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Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

  • 1.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-03-2016 18:47
    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 

    Thanks to the list!

    Jerry
    --
    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 2.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-04-2016 06:18

    Dear Jerry:

     

    The type of business plan/business model may be required depends on several factors in different countries (I mean globally). It is difficult to apply universal benchmark. For example, specific regulatory issues and company formation laws can influence in shaping business plans in both formats and contents. In my view, the three dimensional business plan (3-Ds) is the flexible one that can be adjusted accordingly. Due to time and outlook of business turbulence in the current global techno-economic developmental continuum, a SMARTER business plan can attract supporting and endorsing stakeholders.

     

    Regards,

    Mengsteab

     

     

    In Loving Memory of My Beloved Son, Yohannes Mengsteab, B.Sc., BA (hon). (11.08.1992 – 10.09. 2015)

    Mengsteab Tesfayohannes, Ph.D. PDCE.

    Associate Professor of Management

    (Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Business Promotional Research

    and Economic Development Strategies)

    Sigmund Weis School of Business, Susquehanna University

    Selinsgrove, PENN, USA

    E-mail: tesfayohannes@susqu.edu, or haryohruth@yahoo.ca

     

     

     

     

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Jerome Katz
    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 

     

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

     

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

     

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

     

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 

     

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

     

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 

     

    Thanks to the list!

     

    Jerry

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 3.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-09-2016 13:18
    Jerry at al,

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?

    Ted Ladd PhD
    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy
    Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation
     
    ------
     
    Hult International Business School
    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai
    Email    ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu
    Mobile   307-413-3333
    Web     www.hult.edu 


    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary
     
    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 
     
    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.
     
    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.
     
    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).
     
    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 
     
    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.
     
    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 
     
    Thanks to the list!
     
    Jerry
    --
    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd. 
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu
    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!
    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 4.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-09-2016 13:40
    I really liked the article! In January I was attending the Kern Engineering Entrepreneurship Network meeting in Tempe and had to talk extemporaneously about the limits to lean approaches. My anxiety would have been a lot less if I had read your article before the question came up.

    It seems to me the approach will work just fine. If you had more student judges (say 5), you could adopt the Olympics' model eliminating the highest and lowest scores to avoid extreme results impairing the fairness. Of course, if the mentality of the class is of a Shark Tank variety, even a high-low drop may not have much effect.

    Thanks for adding your thoughts,
    Jerry

    On Wed, Mar 9, 2016 at 12:18 PM, Ted Ladd <ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu> wrote:
    Jerry at al,

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?

    Ted Ladd PhD
    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy
    Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation
     
    ------
     
    Hult International Business School
    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai
    Email    ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu
    Mobile   307-413-3333
    Web     www.hult.edu 


    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary
     
    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 
     
    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.
     
    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.
     
    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).
     
    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 
     
    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.
     
    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 
     
    Thanks to the list!
     
    Jerry
    --
    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd. 
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu
    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!
    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!



    --
    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 5.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-10-2016 14:41

    Hi Ted,

      I'm just wondering if the students would have any cause for concern when they realize that 50% of their grade will come from someone other than the professor? And are there any procedural concerns by your faculty with this kind of approach?

     

     

    Dannie Brown, DBA

    Assistant Professor, Organizational Management

    Shannon School of Business

    Office SB125

    902-563-1645

    @dannieDBA

     

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Ted Ladd
    Sent: March-09-16 2:18 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Jerry at al,

     

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

     

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

     

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?


    Ted Ladd PhD

    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy

    Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation

     

    ------

     

    Hult International Business School

    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai
    Email   

    ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu

    Mobile  

    307-413-3333

    Web    

    www.hult.edu 

     

     

    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 

     

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

     

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

     

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

     

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 

     

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

     

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 

     

    Thanks to the list!

     

    Jerry

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd. 
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

     

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 6.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-10-2016 16:16
    All,

    BIG Deal. In Don Kuratko's course 100% of their Final Grade was determined
    by external reviewer's and if they did NOT pass this course, they did NOT
    graduate! Contact him about this at dkuratko@indiana.edu

    Sincerely,
    Dr. Charles Hofer
    770-455-4280 Cell 1
    770-757-3575 Cell 2

    ----- Original Message -----
    From: "Dannie Brown" <Dannie_Brown@CBU.CA>
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Sent: Thursday, March 10, 2016 2:41:15 PM
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Hi Ted,
    I'm just wondering if the students would have any cause for concern when
    they realize that 50% of their grade will come from someone other than the
    professor? And are there any procedural concerns by your faculty with this
    kind of approach?


    Dannie Brown, DBA
    Assistant Professor, Organizational Management
    Shannon School of Business
    Office SB125
    902-563-1645
    @dannieDBA

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Ted Ladd
    Sent: March-09-16 2:18 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Jerry at al,

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?

    Ted Ladd PhD
    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy
    Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation

    ------

    Hult International Business School
    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai
    Email
    ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu<mailto:ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu>
    Mobile
    307-413-3333
    Web
    www.hult.edu<http://www.hult.edu>
    Profile
    www.linkedin.com/in/tedladd<http://www.linkedin.com/in/tedladd>


    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU<mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU>
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice.

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list),

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods.

    Thanks to the list!

