1 - 10 of 24 results for: STRAMGT

Get the strategy right, and the chance for success is great. Nowhere is this more evident than in today's world of major challenges. Strategy is at the heart of problem solving and achieving objectives, yet few people can define strategy, much less understand how to conceptualize, design, and execute effective strategies that yield the best outcomes.This course will meet once a week to focus on interesting and engaging case studies, each of which illustrates a key ingredient of strategy. Some are well-known historical events, while others are less obvious, but all have a strategic lesson to share. They are quite diverse, from the planning of a high-risk rescue in the Colorado Rockies, to a product crisis in a Fortune 50 company, to a little-known failed military mission of WWII, to a commercial airline disaster. The ability to think through challenging and varied scenarios is both instructive and mind-stretching. There will be some pre-reading on each case study and there may be a field trip for students to put their lessons into practice. The course is designed to be highly interactive; all to enable students to unravel the mystery and power of strategic thinking. Students will also have the opportunity to select and analyze a case reflecting interests of their own. This course can help students not only prepare for a career in a range of fields, but also as they meet the challenges of their current coursework. Problem-solving skills are central in every walk of life; this seminar can help students build a stronger foundation for sound decision-making.

Americans spend nearly 7% of their income on food items and another 5% on food services annually (US Census). Food spend is at the intersection of two of the most important industries in the US: health care and agriculture. Food production today supports the food consumption causing our extraordinary burden of disease; 75 cents of every dollar of the $4.8 billion spent annually on health care is for diet-related disease. The health care system accounts for over 17% of U.S. gross domestic product (GDP). Agriculture and agriculture-related industries contributed 4.8% to the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) in 2012.nThis course focuses on the opportunities across these industries for food, health, and nutrition entrepreneurship. The course is designed for students with a broad interest in the food or health systems and/or who are interested in careers in food-related fields.nnWe will examine the food system from three points of view: the consumer, nutritional science, and policy. The class will focus on problem-solving from the perspective of an entrepreneur. The class will involve lecture, discussion, and prominent guest speakers who are entrepreneurs themselves or industry leaders.

This seminar will showcase successful women entrepreneurs and their professional and personal journeys. We will study how they navigated finding an idea, forming and building a team, being an effective leader, raising money, overcoming setbacks, and assembling a board. We will explore some of the unique challenges women face when approaching entrepreneurship. Speakers will also include female venture capitalists and social entrepreneurs, and male entrepreneurs. The class will use cases, panel discussions, readings and videos and social time with the panelists. nnnThis class is appropriate for women and men considering starting a high-impact venture as well as those who are just curious about entrepreneurship. This class will help you understand your own capabilities and interest in being an entrepreneur.

This workshop provides students with a structured forum in which they can find, develop and receive feedback on a new venture idea. The target audiences are students who have yet to find an idea worth working on, or are trying to decide which of several ideas to pursue. You should NOT take this workshop if you are already actively working on an idea. There are other GSB classes for you. Students can develop an idea alone, but partnering with one or more class members is encouraged.nnThe structured part of the workshop covers: the process of finding new business ideas; how to research and vet a new idea; how to build a business model around an idea; and how to ultimately pitch the idea to others. As part of the workshop, students will spend time helping classmates think through and improve their ideas. Students have the option to present their ideas at the end of the quarter to outside guests or submit a progress report.

This course considers the challenges faced by start-ups in achieving liquidity. We take the perspectives of organizational behavior, marketing, and finance, and examine forks in the road faced by firms that have already launched products. Marketing topics include how to market firms for sale and calculating the addressable market. Organizational topics include hiring and firing, and the role of founders after sales. Finance topics include how the choice between sale and IPO affects value realized, and private equity exits.

This is an integrated lab course in Entrepreneurship designed to teach students the process of creating a new viable venture - from idea to launch. It is a dynamic and interactive course organized around projects undertaken by teams of 3 to 4 registered students from the MSx and MBA programs, together with other graduate students within Stanford who bring expertise of particular relevance to the idea being pursued. This course is designed not only for students with immediate entrepreneurial aspirations, but also for any student considering starting an entrepreneurial venture at some point in his or her career. The course is a two quarter class, with admission to the class by team and idea. In the winter quarter, teams will research, craft, and morph their idea into a viable business concept. In the spring quarter they will further refine their concept and develop a strategy and plan to attract financial, human and other resources. At the end of the spring quarter, teams will present their plan to a panel of experts and potential investors to simulate the funding process. The new course builds on a predecessor course S356 "Evaluating Entrepreneurial Opportunities" and encapsulates new and important research and findings as they relate to the process of new venture creation. The teaching method is primarily learning by doing (LBD) through a structured process and supported by relevant lectures. Learning is further enhanced through meetings with the instructor, coaching by experienced mentors and review by peers. Field research as well as prototype product development are integral to the course. Since admittance to S321/S322 is by team and the quality of their idea, team formation takes place during the autumn quarter. Informal student mixers and seminars will be held to facilitate team formation and idea generation. Each team of 3-4 students should preferably consist of 1 or more MSx students and graduate students from the MBA program or other Schools - Engineering, Medicine, Law, Science, Education - to bring diversity and depth to the team. The application-selection process is described on the S321/S322 website.

