ETP 3000 – Foundations of Entrepreneurship Page 7 of 10
Mark T. Schenkel
Spring Term, 2007 (S07)
ETP 3000 – Foundations of Entrepreneurship (3 Cr.)
College of Business Administration
Belmont University
Spring Semester, 2007 (S07)
Section 01 - Tuesday & Thursday 8:00 – 9:15 a.m. (MC210)
Instructor: Mark T. Schenkel, Ph.D. Phone: 615.460.5474
Office: 436 Barbara Massey Hall Fax: 615.460.6605
Office Hours: T & H 9:30 a. m. – 12:30 p.m. Email:
T & H 2:00 p. m. – 3:00 p.m.
Office hours are posted outside my door, and I will be happy to offer times in addition to my regular office hours if necessary to meet your schedule. It is always a good idea to call or e-mail ahead to make sure I will be in my office on any given day. Generally e-mail is the best way to reach me unless I tell you otherwise in class; I will typically read and respond to e-mail several times throughout the day. I am very happy to speak with you about questions, concerns, or interesting ideas that you have.
Course Description:
This course is designed to provide students with a basic understanding of the entrepreneurial process. Students will examine entrepreneurship as a career. A comprehensive self-assessment will help the students to better understand their own personal aspirations, and assess their unique skills and competencies. Students will learn about opportunity assessment for new venture ideas. An overview of business plans will be presented.
Course Objectives:
Foundations in Entrepreneurship builds a basic framework for much of your other entrepreneurship, business, and liberal arts coursework. A primary goal we will seek is to develop an awareness of the various processes that lead to new venture creation. We will also examine very specific business principles and skills that help increase an entrepreneur’s chances for success. This course will create a basic understanding of the business plan, which will serve as a guiding framework for the general business curriculum. We will begin the self-examination process of “why you’re here” and examine where the entrepreneurial adventure may lead based on some of your answers to this question. The importance of ethics and values in building a successful business will be integrated throughout this course and students will be challenged to address how they will integrate their own values into their businesses and/or careers.
Objectives of the Undergraduate School of Business Administration:
The following School of Business objectives will be applied toward class objectives:
· To provide a personalized career-oriented and practical educational program in Business Administration emphasizing the following four themes: leadership, innovation, private enterprise and entrepreneurship.
· To equip students with the ability to 1) communicate effectively, 2) think critically, and 3) make enlightened judgments about their environment.
· To emphasize quality classroom instruction within the parameters of Christian principles.
Teaching Philosophy/Procedures:
Successful entrepreneurism requires the effective identification, evaluation, articulation and pursuit of opportunity in an increasingly complex and global economic context. It also requires a deep and thorough sense of self. Accordingly, thorough development and integration of each of these aspects is crucial to a well-rounded, intelligent entrepreneur. We improve our ability to recognize and evaluate opportunity by observing and carefully analyzing the experiences of others; we gain a sense of self by identifying and assessing our unique passions and resource bases. Most importantly, we gain understanding of the likelihood that we can successfully engage in entrepreneurism by integrating each of these aspects, and thereby making judgments from a more holistic perspective – that is, by enhancing our ability to understand the nexus between ourselves and economic opportunities. As your entrepreneurship instructor, it is my goal to help you to understand and apply theory; to share with you the excitement I experience in understanding entrepreneurship through theory; and for us to learn from each other new ways of thinking about the entrepreneurial process.
The ways in which we will work together will include both individual and group work. We will utilize concrete examples to build a common foundation for reflecting upon key course concepts. Because the academic environment represents a unique and relatively low risk forum, I feel it is imperative that students work hard to capitalize on the opportunity for personal development this environment presents. Accordingly, students will be expected to regularly leave their “comfort zone,” or demonstrate a willingness to go beyond their existing mental models and beliefs about entrepreneurship during class discussions and on written assignments. Questions, critique and encouragement will be a significant part of each class meeting, and employed with the goal of stimulating the desire for further inquiry in students.
Student Goals/Objectives:
“Man’s mind, once stretched to a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.”
- - Oliver Wendell Holmes
Oliver Wendell Holmes’ quote suggests that effective learning outcomes can be characterized as the “stretching” of our thought process beyond its current state. By logical extension, Holmes’ observation further suggests that actively considering one’s current knowledge-base within the context of future goals can be an effective means for enhancing the natural “stretching” process that accompanies learning. Considering these suggestions, it is important that you identify specific ideas (at least 3) that you would like to “stretch” in order to maximize the learning opportunity this course presents. We will check on your progress toward these periodically.
·
·
·
Guiding Principles:
· What you get out of this course will be directly related to the amount of effort you put into it.
· My role is to help you achieve both your academic and entrepreneurial goals through this course.
· Manage deadlines and conflicts the same as you would in a professional work environment.
· The text is an excellent reference for your personal development and assignments. Use it.
Course Requirements:
1. Attendance:
Belmont University is committed to the idea that regular class attendance is essential to successful scholastic achievement. In addition, the interactive teaching philosophy employed in this course requires active student contributions in order to maximize learning outcomes. Accordingly, absence is permitted only in cases of illness or other legitimate cause, and all such absences should be supported with the appropriate documentation. Attendance is checked from the first class meeting, so late registrants will have some absences accrued when they first meet a class. Students are also expected to be on time for class. If you should experience unanticipated problems that cause you to be late, you should still come to class and quietly enter the classroom and avoid being disruptive to the instructor or your classmates. However, please note that two late occurrences to class will constitute one absence and thus, impact your final grade.
In cases of an excusable[1] absence from the class, the student will have the opportunity to make up all class work missed as soon as possible. If a class absence is necessary because of an activity by another class or university organization, the sponsor of the activity will give the Provost a list of participants in advance, and the students involved will obtain from the Provost an excuse to present to the instructor.
