Frequently Asked Questions about the Entrepreneurial Commercialisation for New Ventures course
Answers to FAQs about entrepreneurship courses in general
Q: Is this a BUGE course?
Yes, for students who are enrolled in a degree or study program that does not belong to the Division of Business. For students in a Division of Business degree, this is a business elective (and not a BUGE) course. This terminology is now replaced by the term "free elective"
Q: What is really special and different about this course?
This course includes a number of innovations that add value and provide an interesting and relevant learning experience.
- Survey of marketing constructs. Students complete an online questionnaire before the start of the course. Each student gets an individual benchmark report showing their responses against the class average, and this report is used in the lecture sessions to clarify marketing principles and constructs
- Team-Based Learning approach. This well-developed approach spreads the assessment load and builds team cohesion and productivity.
- Poster plan presentation and review session. Instead of preparing a long document as the major report, teams produce a plan as two A3 pages that they present to the class. This allows students to get immediate feedback and to learn from the work that other students have done.
Q: Is this course offered externally?
We regret that this course is available only face-to-face because of our reliance on the Team-Based Learning method. It is not offered externally or online. Some regional and interstate students take this intensive course by coming to Adelaide for the two weeks of the lecture/seminar sessions (and come back for the report presentation session and the written exam). They also need to be very well-organised, and make sure that they communicate frequently with their project team. However, it is important to note that the exam is offered only in Adelaide.
Q: What are the prerequisites?
There are no prerequisites for this course, but if you have not taken an entrepreneurship course before, we recommend that you should study Entrepreneurial Enterprises beforehand. This will make it easier for you.
Q: I have not studied marketing – what knowledge do you assume?
This course assumes that many students have taken the Division of Business core course “Marketing Principles Trading and Exchange”. However, the first session covers some "essentials" of marketing. See the separate page that details the content of this session. The rest of the course will draw on the knowledge presented in this session.
Q: I have already studied marketing - what would this course add?
Entrepreneurial commercialisation is different in emphasis from most "mainstream" marketing courses.. This course specializes in the commercialisation process and the marketing process for newly founded firms, small businesses in particular, and has a component of hi-tech marketing.
Research shows that most new product or service failures can be attributed to shortcomings in marketing analysis, planning and implementation. This is why the course focuses on the marketing aspects of commercialisation. In particular, this course provides tools, models and approaches that can readily be applied to improve marketing decision-making in a venture to help it to survive and to be successful.
Marketing is very often written about and taught as a ‘big business’ activity. Most businesses, however, are small and have very limited resources (in particular money, time and people). This means that most business people face the challenge of planning and doing marketing in situations where they do not have ‘big business’ resources and have to do almost everything themselves. There is also another major difference; in the big business situation, the marketing manager is by and large an advertising manager without any real responsibility for product or service development, and pricing and distribution decisions. This can be compared with the small business environment addressed in this course where a marketing person is very much involved in all of these decision areas, as well as in sales and corporate strategy development.
Q: Why would I want to do this course?
Our experience is that we have two different segments of students taking this course. One segment is very interested in the topic, wants to know about marketing in the small business and entrepreneurial contexts, and perhaps wants to complete a minor in entrepreneurship and innovation. If you are in this group, you will find that this is a challenging course that will expand your knowledge and give you a different perspective on marketing studies. You will find that this is a great preparation for working in the small-business or entrepreneurial business environment.
The next segment includes students who simply want to do an elective so that they can quickly complete the requirements for their degree. If you are in this group, you may find that this course is more challenging than you expect - it is a standard university course that requires about 120 hours of your time, and it cannot be completed successfully simply by coming along to a few lectures in the first week. This is a course that offers a great deal of benefit, but you must do your part by putting time and effort into the coursework, and particularly by contributing to the teamwork that is a central part of this course
Q: Aren't entrepreneurial marketers born? How can you teach someone to be one of these?
If you have an entrepreneurial inclination, this course will give you the knowledge and confidence to identify and evaluate a business opportunity, and how to go through the process to develop a marketing plan for a new venture based on this opportunity. It will help you to be an entrepreneurial marketer when the situation arises. It will also give you the knowledge and confidence to join a team (led by an entrepreneur) to set up a new business venture – either as a new business or within an existing organisation.
A purpose of the course is also to give students a better understanding of what it is like to work in a small business, so that these people will feel more comfortable (and be more effective) working in a small or entrepreneurial business.
Q: How can the course content be covered in four full days over two weeks?
See the detailed timetable for the course. There are four half-days and two full days of teaching. These are followed by an optional workshop where you can get support from the lecturer or tutor for preparing your team feasibility study. There is also a final report presentation and review session. In this way, you have the equivalent of five full days to cover and explore the course content, and that is the equivalent of a full semester of lecturers and tutorials.
Q: Why doesn't the workshop appear on the official timetable?
The university system is not really geared to present a simple view of the timetable for an intensive course. Including the optional workshops would make the timetable section of the official home page confusing, and would cause timetable conflicts that prevent students from enrolling. That is why we include the note "Important: See timetable details at www.unisa.edu.au/cde/" on the official timetable page.