    Jerry
    --
    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu<mailto:katzja@slu.edu>, http://eweb.slu.edu
    [https://s3.amazonaws.com/allkdls/Rankings-Spring-2016-Jan(web).png]
    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu<mailto:jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu>) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu<mailto:kcox24@my.fau.edu>). Ventures HO!
    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu<mailto:jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu>) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu<mailto:kcox24@my.fau.edu>). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu<mailto:jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu>) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu<mailto:kcox24@my.fau.edu>). Ventures HO!

    **************************************
    This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management.

    Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list.

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    If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu).

    Ventures HO!

    **************************************
    This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management.

    Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list.

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    If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu).

    Ventures HO!


  • 7.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-10-2016 17:31
    Ted:
    You are a Research Fellow at a Center for "Disruptive Innovation" .... your grading system is all about disruptive innovation in entrepreneurial education. Knowledge about DI is urgently needed. Move on!!!!
    Best,

    Maria-Teresa Lepeley | President CEO | Global Institute for Quality Education GIQE
    www.globalqualityeducation.org
    Lepeley, M.T. HCM book @ Human Centered Management in Executive Education. Palgrave 2016
    Lepeley, M.T. Principal Editor. Book Series Human Centered Management. Meeting Global Demand for Innovation in Education and Organizations in Sustainable Economies and Inclusive Societies. Greenleaf Publishing

    Technology is useful, but it is useless unless people can use it.

    -----Original Message-----
    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Charles Hofer
    Sent: Thursday, March 10, 2016 4:16 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    All,

    BIG Deal. In Don Kuratko's course 100% of their Final Grade was determined by external reviewer's and if they did NOT pass this course, they did NOT graduate! Contact him about this at dkuratko@indiana.edu

    Sincerely,
    Dr. Charles Hofer
    770-455-4280 Cell 1
    770-757-3575 Cell 2

    ----- Original Message -----
    From: "Dannie Brown" <Dannie_Brown@CBU.CA>
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Sent: Thursday, March 10, 2016 2:41:15 PM
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Hi Ted,
    I'm just wondering if the students would have any cause for concern when they realize that 50% of their grade will come from someone other than the professor? And are there any procedural concerns by your faculty with this kind of approach?


    Dannie Brown, DBA
    Assistant Professor, Organizational Management Shannon School of Business Office SB125
    902-563-1645
    @dannieDBA

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Ted Ladd
    Sent: March-09-16 2:18 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Jerry at al,

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?

    Ted Ladd PhD
    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation

    ------

    Hult International Business School
    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai Email ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu<mailto:ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu>
    Mobile
    307-413-3333
    Web
    www.hult.edu<http://www.hult.edu>
    Profile
    www.linkedin.com/in/tedladd<http://www.linkedin.com/in/tedladd>


    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU<mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU>
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice.

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list),

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods.

    Thanks to the list!

    Jerry
    --
    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu<mailto:katzja@slu.edu>, http://eweb.slu.edu [https://s3.amazonaws.com/allkdls/Rankings-Spring-2016-Jan(web).png]
    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu<mailto:jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu>) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu<mailto:kcox24@my.fau.edu>). Ventures HO!
    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu<mailto:jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu>) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu<mailto:kcox24@my.fau.edu>). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu<mailto:jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu>) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu<mailto:kcox24@my.fau.edu>). Ventures HO!

    **************************************
    This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management.

    Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list.

    You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:
    http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1

    If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu).

    Ventures HO!

    **************************************
    This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management.

    Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list.

    You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:
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    If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu).

    Ventures HO!

    **************************************
    This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management.

    Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list.

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    If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu).

    Ventures HO!


  • 8.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-10-2016 16:26

    Generally they like having the outside expert entrepreneur or professional judging - not that stodgy old professor. Also we try and pick as many local "names" as possible for the shock and awe value and tying our university to the larger community, and we confer with students about our choices and give them up-front veto power. 

    All judging is actually done on a real world basis. Student negotiate with us the goal of their plan (funding is the default, other options include partnering/JV, key advisor recruitment, board recruitment, key employee recruitment). We get the plan a week in advance and read and mark it up. Students come in, do a 10-minute pitch deck, 20-30 minutes of Q&A and then we grade and give feedback. In coming to a grade (done outside the classroom by the judges) the scale is: 

    A = "I will sign on the dotted line now."
    B = "No signature, but let's go for a nice dinner. I have a few questions."
    C = "No dinner. Coffee. Free refills. I have a lot of questions."
    D = "Nothing to eat or drink. I'm detecting major flaws here.
    F = "Kid, you're embarrassing yourself. You're wasting my time. Get out of here."

    With this model, people off the street and my co-teacher and I agree on the same grade more than 90% of the time on the first try. When there is more than a 1 level difference, we talk about what we're seeing and missing. BTW, as "the professor" I always go last - when asking students questions and when offering judges what grade I'd give it. I found outsiders defer to professors too readily.

    There is actually a grading packet online at:

    Jerry

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 9.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-11-2016 11:37

    I have to agree with Jerome's "stodgy old professor" comment.

