Economy.  

 

1. Introduction 

Dwindling economy has a direct relationship with decline in wealth, consumption and business/managerial 

skills, along with government spending that represent the nation’s economic engine. The National Bureau of 

Economic Research (NBER)defined dwindling economy as a significant decline in economic activity spread 

across the economy, which have a direct effect on real Gross Domestic Product (GDP), real income, 

employment, industrial production, wholesale and retail sales. Dwindling economy can also be seen as a 

negative real GDP growth rate in a country for two or more consecutive quarters. Judging by the above 

definitions, Nigeria is experiencing economic recession especially by the year 2016. However,  the economy of 

Nigeria is appreciating towards the year ending of 2017 (Kale, Maigari, & Haruna, 2017) 

Business education as a discipline is expected to expose its recipients to diversity of skills needed in the world 



Managerial Skills: An Imperative for Business Education in Enhancing Nigerian Dwindling Economy 

 

                     Lukman et al. 

  

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of work. Hence, it is the type of education that inculcates in its recipients attitudes, knowledge, skills and values 

that are required in the business world (Salome, 2012). This is a means of producing a healthy, literate 

self-reliant citizen that would create wealth for human development, when they become self-employed, thereby 

resulting to sustainable nation’s development at large. Business education must have impacted managerial skills 

and creative knowledge required for employment generation opportunities, such skills and competences that 

would also make the business graduates to adopt some strategic survival drives. 

According to (Ibrahim, 2014) managerial skills are those essential skills that are needed to get most jobs that are 

helpful to employees to stay in a job and facilitate their promotions. The skills are flexibly adapted, applied and 

transferred under different contexts necessary for gainful employment. According to Halliru (2011) managerial 

skills include technical skills, human relation skills, conceptual skills, design skills, Critical Thinking and 

Judgments Skills, Skills in Solving complex, multidisciplinary and open-ended problems, Creativity and 

entrepreneurial thinking Skills, Communicating and collaborating Skills, Skills in Making innovative use of 

knowledge, information and opportunities and Skills in taking charge of financial health and civic 

responsibilities. The framework of managerial skills of Senior (2009) indicated that, a good curriculum should 

provide students with skills on effective communication; supervision; coordinating; planning and think 

strategically, with clear vision, information and communication. To this end, business education skills are very 

essential that if properly acquired and utilize would go a long way in improving the employment opportunities 

of the youths and also mitigate the level of Nigerian dwindling economy.  

2. Concept of Business education  

Business education is an essential ingredient of vocational education. In Nigeria, the education is offered at both 

the secondary and tertiary institutions of learning. According to Abdullahi (2002) Business education is an aspect 

of educational programme which provides the recipients with knowledge, skills, understanding and attitude 

needed to perform well in the business world as a producer or consumer of goods and services. Furthermore, 

Osuala (2004) is of the opinion that Business education is a broad area of knowledge that deals with a nation’s 

economic system and also identifies and explains the rate of business contentment and experience that prepare 

individuals for effective participation as citizens, workers and consumers. The National Open University of 

Nigeria (NOUN) (2008) defines Business education as an aspect of vocational education that equips people with 

necessary skills and theoretical knowledge needed for performance in business world either for job occupation or 

self-employment.  

Finally, Aliyu (2013) stated that the purpose of Business education is to stress the need for fundamental 

instruction to help students assume their economic roles as consumers, workers and citizens in boosting the 

nation’s economy, providing specialized instruction to prepare students with necessary skills for career in 

business. It can be deduced from the definitions above that Business education is an education for and about 

business. It combines both theoretical knowledge and practical skills needed in the work place. In the same vein, it 

exposes the recipients to the economic system of their country and equips them with lifelong skills that would 

enable them to make reasonable judgement as a producers (entrepreneurs), employees or consumers of goods and 

services. 

