"An entrepreneur is someone who can produce two dollars of revenue for every dollar that any fool could generate," Dr. Bruce M. Firestone |
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The entrepreneur is full of boundless confidence as evidenced by this Bizarro cartoon:
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September 12, 2002
| Course Number: 42.491 | Credits: .5 |
| Course Type: Workshop | Instructors: Dr. Bruce M. Firestone and Professor John R. Callahan |
| Term: Winter 2002 | Day and Time: Wednesdays 2:30 to 5:30 pm. (Looking for Class Schedules?) |
| Place: Classroom 415SA | Office Hours: The lecturer shall be available for 45 minutes after the conclusion of each lecture for consultation with the students |
| main course web site: www.dramatispersonae.org |
Contact Co-ordinates: email- bmfirestone@hickling.ca John_Callahan@carleton.ca |
| Check out the: Course Brochure |
related web sites: www.carleton.ca/~callahan/courses/360 www.carleton.ca/~callahan/courses/491 |
Synopsis:
"Being a successful entrepreneur or intrapreneur (i.e., an entrepreneur inside a larger corporate structure) will allow you greater control over your own destiny - both professional and financial. Do you want to learn how?
Join Professor John R. Callahan and Dr. Bruce M. Firestone in Courses 42.360 and 42.491 to:
1) study entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial companies, 2) learn to write a business plan, 3) learn bootstrap financing, 4) learn guerilla marketing, and 5) master the steps to entrepreneurial success. Take either course individually (42.360 in the fall, 42.491 in the winter) or, even better, both as an integrated package.
Students from Business, Commerce, Finance, Engineering, Architecture and other fields can learn the difference between having a j.o.b. and creating significant value in a business -- value that can provide you the freedom and security to realize your lifetime goals.
You will hear top business executives describe what they did to achieve success. You will also be expected to contribute to knowledge in the under-researched and under-explored field of entreprepreneurialist culture and success."
Lecture Plan 2002 (subject to change):
Week 1: Introduction to Course (Dr. Bruce M. Firestone) JANUARY 9, 2002
Week 2: How to Research and Write a Case Study, Formation of student teams, Selection of Companies to be studied (Dr. John R. Callahan and Dr. Bruce M. Firestone) JANUARY 16, 2002
Week 3: First Guest Speaker. Case Studies by the lecturer (Dr. Bruce M. Firestone)- Students choose essay topic. JANUARY 23, 2002
Week 4: Case Studies (Continued- Dr. Bruce M. Firestone)- Student 'Bull Durham' Bio submissions and presentations. Also student questions are due. JANUARY 30, 2002
Week 5: Second Guest Speaker Student-led Lecture (answering student queries about Entrepreneurialist Culture) FEBRUARY 5, 2002
Week 6: a) Negotiating, b) Bootstrap Marketing and Financing, c) Guerrilla Marketing, d) Reverse Mareting , e) Creativity, f) Ordered Thinking, g) Truth/Smart Truth, h) The Art of Pricing, i) Stupid Marketing Surveys (Dr. Bruce M. Firestone) FEBRUARY 12, 2002
Week 7 a) Uncovering Core Competencies , b) Getting the Business Model Right for Startups, Defining the Business Model, No Money Down Startups , Bootstrap Sources of Capital, Networking, Gizmos and Gadgets Selling Your Business (Dr. Bruce M. Firestone)- essays are due. FEBRUARY 27, 2002
Week 8: Third Guest Speaker. In-class work session: preliminary work plans and research due; discussion with lecturers, 'mid-course corrections' (Dr. John R. Callahan and Dr. Bruce M. Firestone) MARCH 6, 2002
Week 9: 25 Steps to Entrepreneurial Success (Dr. Bruce M. Firestone) MARCH 13, 2002
Week 10: Future Vision (Dr. Bruce M. Friestone)- key point notes are due. MARCH 20, 2002
Week 11: Case Study and Business Plan Presentations (Dr. John R. Callahan and Dr. Bruce M. Firestone) MARCH 27, 2002
Week 12: Case Study and Business Plan Presentations (Dr. John R. Callahan and Dr. Bruce M. Firestone) Please note that your final case study and business plan submissions are not due on the day of your presentation but are due on the last day of classes. This will give you some time to edit and improve your material before final submission. Electronic filing of your material is acceptable with a hard copy delivered as well to the lecturers (John Callahan in the School of Business and Bruce Firestone in the School of Architecture.) APRIL 3, 2002
"An entrepreneur is someone who can produce two dollars of revenue for every dollar that any fool could generate," Dr. Bruce M. Firestone |
|
The entrepreneur is full of boundless confidence as evidenced by this Bizarro cartoon:
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Students may make a field trip on the web, in cyberspace and the metaverse to further uncover the principles of the course. The students may also make one field trip in normal space or RL (real life) during scheduled course times to businesses in the Metro Ottawa area to learn first hand the application of the entrepreneurialist principles of the course.
