Course Syllabus

JOHN CABOT UNIVERSITY

COURSE CODE: "BUS 305"
COURSE NAME: "Early Stage Entrepreneurship"
SEMESTER & YEAR: Spring 2025

SYLLABUS

INSTRUCTOR: Silvia Pulino
EMAIL: [email protected]
HOURS: TTH 10:00 AM 11:15 AM
TOTAL NO. OF CONTACT HOURS: 45
CREDITS: 3
PREREQUISITES: Prerequisite: Sophomore Standing
OFFICE HOURS: By appointment

COURSE DESCRIPTION:
This course examines the entrepreneurial process, from recognizing opportunity to planning, organizing and growing a new venture. We will highlight innovation and its methods and applications on business opportunity analysis. Topics covered also include significance, status, problems, and requirements of entrepreneurial businesses. Students will have the opportunity to identify a business opportunity and develop the idea to the point of being start-up ready. This course will serve as a foundation for students who might want to own a business, and it is meant to be accessible also for non-business majors.

SUMMARY OF COURSE CONTENT:

This course emphasizes a hands-on approach, involving students in their learning through a variety of methods. Lectures are used only when necessary, for less than a third of the class encounters. In addition, some of the classes are dedicated to guest speakers, and several classes will require the use of computers to develop a full set of budgeted financial statements.

Highlight of the course: a strong emphasis is placed on learning through doing. Throughout the course students will work in groups on their own business ideas, starting with the creative process and going through each step of idea validation and business plan preparation; this will include the design of a survey and administration thereof to 50-200 potential customers, research potential suppliers, design a prototype and conduct market and industry research in order to determine a strategy. The completed project will be presented by each team to an audience representing investors, using the elevator pitch format.

Topics Covered:

Thinking entrepreneurially: mindset, motivation and behavior. Creativity, Opportunity, and Feasibility. Research and Validation. Value Proposition. Business Model. Marketing Strategy. Testing Key Assumptions. Funding the Venture. Pitching the Idea. Building and Growing the Company.

Course content will include materials related to identifying and analyzing market opportunities, evaluating resources required to exploit market opportunities, and launching a new venture. This process will be assessed mainly from the perspective of an individual entrepreneur.

LEARNING OUTCOMES:

At macro level, after successful completion of the course the student will be able to identify new business opportunities and take the first steps towards implementing a business idea.

Specifically, students will apply their learning through a variety of activities designed to test their ability to:

· Generate innovative business ideas

· Systematically evaluate business ideas and feasibility studies

· Understand key elements of a successful strategy

· Conduct an industry analysis

· Conduct a PEST analysis

· Perform a competitive analysis

· Recognize the importance of business plans and learn what the key building blocks are

· Define a working business model

· Strategically position a new venture

· Formulate and deliver a persuasive elevator pitch

· Understand the pillars of a good marketing strategy

· Forecast sales

· Preparing budgeted financial statements for the first three years of the venture

· Identify the key legal aspects of starting a new business

· Understand key aspects of human resource management in new ventures

TEXTBOOK:

Book Title	Author	Publisher	ISBN number	Library Call Number	Comments	Format	Local Bookstore	Online Purchase
Disciplined Entrepreneurship	Bill Aulet	Wiley	978-1-118-69228-8	https://jculibrary.on.worldcat.org/oclc/855504056
Value Proposition Design: How to Create Products and Services Customers Want	Osterwalder Pigneur et al	McGraw Hill International	978-1-118-96805-5	https://jculibrary.on.worldcat.org/oclc/896908439

REQUIRED RESERVED READING:

Book Title	Author	Publisher	ISBN number	Library Call Number	Comments
HBS Coursepack	Miscellaneous	Harvard Business School Publishing	NA	NA

RECOMMENDED RESERVED READING:

NONE

GRADING POLICY
-ASSESSMENT METHODS:

Assignment	Guidelines	Weight
Engagement	The engagement grade will reflect preparation as well as quality and frequency of participation. Class preparation will require students to read all the assigned material and explore the guiding questions provided in Moodle. Class participation will help students understand the material better and build confidence in public speaking.	15%
Elevator Pitch Competition	All students will participate in the university-wide Elevator Pitch Competition. The pitch will be assessed on innovation, thoroughness, presentation, and persuasiveness.	5%
Building Blocks	The Building Blocks are stepping stones towards the final project. Through the building blocks students apply the material learned to their own project. This work will underpin the final deliverables. For each assignment, students will work as a group to research, analyze and present their findings in the form of slides. The assignments in this category include: 1. Problem / Solution 2. Customer 3. Market 4. Financial projections	30%
Investor Pitch	Students will present their business idea to a hypothetical group of potential investors. Performance will be judged on content, visual support, delivery, fielding of questions, and the questions asked of the other teams. Excellent work will exhibit all or most of the following characteristics: - Impeccably presented work - Viable business idea supported by a consistent business model - Evidence of thorough research and engagement with the field (talking to customers/suppliers/industry experts and development of prototype or minimum viable product) - Demonstrated ability to test assumptions, accept feedback, and adapt or amend the project accordingly - Strong team work	30%
Process Pitch	Students will submit a reflection on the course and the learning process, in video format. They will be evaluated on the extent to which they have been able to learn a process for finding successful business models. To this end, students will walk through the iterations of their business model canvases throughout the course, telling the story of: - Assumptions they made along the way - How they tested those assumptions - What they changed in their business model as a result - What assumptions they want to test next - How well they understand their customers’ emotions - How much they have learned about their business model through experimentation - How well they understand the business model validation process This part of the assessment emphasizes skill development, valuing testing activities taking place “outside the building” as well as student engagement. How teams leverage the results of experiments is more important than whether the experiment succeeded.	20%

-ASSESSMENT CRITERIA:
AWork of this quality directly addresses the question or problem raised and provides a coherent argument displaying an extensive knowledge of relevant information or content. This type of work demonstrates the ability to critically evaluate concepts and theory and has an element of novelty and originality. There is clear evidence of a significant amount of reading beyond that required for
BThis is highly competent level of performance and directly addresses the question or problem raised.There is a demonstration of some ability to critically evaluatetheory and concepts and relate them to practice. Discussions reflect the student’s own arguments and are not simply a repetition of standard lecture andreference material. The work does not suffer from any major errors or omissions and provides evidence of reading beyond the required assignments.
CThis is an acceptable level of performance and provides answers that are clear but limited, reflecting the information offered in the lectures and reference readings.
DThis level of performances demonstrates that the student lacks a coherent grasp of the material.Important information is omitted and irrelevant points included.In effect, the student has barely done enough to persuade the instructor that s/he should not fail.
FThis work fails to show any knowledge or understanding of the issues raised in the question. Most of the material in the answer is irrelevant.

-ATTENDANCE REQUIREMENTS:

Attendance is not graded, but an attendance bonus of up to 3 points will be given to students with 2 unexcused absences or less.

ACADEMIC HONESTY
As stated in the university catalog, any student who commits an act of academic dishonesty will receive a failing grade on the work in which the dishonesty occurred. In addition, acts of academic dishonesty, irrespective of the weight of the assignment, may result in the student receiving a failing grade in the course. Instances of academic dishonesty will be reported to the Dean of Academic Affairs. A student who is reported twice for academic dishonesty is subject to summary dismissal from the University. In such a case, the Academic Council will then make a recommendation to the President, who will make the final decision.

STUDENTS WITH LEARNING OR OTHER DISABILITIES
John Cabot University does not discriminate on the basis of disability or handicap. Students with approved accommodations must inform their professors at the beginning of the term. Please see the website for the complete policy.

SCHEDULE

COURSE SCHEDULE AND ASSIGNMENTS

NOTE: This table is merely indicative. The definitive schedule is the one on MOODLE.

Class
1	SPRINT I: PROBLEM EXPLORATION Problem Discovery
2	The Five Practices of Entrepreneurial Education
3	Recognizing and Shaping Opportunities
4	Guest Speaker
5	Problem Exploration
6	SPRINT II - SOLUTION EXPLORATION Brainstorming Ideas- Project Management
7	Guest Speaker
8	Business Model Canvas. Validation
9	The Lean Startup and the Minimum Viable Product
10	Jobs to be Done. Value Proposition.
11	SPRINT IV: CUSTOMER DISCOVERY End-user Profile and Decision-Making Unit
12	Customer Journey
13	MAKE UP-CLASS Guest Speaker
14	Problem-Solution-Customer Fit
15	SPRINT IV: MARKET DISCOVERY Getting to Product-Market Fit
16	Elevator Pitch Workshop
17	Guest speaker
18	Market Segmentation, Beachhead Market, TAM/SAM/SOM
19	Market Research
20	Competitive Landscape
21	Guest speaker
22	Guest speaker
23	Entrepreneurial Marketing and Selling
24	SPRINT V: DESIGNING THE BUSINESS MODEL Financial Modeling
25	Revenue Model
26	Projecting Financials
27	Preparing the Investor Pitch
28	Preparing the Process Pitch
	FINAL EXAM