     

    At Miami, we've taken it step further in an effort to capture the "real world" anxieties founders face transitioning from an idea to a pre-revenue startup. we have collaborated with accelerators and investors in the Tri-State area (Ohio, northern Kentucky, and Indiana) in an effort to fine-tune the focus and content of our undergraduate curriculum and, in particular, the senior capstone New Venture Creation course. The result is an experiential-based capstone course that parallels the engaged process startups/founders encounter at major accelerators, including content (topics) embedded in the curriculum as well as the startup process itself (milestones, etc.).

     

    The 15-week course ends with a Demo Day that includes founders/directors of major accelerators in the Tri-State area (Ohio, northern Kentucky, and Indiana), angel and venture capital investors, founders of startups that have completed seed and/or Series funding rounds, corporate CEOs of publicly traded firms, other members of Cincinnati's startup ecosystem (legal, accounting, etc.). Last year, about 150 students pitched 32 startup business ideas in competitions held in the fall and spring semesters. Two of the teams that competed last year found spots in Cincinnati-based accelerators-OROS Apparel (a graduate of The Brandery's 2015 Class) and Devoo (currently a member of OCEAN Accelerator's 2016 Class). A third-Nomful-graduated from DreamIt Health Baltimore accelerator last July. Three others received angel and/or seed stage financing over the past year.

     

    At the end of this spring semester, 30 startup business idea teams involving more than 130 students will pitch startup business ideas across two rounds. More than 50 "judges" are expected to participate, including founders/directors from 5 major accelerators (i.e., The Brandery, OCEAN, UpTech, Mortar, and Bad Girl Ventures), investors from 10 or more angel groups and venture capital firms (i.e., CincyTech, Cintrifuse, Blue Chip Ventures, Connetics, Allos Ventures, Hyde Park Venture Partners, Gravity Ventures, Business Backers, West Capital Advisors, and Queen City Angels), founders 15 funded startups, and 3 CEOs (including Jim Ryan, Chairman and CEO of W.W. Grainger), among others. We ask all of them to "pull no punches" in their assessments of and comments to the startup teams and they don't. The result is a heightened sense of the reality founders encounter when dealing with investors. We do ask each judge to evaluate each startup using an evaluation rubric, and we collect these evaluations, compile the comments, and provide them in summary form to startups.

     

    Each year, our entrepreneurship students point to this event as one of if not the single-most impactful learning experience in their undergraduate educational journey.

     

    Finally, on this issue of grades, we assign grades to each team based on a faculty review of each team's pitch, its pitch deck and launch plan, and financial projections. The Demo Day is purposely designed as an "un-graded" exercise, although it includes a cash prize "incentive" to the top 5 startup teams.

     

    Hope this helps.

     

    Tim

     

    Tim R. Holcomb Ph.D. 

    Associate Professor and Cintas Chair in Entrepreneurship |

    Institute for Entrepreneurship and Department of Management | Farmer School of Business | Miami University | 

    2075 FSB/MSC 1148 | 800 E. High Street | Oxford, Ohio 45056 | Office: +1.513.529.3665 | Fax: +1.513.529.6992 | Email: holcomtr@MiamiOH.edu |

    Farmer School of Business Website: http://www.fsb.miamioh.edu/directory/holcomtr |  SSRN Author Page: http://ssrn.com/author=619640 |

    LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/pub/tim-r-holcomb/a/289/966 | Follow me on Twitter: @timrayholcomb |

     

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Jerome Katz
    Sent: Thursday, March 10, 2016 4:26 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     


    Generally they like having the outside expert entrepreneur or professional judging - not that stodgy old professor. Also we try and pick as many local "names" as possible for the shock and awe value and tying our university to the larger community, and we confer with students about our choices and give them up-front veto power. 

     

    All judging is actually done on a real world basis. Student negotiate with us the goal of their plan (funding is the default, other options include partnering/JV, key advisor recruitment, board recruitment, key employee recruitment). We get the plan a week in advance and read and mark it up. Students come in, do a 10-minute pitch deck, 20-30 minutes of Q&A and then we grade and give feedback. In coming to a grade (done outside the classroom by the judges) the scale is: 

     

    A = "I will sign on the dotted line now."

    B = "No signature, but let's go for a nice dinner. I have a few questions."

    C = "No dinner. Coffee. Free refills. I have a lot of questions."

    D = "Nothing to eat or drink. I'm detecting major flaws here.

    F = "Kid, you're embarrassing yourself. You're wasting my time. Get out of here."

     

    With this model, people off the street and my co-teacher and I agree on the same grade more than 90% of the time on the first try. When there is more than a 1 level difference, we talk about what we're seeing and missing. BTW, as "the professor" I always go last - when asking students questions and when offering judges what grade I'd give it. I found outsiders defer to professors too readily.

     

    There is actually a grading packet online at:

     

    Jerry

     

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 10.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-14-2016 09:34

    I have seen that high of the percentage of the grade be a problem in the past (including lawsuits to the university) , especially when the grade has been assigned by someone other than the prof ( other students, panels, etc.) I would caution to be careful with that.

     

    Best

     

    Julio De Castro

     

     

    De: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] En nombre de Dannie Brown
    Enviado el: jueves, 10 de marzo de 2016 20:41
    Para: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Asunto: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Hi Ted,

      I'm just wondering if the students would have any cause for concern when they realize that 50% of their grade will come from someone other than the professor? And are there any procedural concerns by your faculty with this kind of approach?

