The MBA Program in Entrepreneurship at The University of Texas at Austin was recognized as the Model MBA Program in Entrepreneurship for 2000 by the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE). USASBE is the professional association of university educators who teach entrepreneurship. The purpose of the Model Program Award is to publicize excellent programs in entrepreneurship so that business schools can learn from each other. Consistent with this goal, we are providing a detailed description of our MBA Program in Entrepreneurship so that those who are interested may utilize whatever elements of our program they find beneficial.
The McCombs School’s MBA Program in Entrepreneurship was judged on overall quality of the program, innovativeness and uniqueness, comprehensiveness and longevity, and sustainability. The judging criteria also included the transferability of the program’s concepts and ideas to other colleges and universities.
In presenting the program to the panel of judges, Dr. Gary M. Cadenhead, Senior Lecturer in Entrepreneurship and Director of the Moot Corp® Program, cited the McCombs School’s commitment to entrepreneurship, the innovative core curriculum, the spectrum of outstanding electives, the Moot Corp® Competition, the quality of the entrepreneurship faculty and their commitment to teaching excellence, and the strong support of the Austin entrepreneurship and business community as major strengths of the program.
Commitment to Entrepreneurship
A prerequisite for having a world-class entrepreneurship program is the strong support and commitment of the dean and business school faculty. Without these, excellence cannot be achieved. In 1994, Dean Bob May proposed and the faculty voted unanimously that all MBAs graduating from the
McCombs School of Business would have core competency in information technology, entrepreneurship, and a global perspective. This ratification of the commitment to entrepreneurship followed a long history of supporting the development of entrepreneurship courses. The first entrepreneurship course was offered in 1979. The Moot Corp® Competition began in 1984 and Entrepreneurship became an MBA concentration in 1997.
Program Objectives
Texas’ MBA in Entrepreneurship is designed to meet the following objectives:
§ To empower MBAs with the skills:
o To think analytically,
o To ask the right questions,
o To solve the problems of entrepreneurial firms and
§ To enable MBAs to start a new venture.
MBAs completing the Texas Entrepreneurship Program are likely to fall into three categories:
1. MBAs with keen analytical skills and an entrepreneurial perspective who take traditional MBA jobs with large corporations and consulting firms. This group benefits large corporations by bringing in an entrepreneurial perspective and energy. They tend to think “outside the box” and have a “can do” attitude.
2. MBAs with strong analytical skills and entrepreneurial interests who go to work for entrepreneurial ventures. This group joins new ventures and is able to make contributions from day one. These MBAs are in demand among start-ups and growing new ventures in the Austin entrepreneurial community.
3. MBAs who become entrepreneurs. A small and increasing number launch ventures upon graduation. Eleven firms have been launched during the nineties and are still in operation. The first IPO should occur this year. Most of our entrepreneurship MBAs has a goal to have their own business within five years after graduation.
Core Curriculum
The five Core courses include an overview course, The Entrepreneurial Process, and four courses organized by life phases of new ventures: Opportunity Identification and Analysis; Gathering Resources and Launch; Managing Entrepreneurial Growth and Finance, Negotiations and Harvest. The Entrepreneurial Process course presents an overview of the four phases. Organizing by phases means MBAs learn to solve problems in each stage in the same sequence they will face when they launch their ventures. It also means the courses are taught holistically from the perspective of the entrepreneur, not functionally from the perspective of the academician.
Each of the five courses is taught by the case method and use primarily Harvard Business School cases. The case method places the MBAs in the position of the entrepreneur and forces them to do analyses so they can make rational decisions. In the process, the MBAs learn to think analytically, ask appropriate questions, solve problems and communicate persuasively with their colleagues. A brief description of each of the five Core courses follows:
Entrepreneurial Process. The flagship course of the Core curriculum, The Entrepreneurial Process, allows MBAs to explore the entire life cycle of an entrepreneurial business in a single semester. Process presents a rigorous overview of each of the four distinct life cycle phases, with a special emphasis on ethics, morality, the philosophy of entrepreneurship and life planning. It may be taken as an introductory course for the four other Core classes or as a capstone course at the end of the Core.
