IMPROVING STUDENTS' ABILITY TO RECOGNIZE AND …



IMPROVING STUDENTS' ABILITY TO RECOGNIZE AND EXPLOIT BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES

Leon Winer, Pace University

ABSTRACT

To satisfy a discovered need of MBA students to improve their ability to recognize business opportunities, the author developed three assignments: a search for business opportunities with a short business plan and new midterm and final exams. In end-of-term evaluations, students rated "Ability to recognize business opportunities" among the top three learning experiences attributed to the Marketing course.

INTRODUCTION - THE SURVEY OF ENTERING MBA STUDENTS

A survey of entering MBA students conducted during September/October of 1999 at The Pace University Business School asked students to evaluate sixteen carefully selected abilities with respect to two issues:

A. For maximizing your success in business, how valuable are the following abilities?

B. At the present time, how much improvement do you need in your . . . ?

Combining their answers to the two questions disclosed that the top four learning needs perceived by the

students (n=310) were:

1. Ability to recognize business opportunities.

2. Ability to solve business problems.

3. Skill in marketing yourself.

4. Skill in giving oral presentations.

This survey is described in detail in another paper presented at this meeting.

The top four needs were judged to be consistent with the mission of the School which is to "prepare students for successful business careers in a global economy," and therefore, I made changes in the instructional program in my core Managerial Marketing course.

CHANGES IN THE CORE MARKETING COURSE

All MBA students are required to take the Core Marketing Course, entitled "Managerial Marketing," unless they have taken and passed a similar course during the previous three years. Most instructors present this course as a lecture course, supplemented with videos and in some instances, case studies.

For the past ten years, I have been moving away from this teaching model to the point where I am no longer lecturing, or even conducting case discussions. Instead, the basic philosophy of my presentation of the course, is to have students learn by doing rather than by listening and watching. Several of the assignments that I give require students to interact with people outside the classroom in influencing, negotiating and networking experiences. In class, students report on their outside work and submit written reports. They also work in small groups, analyzing and presenting case studies and textbook end-of-chapter questions.

The first change that I made in response to the newly discovered needs of entering students was to introduce the "New Product or Service Assignment," based on Hisrich and Peters (1998) and Vesper (1994). The second and third changes were to change the Mid-term and Final exams, based on Kotler and Armstrong (1998). The material that follows consists of the instructions given to students. Permission is granted to readers of this paper to use these materials with their own students.

1. New Product or Service Assignment

The business world rewards people who discover profitable business opportunities. Some receive promotions from their employers. Others earn their rewards as entrepreneurs.

The purpose of this assignment is to give you experience in developing ideas for new businesses. Once you start looking for business opportunities, you are more likely to find them and thereby increase your success in business. Listed below are seven search methods innovators have used.

1. Applying technology. The innovator found a new application for a technology.

2. Exploiting opportunity. The innovator discovered a need for a new product or service.

3. Surveying sellers. One innovator asked sales representatives what products and services customers were trying to buy and had trouble finding.

4. Surveying buyers. Another innovator asked purchasing agents what products or services they found difficult to buy.

5. Networking. An innovator asked all his business acquaintances to tell him of all the new business ideas they knew of.

6. Current job. An employee suggested a new business, the employer rejected it and the employee started his own business.

7. Hobby. Some entrepreneurs have turned hobbies into businesses.

After you have completed your search, prepare a two page report. Cover these topics:

I. List and evaluate the search methods you used and list all the ideas you considered.

II. Identify your best idea for a new business and prepare a mini business plan:

A. The product or service. What is the product or service? In what ways is it more

attractive to buyers than existing products or services?

B. The market. Who will buy the product or service? How much do they buy of your type of product or service? How much do you expect to sell them?

C. The environment: Competition, trends in relevant external factors, such as the economy, regulation and technology.

D. Marketing strategy: personal selling, advertising, sales promotion, direct marketing, including Internet, pricing, service and warrantee policies, public relations campaign for the new venture.