     

     

    Dannie Brown, DBA

    Assistant Professor, Organizational Management

    Shannon School of Business

    Office SB125

    902-563-1645

    @dannieDBA

     

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Ted Ladd
    Sent: March-09-16 2:18 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Jerry at al,

     

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

     

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

     

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?


    Ted Ladd PhD

    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy

    Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation

     

    ------

     

    Hult International Business School

    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai
    Email   

    ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu

    Mobile  

    307-413-3333

    Web    

    www.hult.edu 

     

     

    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 

     

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

     

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

     

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

     

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 

     

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

     

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 

     

    Thanks to the list!

     

    Jerry

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd. 
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

     

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 11.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-15-2016 11:36
    Julio raises a valid point, as he always does. 

    In my case, I've designed around the problem. Before teaching at SLU, I taught at Wharton, and my first years I tried to apply the same standards at SLU as Wharton. That was a disaster, and I lay that one squarely on my then-much-younger head. So, I ended up having students do the full business plan for a two-round system. The full plan goes to the judges typically 1-2 weeks after midterm. They do the presentation, Q&A and get feedback right then, using the real-world grading system. That grade is not recorded (or you can give it 10% of the grade to make sure kids who blow it off have no way to get an "A"). Armed with the feedback (and marked-up plans) they typically have one month to fix everything. The judges also have to agree to mentor the students in the interim, so if we told them to "do X" and the student doesn't know how, the judges are on the hook to explain. That second round is where that massive percentage of the grade occurs. So when students have performed poorly, it is because of their own failure to do the work, to listen to the feedback, or to follow-up on what they were told (and I tell students to record on their cell phones when we give oral feedback, because we will be talking fast). 

    BTW, when judges give grades, the visitor goes first, my co-teacher (a practicing entrepreneur or professional) next, and me last, just so "the professor" doesn't sway the grading. Sometimes in second round, we will add a second outside judge (to avoid Stockholm syndrome), and the new visitor goes first.

    Finally, as the instructor of record, I hold the power and responsibility to change the given grade. Twice in 28 years here at SLU, we have had a situation where the second outside judge picked up on a problem that the three first-round judges (and the students other mentors) missed. All of us had to admit the new judge was right, and under real-world standards, the plan might not have gone as predicted. To be fair, when we told the students, even they realized the problem. After a sleepless night (that first time), I felt the students acted in good faith, as had the judging team, so I talked with my co-teacher to check my reasoning, and changed the grade based on the grades given by the original three judges, with a grade drop to reflect the problem remaining in the plan. The second time this happened (a couple of years ago), we had the procedure in place and it didn't cost a sleepless night. I just went ahead and let the students know.

    One other aspect of this approach, it produces very good business plans. Our school is ranked 93rd in USNews for undergrads. Our entrepreneurship program is ranked 7th. Our ACT/SAT compared to most of the other top 25 schools reflects that 93rd ranking. A significant part of our ability to compete nationally in entrepreneurship comes from what our undergrads can accomplish in national competitions and getting their businesses launched locally. The two round approach, coupled with the real-world grading, is what I think is the foundation of that academic leveling-up process. And no lawyer calls yet. Irate parents? Yes, a few, but when I describe the two-round process, who the judges and mentors were, what we told the student first-round, and what the student had to literally disregard for a whole month to end up with a low second-round grade, most parents want to scream at their kids, not SLU.

    BTW, this model hits on AACSB hot button topics like  rubric-based grading, practitioner involvement in the classroom, and the introduction of real-world (a.k.a. competency based)  standards for capstone classes, in case you would need to make the case for this approach in your school. 

    Jerry

    On Mon, Mar 14, 2016 at 8:33 AM, Julio de Castro <Julio.Castro@ie.edu> wrote:

    I have seen that high of the percentage of the grade be a problem in the past (including lawsuits to the university) , especially when the grade has been assigned by someone other than the prof ( other students, panels, etc.) I would caution to be careful with that.

     

    Best

     

    Julio De Castro

     

     

    De: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] En nombre de Dannie Brown
    Enviado el: jueves, 10 de marzo de 2016 20:41
    Para: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Asunto: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Hi Ted,

      I'm just wondering if the students would have any cause for concern when they realize that 50% of their grade will come from someone other than the professor? And are there any procedural concerns by your faculty with this kind of approach?

     

     

    Dannie Brown, DBA

    Assistant Professor, Organizational Management

    Shannon School of Business

    Office SB125

    902-563-1645

    @dannieDBA

     

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Ted Ladd
    Sent: March-09-16 2:18 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Jerry at al,

     

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

     

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

     

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?


    Ted Ladd PhD

    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy

    Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation

     

    ------

     

    Hult International Business School

    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai
    Email   

    ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu

    Mobile  

    307-413-3333

    Web    

    www.hult.edu 

     

     

    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 

     

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

     

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

     

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

     

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 

     

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

     

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 

     

    Thanks to the list!

     

    Jerry

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd. 
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

     

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!



    --
    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 12.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-15-2016 12:30

    As usual Jerry has a wonderful solution.  Disclosure and process.  If I were to do something like that I would make sure that the students clearly understand what percentage of the grade will be assigned by the external parties and what would be the elements of that decision.  Second , process,  clearly outlined and taking into account possible problem situations and fixes.

