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Abstract
Entrepreneurship is the most powerful economic force known to humankind! Creating individuals with the
entrepreneurial drive and spirit is the biggest solution to most of the developing countries and more so for a
country like India. Entrepreneurship is a tremendous force that has a big impact on social progress in
fuelling innovation, employment generation and inclusive growth. More importantly, an entrepreneurial
individual whether a student, employee or an employer is the pillar of exponential growth in any economy.
There is an urgent need to excite students in educational institutions to have a paradigm shift to look at
pedagogical innovations is a must as most academic institutions and students believe “Entrepreneurship
cannot be taught”. In a way it is true. Entrepreneurship cannot be taught with the conventional methods like
other subjects. It‟s more of doing than learning in class room. Also the challenge of any faculty is to
provide the real insights on “Entrepreneurship” through the right pedagogical tools. An attempt is made
here to understand the pedagogical tools used to teach Entrepreneurship in Indian campuses.
Key words: Entrepreneurship education, Pedagogical innovation, Continuing education, Best practices in
pedagogy.
Pedagogical Innovations in Entrepreneurship Page 1
1.0 Introduction
India is in a dire need to foster Entrepreneurship drive more effectively. It is recognized that
Entrepreneurial Education can greatly contribute to create an entrepreneurial culture at Universities and
educational institutions. Entrepreneurship education provides benefit to society beyond their applications in
new business ventures. In broad sense Entrepreneurship is considered as a general attitude that can be
Introducing Entrepreneurship courses in higher education builds core competence among students, even
though not all students who are exposed to Entrepreneurship programmes would decide to start their own
venture immediately or at a later date. By taking part in Entrepreneurship programmes and innovative
activities, students may become more willing to take responsibility and use the theory creatively to develop
their own ideas make them more self confident.1 An entrepreneurial mindset is critical for the success of
today‟s competitive world even if they are working as an employee or starting their own ventures.
Entrepreneurs are not born rather they are made because of their experiences and learning‟s. If entrepreneur
are the pillars of next generation economy for a country what India need is a paradigm shift our education
system. The best Business Schools in India including IIMs always stayed away from the responsibility of
building entrepreneurs and by not accepting Entrepreneurship as a core subject in their curriculum.2
Very few organizations like National Entrepreneurship Network in India, Junior Achievement and TiE
(Indus Entrepreneurs, to some extent) are seriously engaged in promoting entrepreneurship education at
campuses.
This paper aims to consolidate the pedagogical innovations and its impact in driving students to opt for
courses on “Entrepreneurship and New Venture Creation” offered by Educational institutions in India. The
primary data on the practices of pedagogical innovations are collected from entrepreneurship faculties
across Business Schools, Engineering colleges, and Undergraduate Colleges. Other than courses the
continuing education efforts like incubating student‟s ideas to develop entrepreneurs is also collected and
analyzed. Efforts are also made to understand such initiations at top rated Business Schools known for
The paper explores the challenges, opportunities and practical recommendations and to develop a model
integrating the best practices on pedagogical innovations to create/inspire more entrepreneurs from
campuses in India.
According to the Final Report of the Expert group of “Education for Entrepreneurship” by European
Commission,3 there was a general recognition of the importance of including within its definition two
different elements.
skills, which involves developing certain personal qualities and is not directly focuses at creation
2. New Venture Creation: A more specific concept of training on how to create a business.
Therefore, according to the agreed definition the objectives of teaching Entrepreneurship are,
ii. Offering early knowledge and theories and some understanding of the role of entrepreneurs in
building economy,
iii. Raising students awareness of self employment as a career option, with message that you can
iv. Organizing activities based on learning by doing – eg. by means of students running mini-
According to this study, Entrepreneurship should be considered as an innovative and cross curricular
approach.
