Objective:
- The learner will discover that they have entrepreneurial abilities and potential
- The learner will get an insight into the world of 'everyday' entrepreneurship
- The learner will become more alert to opportunity recognition
- This is a useful session for the reluctant entrepreneur – those who might think it's not for them, particularly arts students.
Overview:
Activity:
This is a two hour session and it will begin abruptly by creating a case study with the student group.
The idea is to pick on a student and announce in 5 years' time "Jane"(or John) will run a successful arts consultancy. This will raise some surprised gasps and giggles which will immediately engage students' attention. The narrative that unfolds will demonstrate: how Jane started out in one direction but discovered, and followed, opportunities elsewhere, how she took a few risks, showed resilience in the face of setbacks and how she turned to her networks (other students in the room who come into the story) to help her fill skills gaps and capacity problems.
The case study is pre prepared and can be tailored to the cohort. It should be approximately 10 mins long and the story should be plausible – not extraordinary – a case of everyday entrepreneurship. It will be fun as it draws the students into a fictional story.
Following this there is a 30 min breakout to discuss in groups of 3 or 4 to analyse Jane / John's journey: how did he do it, the key factors for success, would you have done it differently, could you have done the same journey, have you encountered any similar situations to John, if so what did you do? Students post thoughts on stickies.
The management of feedback here is important because the students, who are reluctant entrepreneurs, should be led to the explanation that this behaviour is entrepreneurial. The session is to not only identify the behaviour as entrepreneurial but to get the students to reflect on their experiences in similar situations and imagine how they would respond. The idea is for the students to see enterprise as tangible, every day (familiar even), as a series of minor steps and small scale risks and about trying things out to see what happens.
The upshot of the feedback session is that the students 'discover' the entrepreneurial mind-set for themselves – they have not listened to an expert talk about it for 50 mins – and that they identify with it as something they can do themselves.
Skill Development:
The session finishes with 10-15 mins reflection where students have to pledge to do something entrepreneurial that week. It could be something they had been thinking about for a while but had made excuses not to do it. Others may need a little help and guidance from peers about what they might do, so reflection and pledge setting should be discussed in groups. The follow up session (if appropriate) will be when more detailed reflections can emerge and when students can get a measure of where they might be regarding their own development in terms of entrepreneurship and the enterprising mind-set.
Resources:
- Post-its or similar sticky pads
- Pens
- Flip chart