Assignments
The course is essay based and project based; no exams are required.
Students will be expected to be able to master rudimentary web development skills and post their assignments to their personal web sites. Personal web sites are an important tool for career development. Each student is encouraged to prepare their own site; to keep it updated throughout their careers, to keep their cv's current, to post their writings there and to generally use it to further their own personal goals and also to push the frontiers of knowledge and, ultimately, to leave behind, perhaps, something worthwhile for future generations. Students may choose to give their sites a name that conveys meaning to them and reflects their views and outlook. It is strongly suggested that you do not use your personal name for this purpose.
Students are encouraged to learn commercial programs like Net Objects Fusion, Corel Web Designer, Macromedia Dreameaver, Microsoft Front Page or any other suitable program for creating web pages. You are not expected to do more than create "10 cent" web pages, at least to begin with.
Course material and essay assignments are based on original material from the lecturer. Students will choose from a list of essay topics provided by the lecturer. Students may self-select their essay topics with the prior approval of the lecturer.
Case Studies or Business Plans
Your project assignment will include a case study of a project or business drawn from the local area or they may include a case study of a firm from outside the Ottawa area with the agreement of the lecturer. Teams of two to three students will co-operatively research their case study. Each case study of a company will include comments by the student entrepreneurs on how to improve, change, re-engineer or introduce innovation into these businesses with a view to improving their annual results. Case studies will be submitted in writing and presented at the end of the course.
Check out: Student "Elevator" Pitches for Business Plans and Case Studies (the Work Plan)
You must demonstrate your ability to solve problems. Your oral presentation must show your ability to think laterally and creatively, see the non-obvious and present your ideas in a convincing manner. Think-on-your-feet presentation of material will be an important output for students.
Case Studies will include: Sci Fi Channel, NHL.com, National Hockey League Television Marketing, webcasting and ottawasenators.com, iFinanSys.com, Arrow Head Springs, Molstar, Amazon.com, Terrace Corporate Centres, Grocery Express, amphitheatre design, Corel Centre, Busnell Communications, Rentalex Tool and Equipment, Ottawa Business Journal, duplex and triplex housing, Friendship Windmill, Dunrobin Lake, Robertson Mews, Disney Paris, Kanata North, Water Safari Park and others.
The Transitus Case Study
The Ottawa Senators and Palladium Case Study
Student Case Studies
Check out: the Case Study Annex- Learn how to research and write a case study by answering three main questions: 1. What's the problem? 2. What are the alternatives? 3. What are your recommendations?
Doing a case study is more like short story writing- you want to take the reader 'there'. You need to paint a picture of the cast of characters; it is a style of writing that is more casual, more of a conversation style and, maybe, tougher to write than a more polished, formal style which is required for most business and research applications.
Also, while it is preferrable to conduct your interviews in person, if you need to do some interviews over long distance, you may conduct them by telephone or by using one of the instant messenger services. Interviews conducted using, for example, AOL Instant Messenger have been very successful- there is interaction but at the same time people are forced to write their answers and, voila, you get surprising depth. You can also save the interviews and provide transcripts where appropriate. These can be interesting reading on their own. Telephone and email interviews are the least prefered method of conducting case study interviews.
You should develop a 'paragraph plan for your case study.
Alternatively, you may work on a business plan of your own in teams of two to four students for submission to the Wesley Nicol Business Plan Competition. Prizes for the best business plans amount to $10,000.
You will also be asked to complete and present a 90 to 120 second 'Bull Durham' bio of yourself defining who you are, where you want to go, what you want to achieve and what your motivations are. This exercise will help you determine whether you are suited to an entrepreneurial career. Try to summarize at the end of your Bull Durham Bio what it is you want from your life and career. Perhaps it is more quality time with your family or more time at the beach that you really want. If so, that might be a perfectly valid lifestyle choice but it might also be quite incompatible with life as an entrepreneur making, as Steve Jobs once put it, "insanely great products", which also usually involves insane working hours too.
