Your Research in the Classroom: Your Research in the Classroom: Opportunities & Learning Style Andrew C. Corbett Lally School of Management & Technology Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Situation  “How do I find a good opportunity? I would really like to start my own business, but I just don’t where to begin. I’m not creative.”  How often has a student made a statement like this to you?  What do you tell them?

All of the analysis, but …  All of the analysis we ask students to do is useful but this comes after we have identified possible opportunities.  There is a process that precedes all of this which gets to the question of finding “good opportunities.”  I have the students learn about how they learn and then apply this to discovering opportunities.  “Perceiving opportunities through mindful practice and experience” A.C. Corbett & J.S. McMullen Perceiving and Shaping New Venture Opportunities through Mindful Practice in A. Zacharakis and S. Spinelli (eds.) The Entrepreneurial Process, Prager: Greenwich, CT.

Perceiving Opportunities through Experiential Learning  Four day experience that is theoretical, practical, and fun  Learning style instrument  Mindfulness  Self discovery  Learn from others  Anxious students, perhaps lacking in entrepreneurial confidence, experience the power of perceiving entrepreneurial opportunities.

Day One  Theoretical and fun  Discuss Kolb’s learning concepts and the four primary learning styles.  Everyone takes and self scores the Learning Style Instrument (LSI).  I put a version of the following map on the board.

RO AC CE AE

RO AC CE AE * CD * BC * CB * AZ * TV * JM * DP * DL * GL * BH * SW * NG * TJ Each Student then maps his or her LSI score on the board

RO watching AC thinking feeling CE AE doing * CD * BC * CB * AZ * TV * JM * DP * DL * GL * BH * SW * NG * TJ Then I “label” each quadrant and explain more about each learning style Accommodator Diverger Converger Assimilator

Day One  I explain about the “typical” converger, accommodator, diverger, and assimilator.  Provoke a discussion by asking which style is best for entrepreneurs.  Explain the concept of mindfulness and “staying in the moment.”  Management, Leadership, and Entrepreneurship s

Day Two  The “downtown” exercise.  Class meets outside; we walk downtown together.  Take notes and find opportunities by talking, watching, and interacting with the residents and store owners (thinking, watching, doing, learning…)  Meet at end of class; give assignment  Assignment – memo for next class; all opportunities and “opportunities for you.”

Day Three  “Map” opportunities.  Discuss style and how opportunities were “found.”  Reinforce the point that we can all find opportunities through practice.  Discuss the need to cross all areas – learning agility… not isolation in quadrants but a learning cycle…  Team effects … they walk together…

Day Four  Similar to Day Two  Later in the semester  We do the “downtown” exercise again.  Outside their comfort zone.  “Force them to look for opportunities using a style that is NOT their preferred learning style.

Conclusions  Give students a practical way to begin to find ideas for new ventures.  Use some of my own research to make class sessions both theoretical and practical, while also fun.  Build confidence for student nascent entrepreneurs.  Caveat: maybe this experiential exercise works for you; maybe not. If not, that’s okay because you need to be you; not me … think about your own research and ways to use it in a novel way in the classroom.