What Makes Students Employable for Start-Ups ?

Juha Saukkonen

Senior LecturerInternational Business

JAMK Univ of Applied SciencesJyväskylä, Finland

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To start with: This is how we motivate our students:

Degree Programme in International Business (IB)

Degree Programme in International Business provides you with the knowledge and core business management skills you need to succeed in the global marketplace.

Bold statement? How to reach it?

The Global View – where dowe stand

Two results from Business Education Jam2014

(cont)

And to start again: What is a Start-Up

Steve Blank

• A start-up is a temporaryorganisationdesigned to searchfor a scalable and repeatable business model

Eric Ries

• A start-up is anyorganisation trying to create a new productor service in theconditions of extreme uncertainty

Why are Start-Ups so important ? To Society, Students, HEIs…

Case: Finland (2014)

The potential is there…Source: Eurostat

Interim Summary• NEW NET JOBS are born in start-up cohort of companies and SMEs – that

can grow and internationalise fast

• The educators (ourselves!) do not believe in the relevancy of the degrees wedeliver – why should others?

• The educators do not see the graduates as able to cope with demands of thejobs today – what about tomorrow?

• The skills relevant for start-ups are not born in the jobs of establishedcompanies either – where then?

The Problem to Solve: Create Learning Outcomes valid for Start-Up Environment – HOW?

Steve Blank´s Start-Up manifestoWhat items do you find that link to Employment ?

What kind of skills are needed, then? Extracts from StartUp Genome Report (2011)

(cont)

(cont)

But do fresh graduates and studentsalways have a lower hand?

A quote from a serial – and succesful – entrepreneur :

• ”I can not hire to my growth businesses people with 20 yrsexperience in the mainstream industries. They have the bigcorporation mindsets and habits – I can not re-educate them to learn a new approach to everything”

• ”The only advantage might be their networks – but even thoseare in other companies similar to them…”

It is all very understandable since..

If youhavebeen

good in here…The same

tricks donot workin here…

Time to DiscussWhat are the elements we are missing to accomplish the task?

• In Research: What should we know more of ?

• The systems and processes: Are our processes Start-Up Friendly?

• Resources: In Quality (What and How we do things?) and Quantity (who does the ”things”, what are theroles, do we have monetary resources needed ?

• Contents: Do we know what we should deliver to students and companies?

If this is just a Practical Problem – letus create Practical Solutions

Some attempts to answer the callCo-Learning set-ups between Start-Ups and HEI (and itsstudents!)

• Supercoach ® Entrepreneurial Learning (SET) LaunchPad:

- an intensive Entrepreneurial Coaching Program

for First-Time Tech Entrepreneurs

• ETENE (”PROCEED”) –project:

- a HEI course development piloting a project-based

learning set-up between start-ups and international students

Juha Saukkonen, Jussi Nukari/JAMK University of Applied Sciences, Finland

Sharon Ballard/Enable Ventures Inc., AZ, USA

Jonathan Levie/University of Strathclyde, Scotland, UK

Start-Up Businesses And University In A Co-Learning Mode:

Impacts on possessed competencies in an intensive collaborative start-up coaching program

Process stakeholders:

• Start-up teams (8 in total) with a freshly started company or a business idea – typically consisting of members withscience/tech background

• Students (as assistant coaches): 3rd to 4 th year students of business (undergrads) from JAMK Univ. Of Applied Sciences –specialisation programme of High Tech Management

• Coaches: 3 coaches (2 Univ. Lecturers from Finland, 1 Private Business Development Educator from US (partly remotely) – allcertified coaches in the SET® coaching method

• Final Panelists: 5 professional (private, institutional and frompublic funding organisations)

Research questions:

• How does an intensive 8-week collaborative learning program for entreprenurship affect to :

- learner´s skill levels in different start-up business capability areas

(self-assessed)

• How does to these assessments change over time i.e. one year postthe intensive program when either continued work at start-up oradditional studies have impacted the views

The case studied – Supercoach® LaunchPad – programJan-March 2014

• Intensive 4-day seminar introducing the process, key approaches. Teaming up and first team-based exercises – Mid-January 2014

• Weekly coaching sessions from Mid-January to Mid-March 2014: One coach nominated for each team + students as assistant coaches. A 1-2 hour session per week – based on the SET® workbook with exercises

• Final panel = 15-min presentations to professional investors/business developers in the beg. of April 2014

Research method and implementation

• Primary data was collected via on-line survey tools (Digium in 2014 and Webropol in 2015), which the informants were able to answer anonymously