E. Capital requirements. How much money do you need for starting the business?

F. Other. What else do you need to do to get ready to start the business?

2 and 3. The New Mid-term and Final exams

The assignment for the new Mid-term and Final exams which are take-home exams, is to study the textbook and to think creatively about applying the concepts presented in the book to the business situations which they identified in the assignment outlined above. The actual exam assignment follows:

Review the "New Product or Service Assignment" you prepared previously. Use the new product or service that you identified in that report as the basis of you Mid-term and Final exams. (If you are no longer enthusiastic about the product or service you identified earlier, you may choose another new product or service.)

Write 16 essays showing how you would perform each of the following marketing tasks in your new business, the first eight for the Mid-Term and the second eight for the Final.

For each essay, review the appropriate chapter(s) in the Marketing textbook and use as many as possible of the Key Terms listed at the ends of the chapters. In your paper, print the key terms you use in boldface to make it easier for me to evaluate your work. Make absolutely sure that you understand the Key Terms and that you are using them correctly.

Mid-Term

1. Developing marketing strategies.

2. Responding to the company’s environment.

3. Using marketing research.

4. Applying customer behavior concepts.

5. Segmenting markets. Selecting target markets. Positioning your product or service.

6. Developing new products and services.

7. Managing the product over its life cycle.

8. Pricing your products or services.

Final

1. Using advertising.

2. Using sales promotion.

3. Using public relations (differentiate between PR and advertising).

4. Using personal selling.

5. Using direct and online marketing.

6. Creating a competitive advantage.

7. Building customer relationships.

8. Engaging in global marketing.

Grading

I grade the three papers on the basis of adherence to the instructions, amount and quality of work being shown, quality of English language presentation and appearance of the paper. Grade weights are 10% of the semester grade for each of the three papers.

At class meetings when these papers are due, all students discuss their papers in class in small group sessions. Time is also provided for several presentations to the entire class. These discussions and presentations are peer-evaluated at the end of the term as part of the "Class Contribution" grade component, which is 15%.

STUDENT EVALUATIONS

As noted at the beginning of this paper, a survey of incoming MBA students showed that "Ability to recognize business opportunities" to be the highest rated need of these students.

At the end of the Fall 1999 and Spring 2000 semesters, students in my section of the core Marketing course were asked to answer this question: "How much did this course help you

to improve your . . . ?" with respect to the sixteen abilities that had been investigated in the survey of incoming students. They were asked to circle numbers from zero to six, with zero labeled as "Not at all" and six labeled as "Very much."

The top three abilities were, as ranked by students in the core Marketing course were:

Skill in marketing yourself.

Skill in giving oral presentations.

Ability to recognize business opportunities.

Of course, there are no "before" data for comparisons since the entire concept of asking students to define their learning needs and to rate their own progress is brand new. However, it is fair to say that before the 1999-2000 academic year, students would not have rated this particular ability highly, because no specific assignments had been dedicated to it.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION

This paper refers to a survey of entering MBA students that discovered their perceptions of their learning needs. The paper goes on to describe a set of three assignments aimed at satisfying the highest rated need: "Ability to recognize business opportunities." In end-of-term evaluations, students rated this ability third highest in a field of sixteen, in answer to the question, "How much did this course help you to improve your . . . ?"

A start has been made in helping students to learn how to recognize and to take advantage of business opportunities. Readers of this paper are encouraged to adopt and refine the methods described here to help students to achieve success in their business careers.

REFERENCES

Hisrich, Robert D. and Michael P. Peters (1998), Entrepreneurship (4th edition), New York: McGraw-Hill.

Kotler, Philip and Gary Armstrong (1998), Principles of Marketing (8th edition), Upper Saddle River, NJ:

Prentice-Hall.

Vesper, Karl H. (1994), New Venture Experience, Seattle, WA: Vector Books.

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