This course is about how to create an entrepreneurial business. Since the Haas School is principally about professionally managed businesses, the course will focus on businesses that are not small by design, but rather on those that, with vision, hard work and luck can be developed into substantial enterprises. This course will focus on entrepreneurs, on business plans and on businesses that are appropriate for sophisticated angel and/or professional (especially venture capital) investors.
The driving force behind start-up ventures are entrepreneurs – those individuals who have the courage, insight, knowledge, intensity and luck to attempt to achieve great business results without resources remotely sufficient for the job (or so it seems at first). A key vehicle for the entrepreneur’s effort is the business plan – and in most cases multiple versions of it as the opportunity and business change over time! The plan helps the entrepreneur attract support and resources from others because it tells them what the business is about, what its strategy will be, how its management thinks and what the financial risks and rewards most likely will be. It also helps the entrepreneur to manage a growing and necessarily complex set of dynamics by providing mileposts and indicating the resources that will be necessary to achieve them. Finally, it provides a set of standards against which actual performance can be compared. But a great plan by itself is no guarantee of success. A successful startup requires relentless execution against the plan and flexibility in reevaluating and changing the plan. The ultimate validations are customers’ orders and a scalable, repeatable and profitable business.
Section 2: Course Syllabus (pdf)
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