     

    BTW the example I used of a lawsuit is a real one.  Prof (senior adjunct, had taught for many years) had stated in syllabus and in class that since commitment and work were a big part of the equation,  50% of the grade would come from fellow student evaluations of how much work each put into the project.  Those of us that ask for student evals know that this is rarely a problem because they usually say that they all worked really hard.  Well this moron proceeded to get a 0 on his student evals from all his peers, therefore failing to graduate.  Lawsuit ensues, and universities never ones to shy away from taking a stand, proceeds to settle....$15K to the moron,,,

     

    De: Jerome Katz [mailto:katzja@slu.edu]
    Enviado el: martes, 15 de marzo de 2016 16:36
    Para: Julio de Castro
    CC: ENTREP@aomlists.pace.edu
    Asunto: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Julio raises a valid point, as he always does. 

     

    In my case, I've designed around the problem. Before teaching at SLU, I taught at Wharton, and my first years I tried to apply the same standards at SLU as Wharton. That was a disaster, and I lay that one squarely on my then-much-younger head. So, I ended up having students do the full business plan for a two-round system. The full plan goes to the judges typically 1-2 weeks after midterm. They do the presentation, Q&A and get feedback right then, using the real-world grading system. That grade is not recorded (or you can give it 10% of the grade to make sure kids who blow it off have no way to get an "A"). Armed with the feedback (and marked-up plans) they typically have one month to fix everything. The judges also have to agree to mentor the students in the interim, so if we told them to "do X" and the student doesn't know how, the judges are on the hook to explain. That second round is where that massive percentage of the grade occurs. So when students have performed poorly, it is because of their own failure to do the work, to listen to the feedback, or to follow-up on what they were told (and I tell students to record on their cell phones when we give oral feedback, because we will be talking fast). 

     

    BTW, when judges give grades, the visitor goes first, my co-teacher (a practicing entrepreneur or professional) next, and me last, just so "the professor" doesn't sway the grading. Sometimes in second round, we will add a second outside judge (to avoid Stockholm syndrome), and the new visitor goes first.

     

    Finally, as the instructor of record, I hold the power and responsibility to change the given grade. Twice in 28 years here at SLU, we have had a situation where the second outside judge picked up on a problem that the three first-round judges (and the students other mentors) missed. All of us had to admit the new judge was right, and under real-world standards, the plan might not have gone as predicted. To be fair, when we told the students, even they realized the problem. After a sleepless night (that first time), I felt the students acted in good faith, as had the judging team, so I talked with my co-teacher to check my reasoning, and changed the grade based on the grades given by the original three judges, with a grade drop to reflect the problem remaining in the plan. The second time this happened (a couple of years ago), we had the procedure in place and it didn't cost a sleepless night. I just went ahead and let the students know.

     

    One other aspect of this approach, it produces very good business plans. Our school is ranked 93rd in USNews for undergrads. Our entrepreneurship program is ranked 7th. Our ACT/SAT compared to most of the other top 25 schools reflects that 93rd ranking. A significant part of our ability to compete nationally in entrepreneurship comes from what our undergrads can accomplish in national competitions and getting their businesses launched locally. The two round approach, coupled with the real-world grading, is what I think is the foundation of that academic leveling-up process. And no lawyer calls yet. Irate parents? Yes, a few, but when I describe the two-round process, who the judges and mentors were, what we told the student first-round, and what the student had to literally disregard for a whole month to end up with a low second-round grade, most parents want to scream at their kids, not SLU.

     

    BTW, this model hits on AACSB hot button topics like  rubric-based grading, practitioner involvement in the classroom, and the introduction of real-world (a.k.a. competency based)  standards for capstone classes, in case you would need to make the case for this approach in your school. 

     

    Jerry

     

    On Mon, Mar 14, 2016 at 8:33 AM, Julio de Castro <Julio.Castro@ie.edu> wrote:

    I have seen that high of the percentage of the grade be a problem in the past (including lawsuits to the university) , especially when the grade has been assigned by someone other than the prof ( other students, panels, etc.) I would caution to be careful with that.

     

    Best

     

    Julio De Castro

     

     

    De: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] En nombre de Dannie Brown
    Enviado el: jueves, 10 de marzo de 2016 20:41
    Para: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Asunto: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Hi Ted,

      I'm just wondering if the students would have any cause for concern when they realize that 50% of their grade will come from someone other than the professor? And are there any procedural concerns by your faculty with this kind of approach?

     

     

    Dannie Brown, DBA

    Assistant Professor, Organizational Management

    Shannon School of Business

    Office SB125

    902-563-1645

    @dannieDBA

     

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Ted Ladd
    Sent: March-09-16 2:18 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Jerry at al,

     

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

     

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

     

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?


    Ted Ladd PhD

    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy

    Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation

     

    ------

     

    Hult International Business School

    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai
    Email   

    ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu

    Mobile  

    307-413-3333

    Web    

    www.hult.edu 

     

     

    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 

     

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

     

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

     

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

     

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 

     

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

     

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 

     

    Thanks to the list!

     

    Jerry

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd. 
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

     

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!



