BUSI2035 Entrepreneurship and Innovative Thinking (Sections 3, 5 & 8)

Course Outline – 2nd Semester 2021/22

Course Instructor: Mr Francis Chan (Email: [email protected])

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Course Objective
The course develops students’ potential for innovation and thinking and acting entrepreneurially to
enhance their ability to create novel value in business ventures either as independent entrepreneurs
or as entrepreneurial executives in established companies by generating new products, new
processes, new ventures, new business models, new technologies and business reinvention. The
course also equips students with the knowledge and skills to recognize and exploit new
opportunities arising from an increasingly changing environment. Students will also gain the ability
and resources to evaluate and act on these opportunities by making and implementing specific and
detailed action plans.

Learning Outcomes
Upon completion of this course, students should be able to:
1. define what entrepreneurship is and understand how everyone has the potential to be
entrepreneurial and to explore the components of the entrepreneurial process
2. think critically and creatively about the nature of business opportunities, resources and
environment
3. describe the process by which new ventures are created and launched
4. identify the key resources required to exploit an innovative idea or opportunity to develop a
business

Suggested readings:
Entrepreneurship and innovation is a topic which has been widely written on. You should therefore
be able to find a range of readings in the library or online to enhance your understanding of the
relevant topics. For students who would like to get good basic ideas on how they can implement
their business ideas with limited resources, the following textbook may provide some insights:

 Read, Stuart, Saras Sarasvathy, Nick Dew and Robert Wiltbank (2017) Effectual
Entrepreneurship (2nd Ed), Routledge.

For students who would like some stimulations on how they can look at current business
practices/products/services with new perspectives to generate new ideas, they may find the
following readings illuminating:
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 Jaworski, Bernard, Ajay K Kohli and Arvind Sahay (2000), “Market-Driven Versus Driving
Markets”, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science
 Kim, W. Chan and Renée Mauborgne (2004), “Blue Ocean Strategy”, Harvard Business
Review, (October)
 Levitt, Theodore (1960), “Marketing Myopia”, Harvard Business Review, (July-August)
 Smith, N. Craig, Minette E. Drumwright and Mary C. Gentile (2010), “The New Marketing
Myopia”, Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, (Spring)

(On the topic of “Marketing Myopia”, Amy Gallo also has an interesting discussion, which can
be found at: https://hbr.org/2016/08/a-refresher-on-marketing-myopia)

Apart from textbooks and academic journal papers, students are also encouraged to keep abreast
social and business developments through reading a wide range of news and business reports. In
this regard, students may find the following reports enlightening:

 Arthur, W Brian (2017), “Where is technology taking the economy?”, McKinsey Quarterly
 Atluri, Venkat, Jeremy Eaton, Mithun Kamat, Satya Rao and Saloni Sahni (2018), “Tech-enabled
disruption of products and services: The new battleground for industrial companies”, McKinsey &
Company Business Reports
 Atluri, Venkat, MiklÓs Dietz and Nicolaus Henke (2017), “Competing in a world of sectors without
borders”, McKinsey & Company Business Reports
 Atluri, Venkat, Satya Rao and Andrew J Wong (2018), “Why tech-enabled go-to-market innovatin is
critical for industrial companies – and what to do about it”, McKinsey & Company Business Reports
 Benson-Armer, Richard, Steve Noble and Alexander Thiel (2015), “The consumer sector in 2030:
Trends and questions to consider”, McKinsey & Company Business Reports
 Blue Ocean Shift Team (2014), “From Murder Capital to Model City: The Case of Medellin”, from:
https://www.blueoceanstrategy.com/blog/from-murder-capital-to-model-city-the-case-of-medellin/
 de Jong, Marc and Menno van Dijk (2015), “Disrupting beliefs: A new approach to business-model
innovation”, McKinsey Quarterly
 de Jong, Marc, Nathan Marston and Erik Roth (2015), “The eight essentials of innovation”, McKinsey
Quarterly
 Dobbs, Richard, James Manyika and Jonathan Woetzel (2015), “The four global forces breaking all
trends”, McKinsey & Company Business Reports
 Goering, Kevin, Richard Kelly and Nick Mellors (2018), “The next horizon for industrial
manufacturing: Adopting disruptive digital technologies in making and delivering”, McKinsey &
Company Business Reports