This course is for students who may want to undertake an entrepreneurial career by starting and/or joining the senior management team of a social venture. It covers all phases of a venture - ideation and venture creation, resource acquisition, managing growth and harvest/exit. The instructors believe, for the most part, social ventures (which include both for-profit and non-profit structures) should be treated and managed like profit maximizing ventures, and many topics and themes encountered in this course will be similar to those covered in other entrepreneurial courses, such as Formation of New Ventures. Of course there are important differences related specifically to social ventures, some of which are critical to understand properly to effectively start and manage a social enterprise. We will highlight these differences throughout our sessions, so while that the lessons learned in this class can be generalized to all ventures, we do not advise you to take this class unless you really want to learn about social ventures. All the cases used in class and class discussions will be about early stage companies and organizations in the social venture space. Guests, both social entrepreneurs active in the field, and social impact investors, are heavily featured in class discussions and are an important part of the classroom experience.

The Social Ventures Practicum is an experiential learning course for student teams actively working to launch a social venture (nonprofit or for-profit or tbd).n nDesigned as a follow-on to ideation courses such as STRAMGT 356: Startup Garage or the Design for Extreme Affordability sequence, this course will focus on the business planning needed to launch your venture.n nIn weekly sessions through Winter Quarter, teams will work through topics unique to social ventures (e.g. mission, theory of change, impact measurement) as well as topics common to any venture, e.g. product/service market fit, business/economic model, financial planning, early stage financing, logistics, sales/distribution, and board/talent development. Each team will receive significant one-on-one coaching from the instructors, as well as opportunities to share their work with peers and learn from/present to guest speakers.n nTeams will emerge with a solid business and impact model, ready to raise their first round of seed funding. This course will prepare students for the Stanford Social Innovation Fellowship, Echoing Green, and other similar post-graduate funding opportunities.n nThe course will assume a level of familiarity with key social impact frameworks, so students are encouraged to take another social innovation course or to have prior experience working with mission and theory of change.

This 3 unit course is a case study course specifically for those students interested in entrepreneurship and/or investing. The partnership (and interaction) between the entrepreneur and the investor is a very important dimension in the growth of many start-ups. This course examines the entrepreneur ¿ investor relationship from both the entrepreneur's and the investor's perspectives.nnFrom the point of view of the entrepreneur ¿ we look at how to select an investor and match the investor to the growth trajectory of your company, how and when to approach those investors as well as the positioning of your company within their portfolio. The course gives entrepreneurs the opportunity to connect with members of the VC community on a novel business idea or, if you do not have a business idea, we will help you find one to `adopt¿ for this course through the CES site ( https://mygsb.stanford.edu/mba/programs-centers/center-entrepreneurial-studies-ces/looking-startup-idea). You can then use that idea / company as a basis for the paper and team project.nnFrom the point of view of the investor ¿ given the rapid evolution in the investor sector, it is important for entrepreneurs (and future investors) to understand investors¿ motivation and process. We will explain why entrepreneurs have many more investor alternatives today compared to several years ago, how investors look for their next opportunity, the investors¿ selection process and how investors plan to work with the entrepreneur after the investment.nnThe course is geared for multiple audiences: the student who is considering an entrepreneurship or investor career path and the student who is exploring a start-up idea (and perhaps formed a team). Both audiences will benefit from a greater understanding as to what happens `behind the scenes¿ (e.g. in the investors partners¿ meeting and at the negotiating table) between the entrepreneur and investor. Each class is case study based with engaging class discussions led by experienced venture capitalists. The course includes frequent guest speakers (both entrepreneurs and investors) who will give alternate and candid `off the record¿ details about their experiences.nnClass participation is integral to a successful exchange of ideas; therefore, we make class participation 50% of your total grade. The other 50% of the grade is based on both an individual paper and your contribution to a team project. The individual project is a short 3-5 page paper focused on a subject facing entrepreneurship (i.e. investor selection or managing the equity split within the team). The team project is a short presentation to the class on the business idea and then a more complete presentation to a panel of VC investors.