Opportunity Identification and Analysis. In Opportunity, MBAs learn how to identify and categorize compelling business opportunities. Focus areas include understanding customer behavior; building robust business models; and defending against competitors.
Gathering Resources and Launch. This course teaches how to turn a compelling idea into a real business. MBAs learn to identify the key tasks that must be executed flawlessly to satisfy customers and overcome competitors; gather the necessary people, assets and money; craft deals that increase the probability of success; and experience the first few months of a start-up.
Managing Entrepreneurial Growth. Growth maps out what it takes to grow a fledgling business to its full potential. MBAs learn how to choose appropriate growth models; manage the changing strategic, financial and personnel needs of a rapidly growing business; and create systems to manage growth.
Harvest, Finance and Negotiation. This course charts the stages of renewal and harvest in a mature business. MBAs learn how to decide when it is time to sell; how to value a business; how to select the appropriate harvest method; and how to negotiate the sale. The negotiation and valuation skills that are part of Harvest are relevant to all phases of business.
The curriculum is relevant and current in today’s ever changing business environment. Courses are developed with the input of business partners and evaluated and revised annually based on student and faculty evaluations.
Spectrum of Entrepreneurship Electives
An extensive variety of entrepreneurship electives are available. These offer unique experiences both in terms of subjects and exposure to faculty members. Here are some examples:
High Technology Entrepreneurship by Tim Ruefli. Professor Ruefli has spent his academic career studying strategy. Currently, he is focusing on high technology new ventures.
The Sociology of Entrepreneurship by John Butler. Professor Butler has a Ph.D. in Sociology and has spent his career studying entrepreneurship. While entrepreneurship is a relatively recent focus for business schools, it has been a field of study for sociologists for more than hundred years.
Elements of Entrepreneurship by Lee Walker. Professor Walker was President of Dell Computer Corporation during the early years and mentored Michael Dell. He is actively involved in entrepreneurial activities.
Entrepreneurial Marketing by Peter Zandan. Professor Zandan was the founder and CEO of Intelliquest, an innovative, marketing research firm which has been highly successful. Professor Zandan has recently launched a new venture.
Entrepreneurship / Moot Corp and Advanced Venture Development by Gary Cadenhead. Professor Cadenhead teaches this two-course sequence which prepares MBAs to write business plans, solicit funds from venture capitalists and launch their businesses.
Managing and Marketing in the Global Arena by John Doggett. Professor Doggett is an entrepreneur with considerable international experience. He has an especially challenging teaching style and is considered an awesome teacher by the MBAs.
Moot Corp® Competition
This flagship program has continued to grow in prestige and international acclaim since it began in 1984. The Moot Corp® Competition has been called “the Super Bowl of world business-plan competitions”(Business Week – 1993), “the mother of all business-plan competitions”(Success – 1997) and “the granddaddy of them all” (Red Herring – 2000).
With aspiring entrepreneurs soliciting start-up funds from experienced investors, the Moot Corp® Competition simulates the real-world process of raising venture capital. MBAs from business schools around the globe come to The University of Texas at Austin each year to present their business plans to panels of investors. From among myriad offerings, they select the best new-venture opportunity. With a 17-year history, the Moot Corp® Competition is the oldest operating, inter-business school new-venture competition in the world.
In the early years, the Competition was truly moot: no MBAs launched the venture that was the subject of their business plans. The process was strictly an academic exercise. However, many of the participating MBAs went on to work for or started their own entrepreneurial ventures; but they did not “ride the horse” they had written about in their business plans.
During the nineties, the process ceased to be moot: MBAs started converting their classroom creations into real-life enterprises. The Moot Corp® Competition has become a launch pad for MBAs and their new ventures. Each year, Texas MBAs are launching ventures out of this process.
In partnership with prestigious universities around the world, “continental” Moot Corp® Competitions have been launched in Asia, Australia, Africa and Canada. Europe and Latin America will come on line in 2001. The winners are invited to Austin each year to compete in the Moot Corp® Competition.
In the final round of the Moot Corp® Competitions, both the finalists' presentations and their question-and-answer sessions with the judges are videotaped. The winning team’s video and business plan, along with appropriate instructional materials, are packaged into a “new venture module” which becomes a teaching case for the following year’s competitors. This year, these will become available on the Internet. In effect, this top-notch business plan becomes the benchmark for the following year; expertise accrues and the achievement level is constantly rising. This unique spiral factor has worldwide impact, as all participating schools have access to the modules and strong motivation to incorporate their lessons into subsequent entrepreneurship courses.