You will also be asked to submit a one or two page summary of key points for guest speakers in the course.
Additionally, you will be responsible for submitting three questions of your own in a student-led lecture concerning entrepreneurialist culture. You will submit your questions by email and they will form the basis of one lecture devoted to answering students' queries by the lecturers.
| Need an on-line Mortgage Calculator? Go to the canoe web site! (Canadian mortgage tables.) | Need an on-line IRR Calculator? For a trial and error, ten year calculator, go to the unb web site! | Need a personal web site? Every student should have a personal web site; one where you can upload all your IP (Intellectual Property) over your career so that one day you can make money from it while lying on a beach. Check out low cost dot ca availablity at domainsatcost. |
Grading
Grades will be based, in part, on course participation; students must demonstrate an intellectual curiosity about entrepreneurialist culture. The workshops are designed to be interactive. Performance when presenting assignments will be important as well. Much of the success of entrepreneurs derives from the ability to clearly convey ideas in both written form and orally as well about the merits of a project, service, product or business plan to a Board of directors, loans officers, venture capitalists, clients, customers, suppliers, community activists, local governments, approval authorities, regulatory agencies and the media. Course participation- 10%, Key point guest speaker notes- 5%, Attendance- 5%, Student questions- 10%, Bull Durham Bio- 10%, Essay- 25%, Case Study- 35%.
Each grade will be based upon a comparison with the students in the class and the instructor's expectations relative to the stated objectives of the course based on experience.
The university environment is a hot bed for student-led business start-ups.
Check out the latest portal for Carleton University start-ups.
Want to know more about entrepreneurial activity on campus, check out ACE at Carleton University.
Attendance
Attendance is required for all classes. The Lecturer will be available for office consultations for one hour after each class.
(Students, please note that a recently adopted policy requires any questionnaires that you develop for your case studies or any other purpose related to this course or any other at the University have to be cleared through the Ethics Committee of the Schoo of Businessl. Please forward your request to Shibu Pal and Professor Cray. They make up the committee.)
About Bruce M. Firestone
Short Form Resumé of Dr. Bruce Murray Firestone, B. Eng. (Civil), M.Eng.-Sci., PhD.
Guest Lecturers
An important part of the course is the introduction to students of guest lecturers who bring day-to-day experience in industry or in government to the classroom.
Students will be expected to take notes when guest lecturers speak and to prepare a one page summary of key points for submission and grading. This will form part of the course participation and course notes review and grading.
In 491, we have reserved the lecture on March 14th, 2001 for guest speakers- a) Richard Monk, 6 to 7 pm, on Why Businesses Fail, and b) Gil Turcotte, 7:15 to 8:30 pm, on Phoenixing Seprotech and the Role of Patents. This will form part of the Second Annual Entrepreneurship Week "Going Global" at Carleton University sponsored by ACE. For more information about ACE at Carleton University, the on-campus association for entrpreneurs, please visit www.business.carleton.ca/ace. You can also find out more from Darcy McRae, campus co-ordinator for the Canada-wide ACE program.
Also this year, during Course 360, we will witness the Inaugural 'Magic From a Hat Lecture' Series which will see some of Ottawa's leading entrepreneurs at the School of Business to tell us more about their experiences and successes.
Readings
Art of War- The Oldest Military Treatise in the World, Translated from the Chinese by Lionel Giles, Sun Tzu Wu, The Military Service Publishing Company, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, 1944.
Blown to Bits, Philip Evans and Thomas S. Wurster, Harvard Business School Press, Boston, 2000.
Case Research: The Case Writing Process, Third Edition, Michiel R. Leenders and James A. Erskine, Research and Publications Division, School of Business Administration, The University of Western Ontario, 1989.
Crossing The Chasm: Marketing and Selling High-Tech Products to Mainstream Customers, Geoffrey A. Moore, Harper, 1999.
Inside the Tornado: Marketing Strategies from Silicon Valley's Cutting Edge, HarperCollins, 1999.
Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson, Bantam Books, New York, 1992.
The Ingenuity Gap: How can we solve the problems of the future?, Thomas Homer-Dixon, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 2000.
The Origin and Evolution of New Businesses, Amar V. Bhide, Oxford University Press, 1999.
Unleashing the Killer App: Digital Strategies for Market Dominance, Larry Downes, Chunka Mui, Nicholas Negroponte, Harvard Business School, 1998.
