Entrepreneurship Minor

Students will discover and develop the entrepreneurial mindset that is critical to succeed in today’s dynamic business environment so that they will be able to imagine, create, identify, assess, and act on business opportunities in a variety of contexts and organizations. Through real-world examples and hand-ons activities, students will embrace an entrepreneurial and strength-based mindsets that will facilitate their understanding of the major functions of business and the relationships between them, as well as the importance of self-inquiry and teamwork.

Students will learn about creativity from a multi-disciplinary perspective, develop confidence in their own flexible thinking abilities, learn how to practice creativity within a business framework, and appreciate how workplace environments affect creativity. Readings, case studies, class exercises, and projects will emphasize the role of applied creativity in areas such as business opportunity recognition, product design, customer service, and innovative management practices.

Introduces the skills of project management to define a project’s scope, specifications and assumptions, and develop a work breakdown structure using various methodologies. Students gain an understanding of the value of time lines and Gantt charts and utilize a leading project management software application.

Students will explore the many ways that best practices in organizational change and design, business model innovation, information technology, and management can be leveraged within the firm to create an innovative and competitive organization. The course will address how technological innovations can enhance the management of organizations in such areas as digital commerce, supply chain management, business process redesign, and knowledge management.

In this course you will take an active and experiential, lean start-up approach to entrepreneurism. You will learn how entrepreneurism is a basis for developing your professional practice, small business or non-profit. Building on a foundation of earlier courses, you will work both individually and in teams to develop value propositions into innovative and viable business models through the application of business disciplines especially in the areas of marketing, entrepreneurial financial management and operations. You will develop the ability to manage the complete entrepreneurial process from conceptualization, through business modeling, to pre-launch. Learning activities will include case studies, team-based design thinking sessions and both team and individual projects.

Provides a discussion and immersion into the concepts of entrepreneurship as a career option. From ideation, innovation, and opportunity recognition through industry research and competitive analysis, students formulate a vision of their venture and evaluate it against the resources and constraints of the business environment for feasibility and sustainability. Students create a comprehensive business plan on a venture of their choosing.