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UNLOCKING THE ENTERPRISER INSIDE! A BOOK OF WHY, WHAT AND HOW!
This book is based on a highly successful joint project between the University of Cambridge and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), under the auspices of the Cambridge-MIT Institute. The project brings together communities of highly diverse individuals to share and learn how to be enterprising. It has run 17 times with the positive outcomes of not only training more enterprising individuals, but also building capacity in universities.The unique feature of this book is how it covers learning in enterprising skills, while at the same time builds capacity in such a way that the alumni themselves can take what they have learned for the benefit of others. Through this book, the authors intend to share what they have learnt and to transmit their passion for this program to others for personal development. Hopefully, others will then repeat this positive experience and make a difference to their respective institutions and communities.
168 pages, Hardcover
First published March 11, 2011
4 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 13, 2020
All about entrepreneurship education you need to know. A great resource. Well thought out and can change your world view on what entrepreneurship education should look like.
August 22, 2012
A stimulating “how to” for entrepreneurship education
I attended the European Entrepreneurship Colloquium in Cambridge (UK) in 2012 where one of the authors of the book (Shailendra Vyakarnam) was the lead facilitator. This book was part of the reading material and I have summarized my thoughts on the book here.
Comments:
1. The book acknowledges the lack of consensus of what entrepreneurship education is, or should be. This issue is emphasized throughout the book in chapter 1, chapter & 2, introduction of chapter 4). One might argue that this assertion undermines the very purpose of a book on entrepreneurship education but this open and honest attitude actually contributes to the credibility of its contents. The book cites a lot of indirect evidence that entrepreneurship education matters, e.g. the sections on impact measurement of programs (chapter 7), testimonials of participants (chapter 8), opinions of seasoned entrepreneurs (chapter 1 & elsewhere).
2. The authors make a convincing case that entrepreneurship teaching should address two main areas: business knowledge and personal development (§5.2, §8.12). Viewing the latter as a key ingredient of entrepreneurship education has a big impact on the design of the precise educational offering as it should combine business know-how with aspects like self awareness and social skill building. This perspective on entrepreneurship education also explains why this book devotes substantial attention to the concept of self-efficacy as an indicator for impact measurement.
3. The book points out the lack of a clear link between the scholarly literature on entrepreneurship and the implications for entrepreneurship education (§2.5). This book contributes to filling that gap. Don’t expect a detailed discussion on entrepreneurship theory: this is not the book’s main goal, although the endnotes of each chapter do contain references to related scholarly material.
4. Relative to other books on venture creation, ‘Unlocking the enterpriser inside’ is positioned at the ‘fuzzy front end’ of entrepreneurship (p4). In other words, it is as much (or even more) about bringing people to the entrepreneurship runway as it is about how to make an entrepreneurial venture fly.
5. The book is about how to design entrepreneurial learning experiences, it does not contain specific business knowledge on how to start a venture (e.g. financing) nor does it have detailed guidelines on how to conduct individual sessions with a larger program (e.g. pitching a business idea). This book is situated at the level of the design of overall programs and everything that is needed to make such ‘learning experiences’ a success, including professional administrative support and trained facilitators (chapter 6).
6. The book could use additional proofreading (for typos and missing references) and some redundancies could be taken out. E.g. the chapter on facilitation - while overall very useful - is quite repetitive.
Takeaway messages for entrepreneurship educators
1. Acknowledge and act on student heterogeneity. Students and/or aspiring entrepreneurs may be at different levels of readiness, both in terms of knowledge and entrepreneurial intent. A well-designed portfolio of entrepreneurship education should cater for those varying needs.
2. Ideas are cheap, implementation is hard. This is the basis for the unique selling proposition of this book, which is the detailed account of setting up and running various entrepreneurial learning initiatives. It manages to avoid a naive hooray atmosphere by being open and transparent about what works and doesn’t work (e.g. §8.12 on mixing participants of different ages).