Entrepreneurship Faculty: Committed to Excellence
The quality of the faculty dedicated to Entrepreneurship at UT is unparalleled. Fifteen faculty members teach core and elective entrepreneurship courses; two of these are chaired professors and 13 are lecturers. All 13 lecturers have run their own businesses. The five faculty members, Professors Cadenhead, Doggett, Sandefer, Schwartz, and Walker, who launched the concentration are still teaching in the program. The Foundation for Entrepreneurial Excellence provides teaching support to each professor with one-on-one consulting in technique, teaching seminars throughout the year by master teachers, peer group review and dynamic feedback from students.
Instructors and courses in the Entrepreneurship Core outrank their peers in the business school by a strong margin on student evaluations. In a contractual arrangement created expressly for the program, each Entrepreneurship teacher agrees to maintain a ranking in the top 25% of all UT business faculty in order to continue teaching a Core course. The ratings from spring 1999 show that the faculty has exceeded that goal.
Support of Austin
The University of Texas at Austin and the Austin business community have shown their commitment to furthering the Entrepreneurship program by dedicating significant resources to the program. The school supports high-tech start-ups through the Austin Technology Incubator which fosters connections among technology, capital and conventional know-how. The program is further enhanced by the close working relationship with IC2, a technology commercialization center, and the Texas Capital Network.
The Foundation for Entrepreneurial Excellence was formed to fund and manage the program with an entrepreneurial approach to education. The Foundation sponsors teaching seminars to train successful entrepreneurs to be master teachers and supports the curriculum design. The Center for Entrepreneurship, Growth and Renewal was established in 1998 to develop new knowledge in entrepreneurial processes. Plus, student interest and involvement are evidenced by the 280 members of the Entrepreneurship Society, the largest MBA organization on campus.
Measures of Quality
Several measures can be used to evaluate an entrepreneurship program. These include external rankings, success in business plan competitions, MBA demand, and businesses launched.
The McCombs School of Business has one of the most highly ranked Entrepreneurship programs in the world. UT’s MBA program is ranked among the top ten worldwide in Entrepreneurship according to the Financial Times on January 24, 2000. During the four years Success ranked MBA entrepreneurship programs, Texas’ ranked in the top ten every year and number one in 1997.
Texas’ record in business plan competitions was unsurpassed in the nineties. Texas teams won the Moot Corp® Competition three times and the competition hosted by San Diego State University four times.
Texas MBAs are enrolling in Entrepreneurship Core courses in record numbers. During the 1999/2000 academic year, nearly 500 MBAs have taken Entrepreneurship Core courses. The MBAs have also ranked these courses and their instructors in the top 25% of business school courses.
Each year, some MBAs are launching new ventures rather than taking jobs. The number while still low is increasing every year. Four ventures are in launch mode for this year and our first IPO is also planned for 2000. Companies launched by MBAs from the McCombs School of Business
and the Moot Corp Competition are featured under About Moot Corp on this site.
Unique Aspects of the Program
In summary, we consider the unique aspects of the McCombs School’s MBA Program in Entrepreneurship to be the following:
§ Core courses are organized by growth phases of the entrepreneurial venture and are all taught using the case method.
§ An extensive variety of entrepreneurship electives are offered.
§ The Moot Corp® Competition provides MBAs the opportunity to write business plans and present them to investors. Each year, MBAs are launching ventures out of this process.
§ The Entrepreneurship faculty is committed to teaching excellence and has special seminars with master teachers as well as regular faculty meetings and retreats to address teaching effectiveness.
§ Ninety percent of our Executive MBAs take one or more Entrepreneurship courses and are increasingly starting new ventures.
§ The University’s Austin Technology Incubator provides an initial home for new ventures and a teaching hospital for MBAs and business faculty.
§ Our MBAs are creating special programs with venture capitalists including a $1 million fund for investing in start-ups.
§ Austin has a thriving entrepreneurship community that is strongly supportive of our program.
