BA 260 - Introduction to Entrepreneurship
Spring, 2007

[Assessment] [Schedule] [PowerPoint Slides] [Assessment Examples and Progressive Assessment Results]

Dr Justin Craig

Bexell 400C

Phone: (541) 737-6061

Email: justincraig@bus.oregonstate.edu

Office Hours: MONDAY: 12 pm – 1 pm (BEXELL 400C)

TUESDAY: 2.30 pm – 3.30 pm (Bing’s Café in Weatherford)

WEDNESDAY: 1pm – 2pm (BEXELL 400C)

(and by appointment)

Teaching Assistant: Ryan Kirkpatrick: Kirkpatrick.r@gmail.com

Required Text

Entrepreneurship: A Process Perspective (2004). Robert A. Baron and Scott A. Shane. Thompson Publishers.

Course Description

Introduction to Entrepreneurship is a new course for students who are interested in becoming entrepreneurs or entrepreneurial managers. Topics include evaluating entrepreneurial capabilities, creativity and innovation, opportunity assessment and feasibility analysis, business plan creation and implementation, new product introduction, seeking funds and harvest strategies.

Course Overview

Introduction to Entrepreneurship focuses on the concepts, skills and know-how, information, attitudes and alternatives that are relevant for start-up and early-stage entrepreneurs, entrepreneurial managers and the relevant stakeholders. The course has two fundamental goals. The first is to teach future entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial managers to use the entrepreneurial perspective in order to make better decisions, and thereby positively influence the odds for success, and thus minimize the odds – and costs – of failure. The expectation is that students will enhance their capacity to envision, anticipate and orchestrate what is required in order to succeed. The second aim is to teach effective entrepreneurial and general management practice from the perspectives of the founder and the vital stakeholders that can make a substantial difference in the ultimate success or failure of the entrepreneurial process.

It has been suggested that a key difference between managers and entrepreneurs is that managers are ‘resource driven’ and entrepreneurs are ‘opportunity driven’. Within the broadest definition, entrepreneurs are found in most businesses, since any firm, if it is to survive and prosper, must have some entrepreneurial drive. The central focus of this course, therefore, is the critical role of opportunity creation and recognition, and the entrepreneur, as the principal success factors in new enterprise formation and building. The course is especially relevant for aspiring entrepreneurs bent on launching and growing a business, but also has relevance to those intending joining established firms, including those that are family-owned.

Learning Objectives

× Identify and determine what entrepreneurs need to know about the critical driving forces in a new venture success.

× Identify how successful entrepreneurs and investors create, find and differentiate profitable and durable opportunities from just “other good ideas,” and how opportunities evolve over time.

× Evaluate and determine how successful entrepreneurs and investors create and build value for themselves, and others.

× Identify the necessary financial and non-financial resources available for new ventures; identify the criteria used to screen and evaluate proposals, their attractiveness and risk, and how to obtain start-up and early growth capital.

× Determine the critical tasks to be accomplished, the hurdles to be overcome during start-up and early growth, and what has to happen to succeed.

× Identify the future consequences of decisions made by entrepreneurs at each point in time; options that are precluded or preserved; and the nastier minefields and pitfalls to be anticipated, prepared for and responded to.

× Determine decisions that can be made to increase the reward to risk ratio at various stages of the company’s development, and thereby change the odds.

× Determine what are the important factors outside the control of the founders, and how critical and sensitive the current context and timing are to all of these above issues.

× Be able to apply the entrepreneurial process to established ventures, including those that are family-owned.

Achieving Learning Objectives

The course will accomplish these learning objectives through a diverse mix of methods and activities, including:

Analysis and discussion of actual cases
Guest speaker presentations and dialogue
Work in teams to prepare a Feasibility Plan
In-class team assignments and exercises
Outside of class tutorials and meetings with me regarding Feasibility Plans
Lectures and presentations
Related readings and video tapes

Classes will be conducted with equal emphasis on lecture and class participation. Class lectures will relate to chapter reading assignments but will not attempt to cover all the material in the text.

All lecture slides, course notes, example papers, additional readings and marking criteria for all assessment will be posted on the BA260 webpage page: http://classes.bus.oregonstate.edu/ba260/

Email bulletins that contain relevant updates etc. will be sent to all students’ ONID addresses as required.

BA 260 - Introduction to Entrepreneurship Spring, 2007