There are many challenges faced by most of the Universities in becoming entrepreneurial. Students are
taught by fairly didactic methods which pass on “Know-What as opposed to “know – How” and “Know –
Who.” Most of the institutions adopt largely inappropriate western practices as opposed to developing
curricula to fit their educational context. The majority of entrepreneurship modules and offerings are based
on theoretical perspective than practical. There is a number of key pedagogical and contextual challenges
Because of the nature of tacit knowledge in the subject “Entrepreneurship”, it is most often acquired
through learning by experience. Educators address the gap between formal explicit knowledge and tacit
There are a number of key debates surrounding how to teach enterprise and entrepreneurship and
encourage the growth of new businesses by supporting start-ups, including spin-out companies based on
There is evidence from Loughborough University that such an approach is effective in terms of
participation, activity generation and personal development. Such activity can also be underpinned more
conceptually by drawing on the work of Lave and Wenger, in terms of the concept of Community of
Practice (CoP), to support participative activity. The CoP approach argues for a community-based analysis
of learning, which seeks to support a unified view of learning and innovation. This argues that learning is
best achieved through supporting access to and membership of the target community of practice, as
opposed to the use of more didactic approaches which separate learners from the target community (Note
from editors: This is something which is highlighted above as an issue for creating Entrepreneurial
Inevitably, a few individuals in universities, as with other organizations, find such approaches a little
threatening. But our attempts to foster entrepreneurial universities must challenge such traditional
approaches, if we are to provide students with the richness of opportunity they deserve.”4
A useful resource for those interested in reading further about the Entrepreneurial University is Creating
Entrepreneurial Universities by Burton Clark (1998, Permagon Press). Whilst this does explicitly deal with
the “how to‟s”, it provides a good critique and summary of the critical issues associated with establishing
Course contents vary widely including the use of case materials, simulations and various “hand-on”
approaches. (Gorman, Hanlon & King, 1997; Vesper, McMullan, 1988). The use of business plans in
which provides both cognitive tools and flexibility in accommodating unanticipated factors by future
entrepreneurs rather than mere use of conventional method of Business Plans. (Benson Honig, 2004)5.
In the context of economic meltdown, can the entrepreneurial opportunities particularly at grassroots,
really blossom? Anil Gupta, IIMA 20066 says yes, provided we recognise the emerging ability of market
entrepreneurial spirit for social and economic enterprises requires several innovations in the content, mode
of engagement with real life actors, and in the analysis of market opportunities. This paper analyses the
Ashmore emphasized that entrepreneurship education is more than writing a business plan; it includes
financial literacy, economics, communications skills, a great many behaviors that become a process of
discovery, and the trying out of business ideas. “In cross-walking to curriculum standards, we should be
talking educational language so that entrepreneurship education becomes possible in a classroom and more
As this study captures the innovative pedagogy adopted by faculty to teach Entrepreneurship in Indian
campuses we have used a descriptive study. The Sample consists of 25 faculties who are engaged in
teaching Entrepreneurship with a description of sample size as given below. The samples were taken from
major cities in India and mainly from Business Schools, Engineering Colleges and Undergraduate
Institutes.
Sample size
1. Bangalore 10
3. Kolkota 5
4. Chennai 3
5. Delhi 2
Total 25
ii. Course content – What is been taught under the subject “Entrepreneurship”
iii. Course delivery – The pedagogical tools used to teach various modules on Entrepreneurship”
The data collected from 25 faculties belonging to various educational institutions were analysed using
Part 1
Based on the affiliations of the Institute, the courses offered on Entrepreneurship differ. Autonomous
colleges are more advantageous in terms of flexibility and course designs compared to University and
No Compulsory and
University 0 5 0 0 5
Affiliated college 1 4 0 1 6
Autonomous 2 2 2 3 9
Universities and affiliated colleges to the University offer Entrepreneurship as Compulsory course, as most
of the Universities recognize Entrepreneurship as one of the essential subject to be taught. Even though
autonomous colleges have the freedom, some of them are yet to offer courses on Entrepreneurship. More
forward looking autonomous institutes offer this as both compulsory and elective courses. Some institutes
Affiliation University 0 2 3 0 5
Deemed University 0 3 2 0 5
Affiliated college 1 1 4 0 6
Autonomous 2 2 1 4 9
Total 3 8 10 4 25
Many autonomous institutes offer more than one course on Entrepreneurship and offer many new electives.
This is a positive sign to create a better academic ecosystem and produce entrepreneurs from campuses.