• The survey was done at 3 different time points:- t0 = Pre-programme survey at the start of the first intensive seminar session so

before exposure to teaching contents and coaching session in Mid-January 2014 (appr. 40 informants)- t1= Post-programme survey right after session 8 (right after the 15-min

presentation to the investor panel - and the feedback by the panel) in early April 2014 (appr. 40 informants)- t2 = one-year-post programme in March-April 2015 (appr. 20 informants, but all

original start-up cases represented boh in team member and students groups)

Results: Self-assessed skills levels of participantsacross capability areas (1): Start-Up Team Members

Note: Start-Up Team vs. Students is based on

their role at the start of program at t0 (Pre-program)

Results: Self-assessed skill levels of participants across capability areas (2): Students

Note: Start-Up Team vs. Students is based on their role at the start of

The program at t0 (Pre-program)

CONCLUSIONS (AND INTERPRETATIONS):

• A significant improvement to skill levels in such diverse groups as business students and first-time entrepreneurs with science/techbackground can be achieved in an intensive collaborative learningsetting

• Students claim to maintain the skill levels achieves, whereas start-upteam members are much more critical to their skill levels 1-year-post coaching programme

• There are significant differences in both assessed criticalities of competence (which skills matter?) as well as assessed skill-levels (howwell I master the skills?) depending on whether there has been 1 yearof start-up work or other activity between measurements = No educational programme can replace real-life experience!!

ETENE – PROJECT 2015-2016

Turning international student mobility into business assetJuha Saukkonen, Mari Holopainen – JAMK University of Applied SciencesTanja Leppäaho – University of JyväskyläFINLAND

ETENE (in Finnish) = PROCEED (in English)

= Enhancers and Tactics for Entrepreneurs in Environment of internationalization

WHY ??? Rationale for the project to exist

- STUDENT perspective

• Programs such as Erasmus+ move 1 mill.+ students across borders (in EU) on a yearly basis, in addition overseas mobility

• Students get cross-cultural experience and create new networks – but mostlywith other students !

• Students would have additional benefit of interacting with companies aiming at global markets, and could take their specific skills in use

WHY ??? - COMPANY perspective

• SME´s are the engine of growth for most economies

• In order to grow, SMEs need to reach for new markets

• SME´s have limitations in the amount of resources and skills (languages, cross-cultural etc.) for internationalisation

WHY ??? - UNIVERSITY perspective

• Universities have an internal and external urge to be ”good citizens” –have a positive impact on their operating environment

• Universities need to ensure the relevancy and applicability of theirteaching and research to real-life demands

• Faculty members in Universities can keep their knowledge up-to-date vs. demands of the real-life business environment only via dialogue and interaction with industries

How (in ETENE-project)?Start in Spring of 2015

1) Start with the ”expert panels”, where SMEs and Universities identify and ideate the needs and solutions for knowledge needs = create project specs

2) First individual projects performed by multicultural student groups for 10 SMEs – mostly students of Intrenational Business (20+ nationalities)

3) Project types: Competitor benchmarks, Distributor candidates searches, digital marketing analysis and action…

How (in ETENE-project)?(Fall 2015 to Fall 2016)

1) Continuation of the project started in 2015, with more and new studentgroups, adding more cross-disciplinarity, more faculty members

2) Designing a joint (2 Unis together) course: Multicultural and Cross-Disciplinary Company project

3) Matchmaking/networking events between SMEs, students and faculties

4) Spring 2016: First implementation of the joint course – where the core is the project assignments in teams for the SMEs involved

Participants

1) The 2 Universities from Jyväskylä, Finland- University of Jyväskylä- JAMK University of Applied Sciences2) The students from the 2 Unis- Potentially 200+ students/y, 40+ nationalities, across faculties3) SMEs (10 at this stage) seeking for new markets, knowledge and

skills- Mostly manufacturing firms with advanced technology, also some

consultancy/expert services firms- Companies of 5-70 personnel, located in the province of Central

Finland

Enablers1) External funding by:

2) Internal Funding by the Universities (personnel costs)

3) Funding by SMEs: 3000 -5000 € gate fee for participation

Criteria for success

In the end the project has made sense if:

- The Companies have gained new skills, knowledge and business leads

- Students have got meaningful learning experiences that improve their employability and professional confidence

- Universities have expanded their knowledge of industry demands, learned new ways of collaboration between the 2 Unis and faculties in them

Research coming up:

From Start-up Student to Start-UpEmployee or Entrepreneur Study on Career Narratives of JAMK Students in SET®

and Hi Tech Management

Author: Juha Saukkonen

Presented (if accepted): ECIE Conference Sept 2016,

Jyväskylä, Finland…

Strategic Issues to Solve –Action Plan:---?