When the number of absences for any reason exceeds two the student’s Contribution score will be lowered by one full grade.
When the number of absences for any reason exceeds four the student’s Contribution score will be lowered by two full grades.
When the number of absences for any reason exceeds six the student’s Contribution score will be lowered by three full grades.
When the number of absences for any reason exceeds eight the student is involuntarily dropped from the course with a grade of “WF.”
2. Contribution:
"Learning is more effective when it is an active rather than a passive process."
- - Kurt Lewin
Lewin’s quote suggests that a critical aspect of both individual and peer learning revolves around active engagement. Accordingly, contribution will be a significant component of each course member’s grade. Class members will be expected to: 1) prepare for class, 2) attend class, and 3) contribute to class discussions and exercises in a meaningful way. I will be evaluating each individual’s contribution after each class based on the following:
· Does the student demonstrate that they prepared the readings and/or other assignments? This will be one of the main criteria for evaluation of this part of your grade! I will collect any assigned end of chapter questions or other daily assignments on a random basis as these will be part of your Contribution grade.
· Is the student a good listener?
· Does the student attempt build on what is being discussed, or go off on his/her own agenda?
· Does the student simply repeat what has already been stated?
· Does the student attempt to foster full class participation, or does s/he try to dominate?
· Is the student willing to explore new ideas or new ways of looking at things?
· Does s/he attempt to integrate information from other sources (other business classes, readings, and life experiences) for the purpose of enhancing our discussion?
· Does s/he demonstrate a willingness and ability to argue constructively?
Quantity of contribution should be viewed as a bell shaped curve. That is, contributing too little or too will have a negative impact on your contribution grade for that day.
All course members will be expected to respect the need for confidentiality. It is imperative that information shared about student business plans, and sensitive information shared by guest speakers, remain in the classroom. The instructor respects the need for propriety and vows the strictest confidentiality regarding their ventures.
3. Text & Materials:
· Kuratko, D. F. & Hodgetts, R. M. 2007. Entrepreneurship: Theory, Process, Practice; 7th Edition,
Taunton, MA: Thomson South-Western. (ISBN: 0-324-32341-7)
· Supplemental materials provided by the instructor throughout the term.
· Course website: http://coba.belmont.edu/fac/Schenkelm/etp3000s07/ETP3000S07_homepage.html
4. Prepared assignments:
General instructions for all prepared assignments
A professional presentation is an important aspect to entrepreneurism, and therefore, will be important to your grade on prepared assignments. All prepared assignments should be the professionally written – that is, each prepared assignment should be clearly organized in such a way that the reader can easily follow the central theme and key supporting ideas. This means, first, that assignments should employ headings where appropriate – that is, to assist the reader in identifying key transitions in the author’s thoughts. Second, individual paragraphs should have clear topic sentences that reflect a central idea, followed by a discussion that utilizes course concepts, logic and data to support the central idea. As external sources are used in any paper, they should be appropriately referenced in the paper (i.e., following APA style – please see the APA Documentation System document on the course web site for an overview and examples) and a reference page provided at the end of the paper. Third, the sequence of your paragraph topic sentences should help to tell the story (i.e., logically unfold and connect to form support the underlying theme, or your position statement). Some paragraphs will be longer than others, and that’s fine. The length of a paragraph is not important; its focus is. Lastly, assignments should be NEATLY typed and should be free of grammatical, spelling, and/or typographical errors.
Late Assignment Policy: All course assignments submitted late will incur a 10% reduction in the total score possible for every calendar day they are late.
Technical instructions for all prepared assignments
All prepared assignments should be typed on 8 1/2 x 11 paper, double spaced, 12 point Times New Roman font, 1” margins, numbered at the bottom of each page and stapled in the upper left hand corner. (NO FOLDERS PLEASE). All papers should be written as succinctly as possible---however, do not sacrifice thorough analysis for brevity. Papers should include a title page with the following information centered on the page: 1) your name, 2) the name of the assignment, 3) the course title, 4) the day and time of day that your class meets, 5) your instructor's name, and 6) the date you turn in the assignment. The following is an example:
Student Name
Personal Ethics Creed Paper
ETP 3000 02: Foundations of Entrepreneurship
Tues/Thurs: 11:00-12:15p
Dr. Mark T. Schenkel
Assignment Submitted: September 31, 2006
a) Self-assessment Paper
Students will assess their personal values in order to begin the on-going process of integrating these into their work life. This assessment will also require students to consider their personal readiness for engaging in entrepreneurial activity.
This paper should be about five pages in length. It should synthesize what you learned from the self-assessment completed in this class and any other personality or vocational assessments you have completed outside class. Do not write a simple narrative of your responses in any assessments that you are using for this paper. Rather, integrate what you have discovered about yourself as you address the following:
1. Describe if and how these assessments and this class have affected your entrepreneurial aspirations. (10%)
2. Evaluate how your personal values will shape your career by addressing the following (30%):
· Identify the core values that shape your life. How were these values formed? Be sure to identify specific people, events, etc. that have had significant influence as you address this question.
· Identify the stakeholders you believe will be critical in your business life. How will your core values define how you deal with each of these stakeholder groups? Provide specific examples to illustrate.
3. How will you measure your success in dealing with each stakeholder group based on your defined core values? Be very specific as you discuss what you plan to measure and how it relates to your core values. (20%)
4. Evaluate your personal entrepreneurial readiness (30%).
· What will be your short-term steps for your career development (i.e., between now and graduation)?
· What will be your long-term steps for your career development (i.e., first five years after graduation)?
Be sure to be clear about where you are now, where you want to go, and how you want to get there. Clearly, sophomores may be at a very different point in their thinking than seniors. Again, be very specific.