How To Teach Entrepreneurship
Do you want some tips on improving your entrepreneurship class? Steve Blank has some ideas.
Steve Blank sat down with our co-founder Justin Wilcox, pre-pandemic, for a discussion on the state of entrepreneurship education and how each of us can improve.
Who Is Steve Blank? The Forefather of Lean Startup
Entrepreneur, author, professor, and an originator of evidence-based entrepreneurship, Steve Blank developed or popularized some of the most recognizable approaches to entrepreneurship education including Customer Development and Lean Startup.
Steve Blank's Teaching Tips
Tip #1: Accept You Don’t Know Everything
Tip #2: Get a Mentor
Tip #3: When in Doubt, Experiences Teach Skills
The Future of Entrepreneurship Education
Key entrepreneurship skills can be taught with the right combination of theory and experiential exercises.
There is no “right” answer that can be found in a book. This approach encourages Steve's students to figure things out for themselves. The Lean LaunchPad methodology Steve created stimulates the chaos of entrepreneurship for his students. This chaos helps separate those students ready for the pursuit of entrepreneurship from those who are not ready.
Steve uses an experiential, hands-on approach to teach entrepreneurship, and so sees his classes as the Juilliard of entrepreneurship, where students learn entrepreneurship the same way Julliard students learn music. By practicing skills. With this in mind, Steve thinks successful entrepreneurship curricula should include entrepreneurial appreciation.
“These core [entrepreneurship] courses will be the new liberal arts courses of the 21st century.”
Click here to read the rest of the conversation where Steve and Justin discuss how to teach entrepreneurship, including:
- As a teacher, how to improve your effectiveness in the classroom
- The best way to teach entrepreneurship skills
In an upcoming part two, I’ll summarize some of Steve Blank's ideas on creating a comprehensive entrepreneurship curriculum, including:
- The skills professors should teach their students, and
- Four courses Steve thinks are core to a robust entrepreneurship program
Stay tuned for that!
Using critical pedagogy to nurture engaged citizens | Pedagogue, in the positive sense | Always an educator, occasionally an edutainer
4 年So if I could summarize it in two words, it would be Immersive and Experiential. Immersive meaning students are participating within the experience. Experiential meaning students reflect onto their experiences from without.