Business Design
Table 03: Affiliation of the Institute and freedom to design the course
Designed by Total
Independent
Affiliation University 0 4 0 1 5
Deemed University 0 1 3 1 5
Affiliated college 1 3 0 2 6
Autonomous 2 0 3 4 9
Total 3 8 6 8 25
Autonomous colleges offer more number of courses in Entrepreneurship than affiliated colleges. This is
done to cater to larger audience of students by offering different types of courses. Most of the faculty in
University affiliated institutes have expressed that an independent body for designing the course would add
Part II
The faculty affiliated to the university do not have the freedom in the curriculum design or evaluation
pattern. But, most of them have resorted to interesting mix of pedagogical tools like workshops, exercises,
games, psychometric tools, interaction with entrepreneurs etc along with lecture methods.
Autonomous institutes however have all the freedom to design the contents and pedagogical tools to
Idea generation
Opportunity evaluation
Business Plan
Apart for these some of the institutes also include in their syllabi the following contents:
Women entrepreneurship
Problems of SSI‟s
Growth strategies
Exit strategies
Valuation of a venture
Franchising
HR Strategies etc.
NITIE, Mumbai: NITIE Center for Student Enterprises (NCSE), Mumbai, is an Entrepreneurship
Development Center launched in the year 2007 with full funding of by DST, NSTEDB, Government of
India. NCSE has initiated a unique pedagogy called „Student Enterprises‟ for achieving learning
With "Mandi", NITIE made a statement about its pedagogy - the experiential method of teaching.
Mount Carmel Bangalore: adopts both formal (theory in class room) and informal approaches (through
E-Cell) to teach entrepreneurship. About 700 undergraduate students undergo Entrepreneurship as either
core/ elective or credit course. Every student participate in the Rs 50 game to understand the building of
business models, and they also write business plans as part of the curriculum. The success of E- Cell
activities initiated the starting of a student venture on campus Myriad Co Ltd., with the intention of giving
students hands on experience of conceptualizing, ideating, creating and running an organization in the true
style of an entrepreneur. The company manufactures and sells Chalks on campus and publishes an Ad
IFIM Business School, Bangalore: The profit from Rs.100 game , is effectively engaged in organizing the
Mentor‟s and student‟s meet at a City Hotel where all the entrepreneur/mentor share their wisdom and
lessons on entrepreneurship in panel discussions followed by a gala network dinner. Besides this each
students group prepare Business Plan of their choice and an entrepreneur from the same or related domain
is allocated to the group as a mentor. After a month of mentorship, students pitch their idea to a Venture
Mentoring by entrepreneurs, simulations, experiential learning tools like Rs. 50/ Rs.100 games, stories
from entrepreneurs and workshops are some of the most preferred tools to impart entrepreneurial education
to students. These exercises and games allow the students to brainstorm and come up with many new
their success/critical factors etc. Hands-on experience is more important to learn entrepreneurship than
mere classroom lectures and assignments. Continuous interactions with entrepreneurs have a positive
Developing a business plan is a critical component in the evaluation of the course. The Business plans and
their quality could be improved by assigning entrepreneurs as mentors to students. However following
table shows very few faculties assign such mentors to students either due to lack of such mentors or lack of
Part III
Even though, impact is many fold and quite difficult to quantify, the researchers have looked into the
following aspects:
2. Entrepreneurship courses help the students even in better placements and make them more
confident in life.
3. An entrepreneurial faculty is an asset to any institute. He/she delivers the subjects with more
passion and involvement, since the faculty who teaches this subject has a greater role to play as they
Impact on students
We do understand that not all students exposed to entrepreneurship education will become entrepreneurs
and establish business, but will surely lead to their personality appraisal, creativity boosting and the
and improves the intentions to start a venture. However they are of the opinion that it has very less impact
on placements. Students‟ mindset towards working in start-ups has also not much changed.
Impact on Faculty:
The process of implementing the course curriculum using meaningful pedagogical approach is a major
challenge for educators. This requires change in attitude and teaching/learning styles relevant with the
changing world of education and work. Teaching Entrepreneurship using innovative pedagogical tools has
One-Sample Test
Test Value = 0
Lower Upper
Teaching
me more Entrepreneurial
As per the calculations above, it is proven that Entrepreneurship courses make the faculty more
Entrepreneurial.
