What you will study
This course provides you with the knowledge and experience of the key issues of innovation and entrepreneurship. The course emphasises the analysis and practical application of the key issues surrounding innovation management and entrepreneurship, including:
- management systems for innovation projects;
- leadership and entrepreneurial behaviour;
- lean start-up techniques;
- deep customer insights approaches;
- entrepreneurial funding and financing;
- strategies for growth and internationalisation; and
- policy interventions for supporting entrepreneurship innovation and economic growth at a regional and national level.
Please note that this is an indicative list of modules and is not intended as a definitive list. Those listed here may also be a mixture of core and optional modules.
Modules
This course is made up of five core modules.
Core modules
Innovation Management and Entrepreneurial Finance
30 credits
Organisations with a strong, consistent and successful focus on managing innovation outperform their competitors in terms of growth and financial performance. Innovation management requires special knowledge and skills, which are different to standard strategic management theories and practices. Innovative companies often need to raise capital from external sources because they do not have sufficient internal resources or cannot access loans. They typically look for venture capital or business angels to provide them with the financing they need to expand, break into new markets, and grow faster. Innovative companies famous for receiving venture capital or business angel funding early in their development include Apple, Microsoft, Google and Amazon. Recently, the explosion of crowdfunding platforms has signalled a new era for the innovation finance industry.
This module introduces you to the main concepts and management tools for innovation activities and analyses all stages of the entrepreneurial funding ladder for innovative companies. It examines the main forms of entrepreneurial finance and the investment process; how private equity and venture capital funds, business angels and crowdfunding platforms work; how firms become investment ready, raise external finance and how to they finally exit. You also learn about wider framework conditions that have a bearing on business innovation, including availability of entrepreneurial finance, public policies and agencies promoting innovation.
The aim of this module is to:
- develop an understanding of the role and relevance of innovation activities in an organisational context;
- enable you to reflect productively on your individual and team capacities to act as innovation managers in identifying and exploiting opportunities, developing entrepreneurial / intrapreneurial management behaviours and skills whilst coping with uncertainty, risks and complexity;
- develop in-depth knowledge of the entrepreneurial finance industry including private equity, venture capital, business angels and crowdfunding, including a good understanding on how such instruments differ from other types of corporate finance;
- understand the decision-making process with respect to screening and selecting of business proposals, negotiating and structuring the deal, following up on investments, and exiting; and
- enhance and develop key skills in pitching to venture capitalists and develop an appreciation on the evaluation of business opportunities from a VC point of view. To further learn how VCs structure deals, monitor and add value to their portfolio companies.
Entrepreneurship and Growth of Innovative Businesses
30 credits
The module introduces the concepts of entrepreneurship and business growth and provides an opportunity to begin exploring their practice, particularly in relation to innovative businesses. Entrepreneurship is defined as a set of behaviours and also as process through which opportunities are discovered, evaluated and exploited. Once a new venture is created however, a major challenge faced by many entrepreneurs is how to grow their new businesses using different growth strategies, in order to ensure the survival and long-term sustainability of the new enterprises. The importance of entrepreneurship and business growth is underlined in national and international policy initiatives in both advanced and developing countries. You will learn about issues related to sustainable development and business ethics, particularly in the areas of entrepreneurship. The module covers entrepreneurship not just in the developed countries but also in developing countries. Therefore, case studies, videos and examples will be drawn from entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial organisations in different parts of the developing world, such as India, China, Nigeria, Kenya and other developing countries. Through this module you will explore and develop your own entrepreneurial capabilities including creative problem solving, idea exploration, business model and development of growth strategies. Entrepreneurship and growth are relevant to all types of organisations and environment - public sector, not-for-profit and for-profit, small and large businesses, so the module is relevant to students from different backgrounds and motivations.
Management, Strategy and International Entrepreneurship
30 credits
The success of an organisation depends on the ability to make fast, widely supported and high quality decisions on a frequent basis. Many of such decisions affect the long-term ability of the organisation to succeed and remain sustainable. Management, Strategy and International Entrepreneurship is a module that involves studying a mixture of processes by which social and economic organisations assimilate and process information as well as interpret and make decisions within their environments. These decisions tend to involve imitating their competitors or differentiating themselves from them. Contemporary strategic decisions tend to involve learning, flexibility and adaptation rather than rigid, mechanistic processes of their planning era. Students will learn about issues related to sustainable development and business ethics, particularly in the areas of management, strategy and international entrepreneurship. The strategic decision making issues will be covered in the module both in the contexts of advanced and developing countries. Therefore, case studies and examples will be drawn from organisations in different international contexts.
Design Thinking for Start Ups
30 credits
This module aims to give you the knowledge and understanding of creative and business behaviours necessary for developing a product/service and establishing an innovative multidisciplinary business enterprise. You will work in teams to set up a business. Business mentors will be available to coach the teams.
The aim of this module is to:
- critically evaluate and apply design thinking practices into new enterprise ventures;
- gain first-hand experience of managing and developing a start-up business through multidisciplinary collaboration including management and leadership theories in the context of the creative economy;
- develop a professional presence through social media; and
- critically reflect and apply the entrepreneurial and social media skills learnt through the venture to future career goals including creative and innovative individual leading capabilities.
Research Proposal and Research Project
60 credits
This module provides you with the opportunity to research a specific area of start-up venture, established organization, policy instrument or program linked to entrepreneurship, innovation and small business development. It involves the identification of a research question which merits investigation using appropriate theory and research methods in order to be able to make sound, evidence-based, managerial recommendations. You will write a research proposal followed by a research project, combining academic rigour with practical implications. This will be a theoretically-grounded and scientific research project leading to findings that will inform policy making decisions.
You will have the opportunity to apply research skills, as well as acquire capabilities for independently managing a large-scale research project. The module also enables you to draw together and implement the knowledge and skills gained in other modules of the course. The module will aid you in developing and practising a set of advanced research skills which will equip you for making sound business plans for start-up venture, or established firms; or policy interventions in the area of entrepreneurship and innovation underpinned by objectively determined evidence.
Optional placement year
The professional placement year is optional. It takes place after the full-time year. It allows students to do a 12-month work placement as part of their course. The work placement is an assessed part of the course and is therefore covered by a Student Route visa.
Core modules
Professional Placement
120 credits
The Professional Placement module is a core module for those students following a Master's programme that incorporates an extended professional placement that follows completion of the first 180 credits of taught modules and project or dissertation. It provides students with the opportunity to apply their knowledge and skills in an appropriate working environment, and to develop and enhance key employability skills and subject specific skills in their chosen subject.
It is the responsibility of individual students to locate and secure a suitable placement opportunity; this will normally involve one placement which must be completed over a minimum period of 10 months and within a maximum of 12 months. The placement must be approved by the module leader prior to commencement to ensure its suitability.