3. Importance of Business Education to the Nigerian Economy 

The importance of business education to the Nigerian economy will never be over emphasized, however, 

Emmanuel, Omotayo, and Tuke (2015) pointed out some of the importance of business education in enhancing 

the nation’s economy as follows: 



Managerial Skills: An Imperative for Business Education in Enhancing Nigerian Dwindling Economy 

 

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 Business Education is important to the nation in providing skills that enables them to become employers 

of labour, so that people become job creators and over-dependence on government work would also 

minimize.  

 Business education develops proper values towards work as they contribute more to the economic 

development of the nation by providing the required skills needed by handicrafts men and women which 

lead them to become self-reliant. 

 Business education provides its recipients with the skills that if properly utilize they can spend their 

resources judiciously which in turn the country gains by way of investing excess resources on 

meaningful projects that would lead to economic development. Today, we are talking about economic 

recession and rate of inflation, this can be minimize if we spend wisely. 

 Business education has made it possible for those who want to be retrained in order to upgrade their skills 

and have access to education. In this way, people who finish secondary school with no saleable skills will 

have to acquire skills that make them become functional, through retraining programmes. 

 Business education prepares its recipients for the world of work, they can either take up teaching 

profession or they become business people.  

4. Managerial Skills Needed by Business Education  

Management is an aspect of business education that provide the students with managerial functions, skills and 

other business related talents that will help them to work effectively in an organization. Literatures comes up 

with different types of management skills needed by business education that will serve as a route in ensuring the 

nation’s economic growth and development so that the Nigerian dwindling economy would be eradicated. Nazir 

(2010) said that leadership Skills is the management skills that require business education to set-up priorities, 

delegate, motivate, coach and develop your people to become top performers and communicate objectives and 

goals of the organisation. Salome (2012) further emphasized that the skill comes from the knowledge of and 

proficiency in activities involving methods, procedures and processes of getting thing done. To this end the 

skills involve efficiency in dealing with subordinate, working with tools, techniques and equipment to 

coordinate the activities of the organization to perform as expected.  

Communication skills is the skill that require the manager to get points across by  creating a compelling 

presentation to support goals and get buy-in for ideas, inspire others to achieve better results and demonstrate 

emotional intelligence (Nwanaka & Samuel, 2011). In a similar view, Riebe, Girardi, and Whitsed (2016) 

reiterated that communication skills are the capability to express information to another person effectively and 

efficiently. Thus, the skills can be verbal or non-verbal, written or unwritten means of communication that 

facilitate the sharing of information between two or more people in an organization.  

Human Relation Skills is the management skills that involve the ability to work with people (Ibrahim, 2014). 

This involves cooperating with one another as a team by creating an environment when people feel secured and 

free to express their opinions. Collaboration skills are the managers’ commitment to form alliances and negotiate 

effectively (Okolie. 2014). Nazir, (2010) further said that collaborative skills are a skill that involves working 

together with other people through idea sharing and thinking to accomplish a common goal. Developing and 

encouraging collaborative skills in workplace is likely to enhance team commitment and individual performance, 

which might result in minimizing the Nigerian dwindling economy. 

Robles (2012) said that conceptual skill is the ability to see the big picture of the ends in view (objective) of 

where you are going. It also demands that you should be able to see those activities that are necessary to realize 



Managerial Skills: An Imperative for Business Education in Enhancing Nigerian Dwindling Economy 

 

                     Lukman et al. 

  

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the big picture of the organization, the picture must be clear, capable of supervising and monitoring the activities 

of employees, customers and the management in order to improve the efficiency of the organization and 

increase employability in the nation.  

According to Riebe, Girardi, and Whitsed (2016) critical thinking skills involves the managers’ ability to 

approach problem solving logically, research options, avoid biases and focus on meaningful data to draw the 

right conclusions even under pressure. The skills empower managers to assess the credibility, accuracy and 

value of information, analyse and evaluate information, make reasoned decisions and take purposeful action. 

This will help in developing a clear and core effective thinking in promoting the image of businesses in Nigeria.  

Design skill is the ability of manager to solve problems associated with how to combine colour, graphics, 

technology, text, ideas and other relevant ingredients to come up with a product which will benefit the 

organization, customers and the nation at large (Snyder, 2013). This can open a way to job creation and also 

reduce the inflation rate in the country. 

Finance skill is the capability to weigh different types of currencies implications of business in making decisions, 

including the ability to build a sound budget and formulate reasonable forecasts. It involves taking charge of 

financial, health and civic responsibilities and making wise choices by deciding how to invest their savings 

(Halliru, 2011). The basic skills  needed to accurately predict revenues and unit costs of product is a helping 

matter in determining the average number of labour needed to employ (Ibrahim, 2014). Nigerians need more 

specialized financial skills simply because appropriate resource allocation requires critical thinking that favour 

marketplace and the Nigerian economy at large, this can reduce the over dependence on government work. 

Okolie, (2014)said that to grasp the scope and objectives of any given projects, the manager must acquire the 

project management skills, this will help to recognize the roles and responsibilities of others. The manager will 

use tools to stay on track and become an effective member of a cross-functional team. In that building a social 

foundation of project management knowledge and techniques will cover the entire project life cycle. 

Creativity and entrepreneurial thinking skill is a skill that is highly demanded to boost the Nigerian economy. It 

is highly associated with job creation, many of the fastest-growing jobs and emerging industries rely on 

workers’ creative capacity and the ability to think unconventionally in creating something new (Sikorski, 2007). 

The global marketplace rewards organizations that rapidly and routinely find better ways of doing things. 

Likewise, Nigerians can create jobs for themselves and others with an entrepreneurial mind-set to recognize and 

act on opportunities and the willingness to embrace risk and responsibility for the nation’s economic growth. 

5. Conclusion 

This study stressed the need for minimizing the ongoing economic recession in Nigeria, fundamentally there is 

urgent need to inculcate managerial skills in the curriculum of business education at all levels, this would help 

the students acquire some skills which in turn enables them to assume their economic roles as consumers, 

workers and citizens in boosting the nation’s economy. It is however noticed that business education is an 

umbrella term in providing these types of skills. The skills are very essential that if properly acquired and 

utilized would go a long way in improving the employment opportunities of the youths and also mitigate the 

level of the Nigerian dwindling economy.  

It can be deduced that Business education is an education for and about business, it combines both theoretical 

knowledge and practical skills needed in the work place. In the same vein, it exposes the recipients to the 

economic system of a country and equips them with life-long skills that would enable them to make reasonable 

judgement as a producer, employee or consumer of goods and services. To this end, The importance of business 



Managerial Skills: An Imperative for Business Education in Enhancing Nigerian Dwindling Economy 

 

                     Lukman et al. 

  

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education managerial skills to Nigerian economy will never be over emphasize, the study concludes that  to 

mitigate the economic recession in Nigeria, many literature come to realized that utilization of managerial skills 

have a significant impact in enhancing the nation’s economy 

6. Recommendation  

The following recommendations were raised 

 There should be a provision for periodic retraining of business education teachers to update their 

knowledge in the various areas of management skills. This will expose them to modern trends in 

management across the globe and contribute to the nation’s economy. 

 Business education teachers should re-dedicate themselves by attending more workshops and seminars 

to acquaint themselves with these skills so that they can in turn, impart same in the students. 

 The higher institutions should emphasis on curriculum that is aimed at improving skills and expanding 

the production of management professionals in the country. 

 Management education should become a main-stream activity in education to enable transformations of 

Nigerian economic growth and development.  

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Emmanuel, A. O., Omotayo, B. K., & Tuke, E. (2015). Issues in Business Education Programme: Challenges to 

National Transformation. Journal of Education and Practice, 6(21).  

Halliru, A. J. (2011). Business Education Managerial Skills For National Development. International Jornal of 

Business Education, 2(7), 23-25.  

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Students Acquisition of Requisite Skills For Job Opportunities In Nigeria.  

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Snyder, M. J. (2013). Teaching Critical Thinking and Problem Solving Skills.  

 

 

 

 

Copyrights 

Copyright for this article is retained by the author(s), with first publication rights granted to the journal. 