     

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 13.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-15-2016 15:09

    Jerry,

     

    In regards to the AACSB hot button issue, how do you handle the mandate to grade students individually as opposed to utilizing team-level outcomes? This seems to be a thorny issue at my institution where a tension has arisen between fulfilling this assessment requirement and the evolving world of entrepreneurial education with a strong focus on teams.

     

    I love the concept behind what you are doing.

     

    Thanks,

    -Willie Stromeyer

     

     

     

    William Stromeyer

    Dept. of Management, IB, & Entrepreneurship

    Saunders College of Business

    Rochester Institute of Technology

    wstromeyer@saunders.rit.edu

    585-475-4298

     

                                                                                                                                       

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Jerome Katz
    Sent: Tuesday, March 15, 2016 11:36 AM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Julio raises a valid point, as he always does. 

     

    In my case, I've designed around the problem. Before teaching at SLU, I taught at Wharton, and my first years I tried to apply the same standards at SLU as Wharton. That was a disaster, and I lay that one squarely on my then-much-younger head. So, I ended up having students do the full business plan for a two-round system. The full plan goes to the judges typically 1-2 weeks after midterm. They do the presentation, Q&A and get feedback right then, using the real-world grading system. That grade is not recorded (or you can give it 10% of the grade to make sure kids who blow it off have no way to get an "A"). Armed with the feedback (and marked-up plans) they typically have one month to fix everything. The judges also have to agree to mentor the students in the interim, so if we told them to "do X" and the student doesn't know how, the judges are on the hook to explain. That second round is where that massive percentage of the grade occurs. So when students have performed poorly, it is because of their own failure to do the work, to listen to the feedback, or to follow-up on what they were told (and I tell students to record on their cell phones when we give oral feedback, because we will be talking fast). 

     

    BTW, when judges give grades, the visitor goes first, my co-teacher (a practicing entrepreneur or professional) next, and me last, just so "the professor" doesn't sway the grading. Sometimes in second round, we will add a second outside judge (to avoid Stockholm syndrome), and the new visitor goes first.

     

    Finally, as the instructor of record, I hold the power and responsibility to change the given grade. Twice in 28 years here at SLU, we have had a situation where the second outside judge picked up on a problem that the three first-round judges (and the students other mentors) missed. All of us had to admit the new judge was right, and under real-world standards, the plan might not have gone as predicted. To be fair, when we told the students, even they realized the problem. After a sleepless night (that first time), I felt the students acted in good faith, as had the judging team, so I talked with my co-teacher to check my reasoning, and changed the grade based on the grades given by the original three judges, with a grade drop to reflect the problem remaining in the plan. The second time this happened (a couple of years ago), we had the procedure in place and it didn't cost a sleepless night. I just went ahead and let the students know.

     

    One other aspect of this approach, it produces very good business plans. Our school is ranked 93rd in USNews for undergrads. Our entrepreneurship program is ranked 7th. Our ACT/SAT compared to most of the other top 25 schools reflects that 93rd ranking. A significant part of our ability to compete nationally in entrepreneurship comes from what our undergrads can accomplish in national competitions and getting their businesses launched locally. The two round approach, coupled with the real-world grading, is what I think is the foundation of that academic leveling-up process. And no lawyer calls yet. Irate parents? Yes, a few, but when I describe the two-round process, who the judges and mentors were, what we told the student first-round, and what the student had to literally disregard for a whole month to end up with a low second-round grade, most parents want to scream at their kids, not SLU.

     

    BTW, this model hits on AACSB hot button topics like  rubric-based grading, practitioner involvement in the classroom, and the introduction of real-world (a.k.a. competency based)  standards for capstone classes, in case you would need to make the case for this approach in your school. 

     

    Jerry

     

    On Mon, Mar 14, 2016 at 8:33 AM, Julio de Castro <Julio.Castro@ie.edu> wrote:

    I have seen that high of the percentage of the grade be a problem in the past (including lawsuits to the university) , especially when the grade has been assigned by someone other than the prof ( other students, panels, etc.) I would caution to be careful with that.

     

    Best

     

    Julio De Castro

     

     

    De: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] En nombre de Dannie Brown
    Enviado el: jueves, 10 de marzo de 2016 20:41
    Para: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Asunto: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Hi Ted,

      I'm just wondering if the students would have any cause for concern when they realize that 50% of their grade will come from someone other than the professor? And are there any procedural concerns by your faculty with this kind of approach?

     

     

    Dannie Brown, DBA

    Assistant Professor, Organizational Management

    Shannon School of Business

    Office SB125

    902-563-1645

    @dannieDBA

     

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Ted Ladd
    Sent: March-09-16 2:18 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Jerry at al,

     

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

     

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

     

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?


    Ted Ladd PhD

    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy

    Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation

     

    ------

     

    Hult International Business School

    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai
    Email   

    ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu

    Mobile  

    307-413-3333

    Web    

    www.hult.edu 

     

     

    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 

     

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

     

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

     

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

     

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 

     

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

     

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 

     

    Thanks to the list!

     

    Jerry

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd. 
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

     

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!



     

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!


  • 14.  Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

    Posted 03-15-2016 16:40
    The process leading up to the business plan course relies on individual project grades, with generally the same criteria and much of the same judging process intact. That said, we often have a mix of solo students and teams in the business plan classes. Certainly for the more ambitious plans, the workload could be impossible for a single student to finish in a semester (think a biotech startup out of tech transfer, for example). 