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 Greenberg, Ezra, Martin Hirt and Sven Smit (2017), “The global forces inspiring a new narrative of
progress”, McKinsey & Company Business Reports
 Lamarre, Eric and Brett May (2019), “Ten trends shaping the Internet of Things business landscape”,
McKinsey & Company Business Reports

While COVID-19 is without doubt the most significant factor affecting the whole world in 2020 and
2021, students may wish to refer to the following reports on impact of COVID-19:

 Alicke, Knut, Xavier Azcue, and Edward Barriball (2020), “Supply-chain recovery in coronavirus times
— plan for now and the future”, McKinsey Quarterly
 Anant, Venky, Jeffrey Caso, and Andreas Schwarz (2020), “COVID-19 crisis shifts cybersecurity
priorities and budgets”, McKinsey Quarterly
 Barriball, Edward, Katy George, Ignacio Marcos, and Philipp Radtke (2020), “Jump-starting resilient
and reimagined operations”, McKinsey Quarterly
 Brimmer, Amanda, Vincent Chin, Patrick Hayden, Troy Thomas, Alexander Türpitz, and Yvonne Zhou
(2020), “Beyond the Curve: How to restart in the wake of COVID-19”, Boston Consulting Group
Reports
 D’Auria, Gemma and Aaron De Smet (2020), “Leadership in a crisis: Responding to the coronavirus
outbreak and future challenges”, McKinsey Quarterly
 Dewar, Carolyn, Scott Keller, Kevin Sneader, and Kurt Strovink (2020), “The CEO moment:
Leadership for a new era”, McKinsey Quarterly
 Fulcheri, Pabli, Matt Higginson, Frédéric Jacques, and Flavio Litterio (2020), “Reimagining customer
service to manage delinquencies after COVID-19”, McKinsey Quarterly
 Gjaja, Marin, Lars Faeste, Gerry Hansell, and Doug Hohner (2020), “COVID-19: Win the Fight, Win
the Future”, Boston Consulting Group Reports
 Levy, Cindy, Jean-Christophe Mieszala, Mihir Mysore, and Hamid Samandari (2020), “Coronavirus: 15
emerging themes for boards and executive teams”, McKinsey Quarterly
 Reeves, Martin, Philipp Carlsson-Szlezak, Kevin Whitaker, and Mark Abraham (2020), “Sensing and
Reshaping the Post-COVID Era”, BCG Henderson Institute

Learning Schedule and Course Assessments

The University has announced that we will go back to face-to-face teaching in Semester 1 AY2021-
2022. Nevertheless, there may still be changes to the teaching arrangements pending on future
development of the pandemic. For students, especially international students facing problems to
come back to Hong Kong due to travel ban, who are not able to attend face-to-face classes due to
extenuating circumstances, please contact the course instructor for special arrangements.
Schedule
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Week 1 Lecture Session on “Why do I need to be entrepreneurial? And I am not
(10-15 Jan) innovative!”
Week 2 Lecture Session on “How to make innovative idea business viable?”
(17-22 Jan)
Week 3 Lecture Session on “Resources requirements and business planning”
(24-29 Jan)
Week 4 Lecture Session on “Pitching and communicating your business plan”
(7-12 Feb)
Week 5 Discussion Session on “students share their innovative ideas”
(14-19 Feb)
Week 6 Practice Session on “Pitching of innovative ideas (1)”
(21-26 Feb)
Week 7 Practice Session on “Pitching of innovative ideas (2)”
(28 Feb - 5 Mar)
Week 8 Activity Session on “Review of business ideas and Project Team
(7-12 Mar) Formation”
Week 9 Consultation Week: “Consultation sessions on business plan/proposal
(14-19 Mar) development”
Week 10 Presentation Session “Presentations of new business plan/proposal, with
(21-26 Mar) Q&A (1)”
Week 11 Presentation Session “Presentations of new business plan/proposal, with
(28 Mar – 2 Apr) Q&A (2)”
Week 12 Test (Details to be announced)
(4-9 Apr)
Week 13 Discussion Session on “Revision and Consolidation of Learning”
(11-13 & 21-23 Apr)