Using Likert scale, the impact of teaching Entrepreneurship course on faculty was asked. The findings are
as below:
Teaching Entrepreneurship is
25 1 5 1.80 1.118
challenging
As the table suggests, there is a positive impact on Networking and making them more entrepreneurial in
terms of creating course contents, improving teaching skills, interaction with industry and other faculty
members. However, teaching entrepreneurship poses many challenges to the faculty in terms of mobilising
Areas of improvement:
Funding:
Exploring and implementing new pedagogical tools requires financial support. Identifying funding courses
and obtaining funds seems to be one of the monumental tasks faced by our faculty. Very few institutes
Some of the Universities / Colleges which has funding for running Entrepreneurship related courses are as
follows:
EILM University has created a corpus fund of Rs.20 Lakh per year,
Alumni funding
All other institutes have used either student fund or institutes‟ fund to conduct entrepreneurship related
programmes. The time is ripe that Government and Companies to come forward to fund Entrepreneurship
activities at Colleges.
Most of the faculty whom we have interviewed for the purpose of this research were trained by National
Entrepreneurship Network, a non profit organization which trains faculty in teaching high impact
entrepreneurship courses in campuses. One of their flagship programme called EEC (Entrepreneurship
Educators Programme) is very popular and more than 1000 faculty are trained under this programme. ISB
Hyderabad also provides such training programme for faculty called as EEDC (Entrepreneurship Educators
NEN and
6 24.0 24.0 92.0
ISB
As teaching Entrepreneurship is not like any other subjects, faculty who teach this subject must have
either enough industry and teaching experience, or enough research experience on developing case studies,
course materials or writing Business Plans. Networking with entrepreneurial community is essential to
Most of the faculty also opines that having unstinted support from Management is essential for the
success of Entrepreneurship related activities and courses in campuses. Some of them suggest that
entrepreneurship as a subject needs to be taught from school level to sow the seed early through a student,
rather than introducing the subject in later years. Collaborative teaching and knowing about other
campuses activities can create a better learning environment. This resource sharing is required so that
entrepreneurship educators can learn from one another and work together to raise the bar for all. This will
surely enhance the drive to attract, nurture and sustain an entrepreneurial culture.
Venture Creation:
This model takes into consideration an academic ecosystem to conduct Entrepreneurship related courses
and activities in campuses. Most of the colleges have besides courses on Entrepreneurship an E-Cell
(Entrepreneurship Cell) which conducts a series of activities like workshops, entrepreneur‟s talks,
driving force to join Entrepreneurship related courses especially if they are offered as electives.
7.0 Conclusion
Academic ecosystem promoting Entrepreneurship is still very primitive in India. We need to create
environment with networking opportunities with entrepreneurs and investors like as in Silicon Valley,
where academic institutions and start-ups work very closely. Some of the suggestions from the faculty who
2. Networking with faculties from other campuses to understand and share experience and knowledge,
The researchers find that there are three categories of Entrepreneurship programmes run in our Educational
Universities.
1. Non-Entrepreneurial: Here Entrepreneurship is taught like any other subjects, using more of
lecture methods and with very little scope for experiential learning. Faculty neither introduces new
and emerging contents in the field of entrepreneurship nor experiments any new pedagogical
less scope of integrating with other subjects. However, due to the training received or their
entrepreneurial nature, they use a mix of interesting pedagogical tools in making the course more
experiential.
taught not as a subject but as a mindset and integrates the entire activities of the Institutes around
being more entrepreneurial. Students have given hand-on experience not only during the course but
during their stay at the institutes. Faculty at these institutes are more passionate about propagating
entrepreneurship.
True entrepreneurship education provides opportunities for youth to master the core entrepreneurial
competencies of opportunity recognition, idea generation, venture creation and critical thinking.8
Entrepreneurship is the new Buzzword in our campuses recently. However most important hurdle to teach
and learn entrepreneurship is the prevailing mindset among students and faculty. There is definite need of
excited about the Entrepreneurship as whole which would contagiously/ infectiously pass on to students as
1
Abstract from final proceedings, OSLO 2006, Entrepreneurship Education in Europe – Fostering
2
The ASPEN Institute YESG: Advancing entrepreneurship education
3
Final report of the expert group “Education for Entrepreneruship” by European Commission, 2005 Pp
11-12
4
The newsletter of EFMD‟s Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Small Business Network, 2004, Issue 2
5
Benson Honig, Wilfrid Laurier University and The University of Haifa, 2004, “Entrepreneurship
9. Margaret Emalereta Akpomi, Rivers State University of Science and Technology, (2008)
10. www.nenonline.org