    What can help where that is an issue is to organize plans so each student is responsible for one more more sections (and tracking the emerging document using MS Word "track changes" or individual turn-ins) to make it possible to parcel out the work and evaluate it. Note if you have to do this, organize (i.e. track) the within-team feedback process as team members give feedback to one another, so you can show how students are analyzing and solving problems as they crop up in their own work and the work of their team mates - another valuable outcome. As Julio mentioned, you would want to make it clear to students when their own work is being evaluated and how they should collaborate and support each other as a team in ways that fit with this type of grading system. I am pretty sure they will not have seen anything like it before, so be ready for mistakes and explanations.

    These internal processes may be evaluated by the standing faculty rather than the outside judges, since few outside judges would have the time or patience for that sort of ongoing evaluation, but the final grades on the plan would involve the outside judges. If you were following this model, adjust the grading packet so that all judges are evaluating each section, so that you have final-outcome grades for each student based on the sections of the plan they did. And you'd no doubt want to reweigh the final grade to reflect individual effort more than the overall plan grade.

    That said, I am glad this issue has not come up in my school, yet. Thanks for the heads-up.

    Jerry

    On Tue, Mar 15, 2016 at 2:09 PM, William Stromeyer <wstromeyer@saunders.rit.edu> wrote:

    Jerry,

     

    In regards to the AACSB hot button issue, how do you handle the mandate to grade students individually as opposed to utilizing team-level outcomes? This seems to be a thorny issue at my institution where a tension has arisen between fulfilling this assessment requirement and the evolving world of entrepreneurial education with a strong focus on teams.

     

    I love the concept behind what you are doing.

     

    Thanks,

    -Willie Stromeyer

     

     

     

    William Stromeyer

    Dept. of Management, IB, & Entrepreneurship

    Saunders College of Business

    Rochester Institute of Technology

    wstromeyer@saunders.rit.edu

    585-475-4298

     

                                                                                                                                       

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Jerome Katz
    Sent: Tuesday, March 15, 2016 11:36 AM


    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Julio raises a valid point, as he always does. 

     

    In my case, I've designed around the problem. Before teaching at SLU, I taught at Wharton, and my first years I tried to apply the same standards at SLU as Wharton. That was a disaster, and I lay that one squarely on my then-much-younger head. So, I ended up having students do the full business plan for a two-round system. The full plan goes to the judges typically 1-2 weeks after midterm. They do the presentation, Q&A and get feedback right then, using the real-world grading system. That grade is not recorded (or you can give it 10% of the grade to make sure kids who blow it off have no way to get an "A"). Armed with the feedback (and marked-up plans) they typically have one month to fix everything. The judges also have to agree to mentor the students in the interim, so if we told them to "do X" and the student doesn't know how, the judges are on the hook to explain. That second round is where that massive percentage of the grade occurs. So when students have performed poorly, it is because of their own failure to do the work, to listen to the feedback, or to follow-up on what they were told (and I tell students to record on their cell phones when we give oral feedback, because we will be talking fast). 

     

    BTW, when judges give grades, the visitor goes first, my co-teacher (a practicing entrepreneur or professional) next, and me last, just so "the professor" doesn't sway the grading. Sometimes in second round, we will add a second outside judge (to avoid Stockholm syndrome), and the new visitor goes first.

     

    Finally, as the instructor of record, I hold the power and responsibility to change the given grade. Twice in 28 years here at SLU, we have had a situation where the second outside judge picked up on a problem that the three first-round judges (and the students other mentors) missed. All of us had to admit the new judge was right, and under real-world standards, the plan might not have gone as predicted. To be fair, when we told the students, even they realized the problem. After a sleepless night (that first time), I felt the students acted in good faith, as had the judging team, so I talked with my co-teacher to check my reasoning, and changed the grade based on the grades given by the original three judges, with a grade drop to reflect the problem remaining in the plan. The second time this happened (a couple of years ago), we had the procedure in place and it didn't cost a sleepless night. I just went ahead and let the students know.

     

    One other aspect of this approach, it produces very good business plans. Our school is ranked 93rd in USNews for undergrads. Our entrepreneurship program is ranked 7th. Our ACT/SAT compared to most of the other top 25 schools reflects that 93rd ranking. A significant part of our ability to compete nationally in entrepreneurship comes from what our undergrads can accomplish in national competitions and getting their businesses launched locally. The two round approach, coupled with the real-world grading, is what I think is the foundation of that academic leveling-up process. And no lawyer calls yet. Irate parents? Yes, a few, but when I describe the two-round process, who the judges and mentors were, what we told the student first-round, and what the student had to literally disregard for a whole month to end up with a low second-round grade, most parents want to scream at their kids, not SLU.

     

    BTW, this model hits on AACSB hot button topics like  rubric-based grading, practitioner involvement in the classroom, and the introduction of real-world (a.k.a. competency based)  standards for capstone classes, in case you would need to make the case for this approach in your school. 

     

    Jerry

     

    On Mon, Mar 14, 2016 at 8:33 AM, Julio de Castro <Julio.Castro@ie.edu> wrote:

    I have seen that high of the percentage of the grade be a problem in the past (including lawsuits to the university) , especially when the grade has been assigned by someone other than the prof ( other students, panels, etc.) I would caution to be careful with that.