Attending Mandatory Entrepreneurship Seminar Series

Seminar 1: Tuesday (15 February 2022) 5:30 pm – 6:30 pm, WLB103

(Speaker: Ms Agnes Wun, Co-founder and CEO of NEUFAST)

Seminar 2: Tuesday (1 March 2022) 5:30 pm – 6:30 pm, WLB103

(Speaker: Mr Alex Lau, Lead Instructor of TECKY ACADEMY)

(Students are encouraged to summarize what they have learned in individual seminar by
submitting a short reflective essay, no more than two A4 pages, within three days after attending
each seminar. ONE bonus mark will be awarded for reflective summary submitted after each
seminar.
Assessment components
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 a. Class Activities and Assignments 45%
(Class participation: 5%)
(Written assignment on personal reflection and innovative idea: 7%)
(Pitching of innovative idea: 6%)
(New Business Plan/Proposal – Oral Presentation: 12%)
(New Business Plan/Proposal – Written plan/proposal: 15%)
b. Test (at Week 12) 15%
c. Examination 40%

1. Written Assignment on personal reflection and innovative idea (to be submitted via
Moodle)

Students are required to submit a written assignment in Week 4.

There are two parts for this written assignment. In Part A, with no more than 500 words,
students should discussion their personal views on what entrepreneurship and innovation
mean to them, and why entrepreneurial spirit and innovative thinking are important (or
irrelevant, if this is what they think) to our society in general, and business in particular.

In Part B (again with a word limit of 500), students should present and discuss an innovative
idea, which can be an idea based on which they are going to develop a new business, an idea
which can be adopted by a business (or the government, or a non-government organization) to
improve their operations or to solve their problems.

After submission of this written assignment, there will be a discussion session in Week 5, in
which some innovative ideas will be selected for review and discussion in class.

2. One-minute pitching of innovative idea (Weeks 6 & 7)

Each student is required to do a one-minute pitching on their own innovative idea in class in
Weeks 6 and 7. Instructor, as well as other students, will provide feedback on both the idea
itself, and the pitching/presentation skills. Pitching sequence will be announced in Week 5.

Students are encouraged to participate by giving their comments to other students’ innovative
ideas to help them improve.

In Week 8, there will be a review session on the innovative ideas presented in Weeks 6 & 7.
And students will make decisions on which innovative idea they would like to work on the
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 development of new business plan/proposal. Students are expected to form teams of four
students to work on the innovative idea they have chosen. Students may drop their own idea
and join another student to form a team to work on his/her idea. If there are more than three
students wanting to join, the student who develops the idea will make the decision on whom
s/he will accept to form the team. After team formation in Week 8, students will have two
weeks to work on the development of business plan/proposal. And Week 9 is reserved as
consultation week, in which students can consult the instructor on development of their
business plans/proposals.

Students who are not able to attend fac-to-face class on campus may opt to join a team, with
teammates in Hong Kong or outside Hong Kong, or to do an individual business
plan/proposal.

3. Oral Presentation of the New Business Plan/Proposal (Weeks 10 & 11)

Teams will have oral presentation of their new business plan/proposal in Weeks 10 or 11. Each
team (of FOUR students) will have FIFTEEN minutes for presentation, followed by a
Q&A/Comment session of TEN minutes. ALL team members must participate in the oral
presentation.

4. Written New Business Plan/Proposal presentations

Teams will submit a Written New Business Plan/Proposal within THREE days after their
Q&A/Comment session. Teams are expected to make necessary changes to their written
plan/proposal according to comments made in the Q&A/Comment session. The page limit on
the Written New Business Plan/Proposal is TEN A4 pages.

5. Test
A test will be arranged in Week 12, with detail to be announced in due course.

6. Examination
Examination, which is a case analysis, will be arranged at the end of the semester. Students
should nevertheless pay attention to announcements to be made by the University in due
course, in case there may be unexpected changes and development of the COVID-19
pandemic.

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