Overall, this book gives a detailed account of what is arguably the benchmark practice in entrepreneurship education. Its comprehensive coverage of all aspects that need to be addressed in crafting successful learning experiences is undoubtedly of great value for educators facing the daunting task of getting their own initiatives off the ground. Perhaps even more important, the authors succeed hands down in transferring their enthusiasm for entrepreneurial teaching. Without a doubt, this book will increase the self-efficacy of entrepreneurship educators in designing effective entrepreneurial learning experiences.
I attended the European Entrepreneurship Colloquium in Cambridge (UK) in 2012 where one of the authors of the book (Shailendra Vyakarnam) was the lead facilitator. This book was part of the reading material and I have summarized my thoughts on the book here.
Comments:
1. The book acknowledges the lack of consensus of what entrepreneurship education is, or should be. This issue is emphasized throughout the book in chapter 1, chapter & 2, introduction of chapter 4). One might argue that this assertion undermines the very purpose of a book on entrepreneurship education but this open and honest attitude actually contributes to the credibility of its contents. The book cites a lot of indirect evidence that entrepreneurship education matters, e.g. the sections on impact measurement of programs (chapter 7), testimonials of participants (chapter 8), opinions of seasoned entrepreneurs (chapter 1 & elsewhere).
2. The authors make a convincing case that entrepreneurship teaching should address two main areas: business knowledge and personal development (§5.2, §8.12). Viewing the latter as a key ingredient of entrepreneurship education has a big impact on the design of the precise educational offering as it should combine business know-how with aspects like self awareness and social skill building. This perspective on entrepreneurship education also explains why this book devotes substantial attention to the concept of self-efficacy as an indicator for impact measurement.
3. The book points out the lack of a clear link between the scholarly literature on entrepreneurship and the implications for entrepreneurship education (§2.5). This book contributes to filling that gap. Don’t expect a detailed discussion on entrepreneurship theory: this is not the book’s main goal, although the endnotes of each chapter do contain references to related scholarly material.
4. Relative to other books on venture creation, ‘Unlocking the enterpriser inside’ is positioned at the ‘fuzzy front end’ of entrepreneurship (p4). In other words, it is as much (or even more) about bringing people to the entrepreneurship runway as it is about how to make an entrepreneurial venture fly.
5. The book is about how to design entrepreneurial learning experiences, it does not contain specific business knowledge on how to start a venture (e.g. financing) nor does it have detailed guidelines on how to conduct individual sessions with a larger program (e.g. pitching a business idea). This book is situated at the level of the design of overall programs and everything that is needed to make such ‘learning experiences’ a success, including professional administrative support and trained facilitators (chapter 6).
6. The book could use additional proofreading (for typos and missing references) and some redundancies could be taken out. E.g. the chapter on facilitation - while overall very useful - is quite repetitive.
Takeaway messages for entrepreneurship educators
1. Acknowledge and act on student heterogeneity. Students and/or aspiring entrepreneurs may be at different levels of readiness, both in terms of knowledge and entrepreneurial intent. A well-designed portfolio of entrepreneurship education should cater for those varying needs.
2. Ideas are cheap, implementation is hard. This is the basis for the unique selling proposition of this book, which is the detailed account of setting up and running various entrepreneurial learning initiatives. It manages to avoid a naive hooray atmosphere by being open and transparent about what works and doesn’t work (e.g. §8.12 on mixing participants of different ages).
Overall, this book gives a detailed account of what is arguably the benchmark practice in entrepreneurship education. Its comprehensive coverage of all aspects that need to be addressed in crafting successful learning experiences is undoubtedly of great value for educators facing the daunting task of getting their own initiatives off the ground. Perhaps even more important, the authors succeed hands down in transferring their enthusiasm for entrepreneurial teaching. Without a doubt, this book will increase the self-efficacy of entrepreneurship educators in designing effective entrepreneurial learning experiences.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews