MODERATING EFFECT OF TRAINING TRANSFER ON THE DETERMINANTS OF ENTREPRENEURIAL PERFORMANCE AMONG MICRO, SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES (MSMEs) OWNERS IN LAGOS STATE, NIGERIA

Despite the significance and contributions of micro, small and medium ente1prises (MSMEs) ·to the national economy, many problems and constraints still exist in promoting their development and growth ·which invariably affect the pe1formance of the O"!-llners. This, in turn, led to dwindling in the number of MSMEs in Nigeria. The declines were attributed to poor personal traits of entrepreneurs in Nigeria, underdeveloped human resour~es, and the lzarslz operating business environment. In addition, MSMEs failure, particularly in emerging economies, has been attribwed to lack of preparedness as a result of · inaccurate entrepreneurial training transfer and lack of basic education on entrepren.eur skills. Though, . velJ' few studies have been conducted in Nigeria to ascertain the. pe1formance rate of entrepreneurs and factors influencing entrepreneurial pelformaizce colleCtively. T/zus, this study e.:wmines holistically the determinant factors· ilrflitencing··entreprencuria.l p~Cn:{ormance' in Lagos State Nigeria taken inro consideration the multidimensional constructs of personal qualities of the entrepreneurs, business compete11cies, environmental factOI:s; and training transfer. The study adopted a quantitative approach itsing a· cross-secti~nal descriptive survey ·while Cochran (19 77) formula .for sample size determination was used to calculate for the sample size. Descriptive statistic !~"'ol was used for demographic data analysis as well as to determine the level of the used constmcts in the study. The Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) approach and Multi-Group Analysis are utilised to test the stated research hypotheses. Prior to full utilisation of the model, the researcher ensure the model meet the acceptable goodness-of-fit indices: _x'l (CMJN) = 387.238 (DF = 196), Relative X1 (CMINIDF) = 1.976, AGFI = .870, GFI = .899, CFI = .939, IF!= .939, TLJ = .928 and RMSEA = .056. The study revealed that there is a moderate level of e1itrepreneurial pe1jormance among the 307 valid respondents with an overall aggregate mean score of24.24 (SD= 8.07). The structural equation model showed that personal quallties did not significantly contribute to entrepreneurial pe1jormance (p = .1 05, p == .121). However, the analysis of structural equation model depicted that business competencies contributed significantly to entrepreneurial petformance (p = .126, p = . 050). In addition, training transfer contributions to entrepreneurial pe1formance revealed (P = .321, p =:= .000) which was also significant with high effect size when compared to the relationship with business competencies and entrepreneurial pe1jormance. The structural model revealed that the relationship between personal qualities, business competencies, and environmental factors are mode1~ated b;' training transfer in the_ study with mefsurement residual x- greater than unconstramed x- based on model companson output !1X- (CMIN) = 140.931; t1df= 57; p = .000. Therefore, there is a presence of moderation effect of training transfer on the determinants of entrepreneurial performance in the overall model