     

    Best

     

    Julio De Castro

     

     

    De: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] En nombre de Dannie Brown
    Enviado el: jueves, 10 de marzo de 2016 20:41
    Para: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Asunto: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Hi Ted,

      I'm just wondering if the students would have any cause for concern when they realize that 50% of their grade will come from someone other than the professor? And are there any procedural concerns by your faculty with this kind of approach?

     

     

    Dannie Brown, DBA

    Assistant Professor, Organizational Management

    Shannon School of Business

    Office SB125

    902-563-1645

    @dannieDBA

     

    From: Entrepreneurship Division Listserv [mailto:ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU] On Behalf Of Ted Ladd
    Sent: March-09-16 2:18 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: Re: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    Jerry at al,

     

    I typically do business pitches based on business modeling and the Lean Startup Method. (There are, however, limits to Lean, which I highlight in a recent HBR article at https://hbr.org/2016/03/the-limits-of-the-lean-startup-method)

     

    I'm about to teach a course with 200 MBAs on 6 different campuses with a large online component. The final project for that class will be a 15 minute pitch via video, since this presentation format requires skills that business professionals will increasingly need. I'm also incorporating a double-feedback loop. The teams' grade will be comprised of 50% my evaluation based on a rubric and 50% on the evaluation from three anonymous peers (using the same rubric). These student reviewers will also provide qualitative constructive criticism. The team will then provide a single grade to each reviewer to assess the value of the critique, which will factor into the reviewers' course grades.

     

    Based on the experiences of the assembly, will this work, or am I doomed?


    Ted Ladd PhD

    Professor of Internet Economics and Strategy

    Research Fellow at the Center for Disruptive Innovation

     

    ------

     

    Hult International Business School

    San Francisco | Boston | New York | Ashridge | London | Dubai | Shanghai
    Email   

    ted.ladd@faculty.hult.edu

    Mobile  

    307-413-3333

    Web    

    www.hult.edu 

     

     

    Sent: Thursday, March 03, 2016 6:47 PM
    To: ENTREP@AOMLISTS.PACE.EDU
    Subject: [ENTREP] Business Plan Questions - Response Summary

     

    THE ORIGINAL: The traditional business plan was 25 pages of text and 15 pages of appendices (including the financials). While over the years the requirements for business plan competitions changed this to more along the lines of 10 pages of text and 7 of appendices, I am curious what page limit faculty use in practice. 

     

    In my school, most business plans are not going to competitions (or even for angel, much less VC, funding), and so pedagogically, I can see where it makes sense for students (esp. undergraduates) to do a longer plan to better capture and frame their thinking about the details of the proposed business. On the other hand, if bankers, and family lawyers and accountants are expecting shorter plans, that is a countervailing consideration.

     

    Thoughts and experiences are welcome.

     

    RESPONSE SUMMARY: As expected, there was a lot of variation in the answers. Several people responded by saying they no longer do business plans, and they shared what they do instead - pitch decks, business model canvases, customer development projects (Craig Armstrong, shared with the list).

     

    We also had one respondent with a 10-slide pitch deck and 5000 word plan (Erik Monsen, shared with the list), another with a plan of nearly any length (local judges from SCORE had no particular length in mind, but wanted 5 pages of financials and a canvas), a school using a 5-page plan, another school with a short (no page number specified) plan with full financials for bankers and a longer plan (also length unspecified) for equity funders, another school which opts for the "industry standard" a shorter plan (Blair Winsor, shared with the list), 

     

    In addition to those mentioned by name above, let me thank John Tatum, Siri Terjesen, David Deeds, Chris Welter and Bill Gartner for their insights and advice.

     

    FYI: Andrew Corbett and I co-edit Advances in Entrepreneurship, Firm Emergence and Growth and the volume that will be out around the time of AOM. It's title is MODELS OF START-UP THINKING AND ACTION  Theoretical, Empirical, & Pedagogical Approaches and it will have scholarly works on different approaches to early stage analysis and action for startups. It will have a mix of empirical and conceptual papers and deals with issues of feasibility analysis, business models, business plans, and a range of related methods. 

     

    Thanks to the list!

     

    Jerry

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd. 
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here:http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

     

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!



     

    --

    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!



    --
    Jerome A. Katz | Coleman Foundation Professor of Entrepreneurship and Director, Billiken Angels Network  | John Cook School of Business, Saint Louis University, 3674 Lindell Blvd.
    St. Louis MO 63108 USA, 314-977-3864w; 314-302-0641c, katzja@slu.edu, http://eweb.slu.edu

    ************************************** This message is from ENTREP which is sponsored by the Entrepreneurship Division of the Academy of Management. Please do not post messages with attached files. Commercial messages or spammed messages are not allowed on the list. The use of auto-responder "out-of-office" messages may also lead to your removal from the list. You can manage your subscription options, including joining or leaving the list here: http://aomlists.pace.edu/scripts/wa.exe?SUBED1=entrep&A=1 If you have questions or need help, please contact Jeff Pollack (jeff_pollack@ncsu.edu) or Kevin Cox (kcox24@my.fau.edu). Ventures HO!