Q: How much work does this course involve?
The 'rule of thumb' for business courses is that you spend 2 hours of your own time on assignments, group work, tutorial preparation and self-directed learning for every contact hour. This course is about 40 contact hours (including seminars and workshop sessions). This means that we expect that you will spend a total of about 120 hours of your own time to prepare for the exam, work with your team to develop your business idea and write your team marketing plan.
CDE staff have taught this type of course many times. We have observed that students who are well organised seem to have few problems. Students generally arrange to meet in their teams on a regular basis (eg before the lecture sessions) to plan and coordinate their activities and allocate tasks. They then spend time on their own doing their allocated tasks and own study.
Q: What course materials are provided?
You receive a printed study guide of about 240 pages. This includes copies of lecture presentations and a template for each class exercise. You will also have access to the course web site that includes supplementary readings and templates for preparing the team report for this course.
Q: Will I need to get the textbook?
Students sometimes ask if it's worth getting the textbook. As we point out in the first lecture session, our task is to present current thinking in this field, and so the course content draws on research findings, as well as materials from a wide range of sources. This means that we do not lecture out of a textbook, and we do not necessarily lecture out of the study guide. We expect that you will use the text to supplement the content that is delivered in a lecture/seminar sessions, as it is just not possible to cover all of the relevant material in those sessions. That is why we go to some effort to identify a text that adds value to the course, and contributes to your learning.
The text for this course is one of the few books that approaches marketing from the entrepreneurial point of view. It is not large and it is easy to read. It would be a very useful addition to your library.
Q: What is the assessment?
-
A series of multiple choice tests that make up 10% of marks.
-
A marketing plan for a business idea selected by the lecturer. This is a team exercise that is presented as poster plan of two A3 pages (40%)
-
A two-hour written exam (50%).
Q: What are the multiple choice tests?
We implement a "Team Based Learning" approach to teaching this course. This means that the first assignment is taken as five multiple-choice tests taken at the start of each session except the first. In the first session, you are given a practice test that does not count for marks.
Q: What is the exam?
This course includes a two-hour written examination. Students will be given access to about 20 questions covering all aspects of the course, and the exam will consist of five of these questions, of which students will be required to answer four. Students must pass the exam to pass the course. The lecturer/seminar series includes a session on "answering examination questions" that will help students to understand the expectations regarding the examination.
Q: When is the exam?
The exam will be held during the exam period for this study period. Check the University website for the date, time and location.
Q: What are the arrangements for deferred exams, or for special consideration?
If you wish to apply for a deferred examination (or for special consideration), then you need to do this through Campus Central within the required number of days following the examination. Arrangements will then be made by School of Management staff, and you will be advised by e-mail. Please do not contact the lecturer regarding these arrangements, or about the scheduling of deferred examinations.
Q: How are we allocated into teams?
The lecturer allocates teams in the first lecture/seminar session. You will sit with your team members, as you will carry out a number of team exercises during the three days of intensive sessions.
Q: Can we form our own teams?
Team allocation is based on gender, study program and international/local student status, and the aim is to include a range of viewpoints and capabilities in each team. This approach reflects the workplace, where people are put together to carry out specific projects. Our experience has been that teams that are self selected do not get on as well as teams that are allocated (and this is why we go to the trouble of allocating teams). If two or three members of a project team are friends or work together, then this can put the other team member(s) in a difficult situation, or at a disadvantage, if the relationship is not well managed. In addition, if something goes wrong in the project team, the problem may be carried over into the workplace if members of the team work together.
Our view is that University offers a great opportunity to meet people from other study programs and from other countries, and the people you work with in a project team may be valuable members of your (International) network in the future.
Q: What is the team assessment?
The class will be given a single business idea as the subject for your project work and your project report. This idea has been selected on the basis of its potential for development in the form of a marketing plan. There are many advantages that arise from this approach. In particular, the business idea will be discussed during the week of seminars and exercises. This means that your team will be able to develop a very good feel for your project during the lecture sessions, and this will make the project more interesting, and easier to deal with (than if you chose your own topic).
You will cover key aspects of the report preparation task in your team exercises during the intensive sessions. You will be expected to meet as a team to produce the plan. You must use the Word document and the Excel spreadsheet templates (that are provided on the course web site) to develop the report as a Poster Plan. The full specification for the report is included in the course website. Teams attend a report presentation and review session that allows students to learn from the work that other teams have done, and to get immediate feedback on their own work. The report is assessed as a whole - that is, a grade is given for the report, so that each team member receives the same grade for this assessment (although it is possible to award different grades if necessary).
Q: Can we use our own report templates?
You have access to templates to produce the outputs required for this course. They have been tailored to the needs of this course and to our local conditions. Although you can get document and financial templates with marketing textbooks and from various web sites, these are not appropriate and are not to be used for this course. In particular, teams learn by comparing their work with that of other teams at the report presentation and review session, and this is possible only because every team uses the same format and layout for their reports.
Go to "Answers to General FAQs"
Further Enquiries? Peter Balan Home Page