What They Don't Teach You at the Harvard Business School, Mark H. McCormack, Bantam Books, New York, 1984.
What They Don't Still Teach You at the Harvard Business School, Mark H. McCormack, Bantam Books, New York, 1989.
Why Things Bite Back- Technology and the Revenge of Unintended Consequences, Edward Tenner, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1996.
Suggested Readings
A Better Place to Live- Reshaping the American Suburb, Philip Langdon, University of Massachusetts Press, Amherst, 1994.
A Geography of Time- the temporal misadventures of a social psychologist, Robert Levine, Basic Books, HarperCollins, New York, 1997.
Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand, Penguin Group, New York, 1957.
Boom, Bust & Echo 2000, Profiting from the Demographic Shift in the New Millennium, David K. Foot with Daniel Stoffman, Macfarlane, Walter & Ross, Toronto, 1996 & 1998.
Cities and the Wealth of Nations- Principles of Economic Life, Jane Jacobs, Random House, New York, 1985.
Creating a New Civilization, Alvin and Heidi Toffler, Turner Publishing, Atlanta, 1994.
Energy in a Finite World- A Global Systems Analysis, Report by the Energy Systems Program Group of the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, Wolf Häfele, Program Leader, Ballinger, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1981.
Fixing Broken Windows- Restoring Order and Reducing Crime in Our Communities, George L. Kelling and Catherine M. Coles, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1996.
Getting to Yes- Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In, Roger Fisher and William Ury, Penguin Books, New York, 1991.
Home from Nowhere- Remaking Our Everyday World for the 21st Century, James Howard Kunstler, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1996.
Lost Rights- the Destruction of American Liberty, James Bovard, St. Martin's Press, New York, 1994.
Managing for the Future, Peter F. Drucker, Penguin Group, New York, 1992.
Ottawa Senators Hockey Club- Official Application, National Hockey League Plan of Sixth Expansion, Terrace Investments Limited, Ottawa, 1990.
Shifting Gears, Nuala Beck, HarperCollins, Toronto, 1992.
Small is Stupid- Blowing the Whistle on the Greens, Wifred Beckerman, Redwood Books Limited, Trowbridge, 1995.
The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs, Vintage Books, Random House, New York, 1961.
The Diamond Age- or, A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer, Neal Stephenson, Bantam Books, New York, 1995.
The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand, Signet Books, New York, 1943.
The Geography of Nowhere- the Rise and Decline of America's Man-Made Landscape, James Howard, Kunstler, Touchstone, New York, 1993.
The Master and Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov, Harvill Press, London, 1967.
Index
Bankruptcy
Bootstrap Finance
Bootstrap Marketing
Case Studies- how to research and write a case study
Case studies will include: Sci Fi Channel, NHL.com, National Hockey League Television Marketing, webcasting and ottawasenators.com, iFinanSys.com, Arrow Head Springs, Molstar, Amazon.com, Terrace Corporate Centres, Grocery Express, amphitheatre design, Corel Centre, Busnell Communications, Rentalex Tool and Equipment, Ottawa Business Journal, duplex and triplex housing, Friendship Windmill, Dunrobin Lake, Robertson Mews, Disney Paris, Kanata North, Water Safari Park and others
City-states
Competition- niche markets and trends
Corel Centre
Creativity, lateral thinking and value creation
Creativity and creation of value
e-business
e-commerce
Education, Value of
Entertainment Economics
Ethics
Financing and capital markets- bootstrap financing/bootstrap business startup/bootstrap marketing
Future vision
Government subsidies
Intellectual property
Internal rates of return projects
IRR- value of education as an example
IRR Calcs- How to really Measure Rates of Return
Internet is Eating a Hole in the World Economy- deflation because of the net; collpase of currencies and r.e. prices are related to early adopters of tech in USA
Legal Issues
Lenders, financial ratios, access to funds
Lost Rights
Marketing, market share, bootstrap marketing
Metaverse
Negotiating, selling
Option agreements
Politics and entrepreneurialist culture
Pricing, the art of
Revenge effects
25 Steps to Entrepreneurial Success
Tooth to tail ratios
Web Strategies
Some Helpful Site Links
Test Your Entrepreneurialist Culture Quotient
getting the business model right for startups
art of pricingreverse marketing
No Money Down Startups
Stupid Marketing Surveys
Making Money on the Internet
media relations
data backup
Entrepreneurialist Culture Front Page
