Description
Venturing Into Entrepreneurship Education
1
Contents
Venturing into Entrepreneurship Education 10
Focus on Capacity Building 15
NEN Faculty Development Courses Portfolio
Foundation Courses 30
a. NEN Orientation Program
b. Kick-starting the Entrepreneurial Campus
c. Building Technology Ventures
Advanced Topics 32
a. Business Models and Business Plans
b. Getting to Market: Commercializing Your idea
c. Venture Capital, Angel Funding and Debt: Raising Capital for Your Entrepreneurial Venture
d. Successful Growth: Project to Process
e. Building Start-up Organizations: Hiring and Retaining Talent
f. IP Strategies for Building Competitive Advantage
g. Practical Ethics: Succeeding in a Transparent World
High Impact Infrastructure Design 35
a. Developing Advanced Infrastructure: IEDC/EDCs, Mentoring Units and Incubators
b. Building IP in Academic Campuses
c. Tools for Successful Business Incubation
Mentor Development Programs 37
a. Mentoring Skills Finishing School
b. Entrepreneur Educator and Mentor Round Tables
c. Tools for Growth
d. Kick-starting Ventures
The NEN Community 44
Faculty Success Stories
Kaustubh Dharghalkar: Enabling the Entrepreneurship Ecosystem 4
Radhika Meenakshi Shankar: A Resourceful Mentor Impacts Thousands! 22
Soumya Chakraborty: Connecting Young Entrepreneurs to the Ecosystem 41
At the We School, Mumbai, entrepreneurship,
innovation and design are not just taught, they are
put in practice. One faculty member has played a
signifcant role in creating this environment.
5
In November 2011, Priyanka Amar wrote a business plan for a venture to
help people set up urban farms or kitchen gardens in densely populated
Mumbai. She was a student of the Business Design Program at the We
School (formerly Welingkar Institute of Management Development &
Research), and was mentored by NEN Faculty Leader Prof. Kaustubh
Dhargalkar in her initiative.
Having developed kitchen gardens at home, she wanted to take it up at a
professional level and help others do the same. Kaustubh vetted her plan;
with his help, she carried out extensive market research to understand
what impact the business can make. She started of soon after graduation
with just one maali (gardener) and an investment of 50,000 Rupees from
her personal savings. Kaustubh helped her in networking with customers,
including households, builders and corporates, and reaching out to
investors. He had also helped plan for scaling up, getting visibility and
brand positioning.
Cut to 2014, Priyanka and her venture iKheti has a growing list of customers
and plans to pitch to investors. In no time, her venture had matured into
a team of eight. Priyanka credits her mentor for showing her the right
direction – helping her decide to take up entrepreneurship, instead of
opting for placements!
Prof. Kaustubh had joined Welingkar as a professor in 2006. Soon after, with
his deep interest in entrepreneurship, he reached out to NEN and started
engaging with the network’s activities. This also helped him setup the E
Cell as a student-run initiative to encourage entrepreneurship.
In the last three years (2010 – 2013), more than a dozen businesses have
been started by We School students on campus and many of them continue
to build their ventures even after passing out. Apart from iKheti, Campus
Companies that became full-fedged ventures include Opulent Infotech,
Vibrant Holidays and Zapp Party Solutions.
Enabling the Entrepreneurship Ecosystem
Even afer
fve years, Springs
Innovations! was not
out of the woods.
Prof. Kaustubh started
mentoring me actively
specially in revenue
generating options,
marketing, and
product development
and delivery. He
helped me steadily
gain confdence in my
ideas, decisions and
most importantly, my
imagination.”
— Savita Rajeev, founder of
Springs Innovations!
6
Innovation at Welingkar
In 2008, We School launched an innovation lab called InnoWE Center for
Innovation and Memetics, under Kaustubh’s leadership. One of the key focus
areas of the lab is business design management, which helps businesses
to improve their ability to solve problems and innovate, based on design
thinking methodologies. The centre also looks at memetics, an emerging
feld that explores the relationship between socio-cultural trends and
business opportunities.
The innovation lab was a pioneering concept – the earliest such initiative
in any B-school in the country. Completely self-funded by the institute, it
is open to all students on campus and serves as a space for students to
brainstorm and prototype their ideas. According to Kaustubh, “It has
become a magnet attracting more students and an efective support
system for ventures.” InnoWe also organizes activities like ideation contests,
toy-making contests, concept shows, meetings with entrepreneurs, and
flm-making contests.
The success of the lab and the impact of Kaustubh’s innovation-centric
approach are evident in the number of students associated with the
Business Design Program, one of the programs at InnoWE. From just 30
students initially, over 60 students are part of the program today. Many of
these students are actively starting new ventures based on what they have
learnt in the lab.
The Business Design Program integrates design thinking and innovation
process into mainstream management subjects. It ofers a holistic view
of the human aspects in business, the economic, social, cultural and
technological context of the environment, and a research orientation,
analytical and leadership skills.
The Business Design Program also includes a credit-based elective on
entrepreneurship in the second year of the course. Kaustubh incorporated
many ideas from NEN programs he had attended into this course. His
own experience as an entrepreneur — he had had a 15-year stint running
companies he had founded, before moving into teaching — helps him
give students a practical view of entrepreneurship.
My
introduction to
structured and formal
mentoring was
through NEN. Teir
Mentor Development
Programs organized
in partnership with
Goldman Sachs
and Cherie Blair
Foundation for
Women, was very
useful. I got hands-
on experience
in mentoring,
with a couple of
entrepreneurs
allocated to each of us
faculty members to
mentor, as part of the
program.
- Prof. Kaustubh Dhargalkar
Personal Growth
With a passionate interest and belief in innovation
and entrepreneurship, and his experience as an
entrepreneur, Prof. Kaustubh is now an efective
educator, start-up mentor and academic leader. He
currently is:
• Associate Dean, Business Design and Innovation,
We School
• Head, InnoWE Center, We School
• Mentor at the Center for Innovation and Enterprise,
IIM, Ahmedabad. Facilitator of workshops for
entrepreneur associations
• Contributor of articles on entrepreneurship.
Over the years, Kaustubh had sought out various
courses to enhance his own
learning. In 2007-8, Kaustubh
had attended the year-
long NEN Entrepreneurship
Educator’s Course (EEC)
comprising of a series
of Faculty Development
Workshops, co-developed
by NEN and Stanford
University’s Technology
Ventures Program (STVP). The
training under international
entrepreneurship educators
like Tina Seelig from Stanford
and John Mullins from
London Business School, and
access to world-class content
helped develop programs
for his own students.
He started conducting
workshops for students and motivating them to view
entrepreneurship as a career option.
While the introductory courses gave Kaustubh the
knowledge, skills to start facilitating entrepreneurship,
Tools for Growth, a Mentor Development Course that
Kaustubh attended in 2010, exposed him to a formal
mentoring process. It equipped him to support
growth stage entrepreneurs. Participants in this
course conducted under the Goldman Sachs 10,000
Women Program help their mentees assess growth
opportunities, learn how to manage cash for growth,
and develop the required organizational capabilities.
In 2011, Kaustubh participated in the year-long
Cherie Blair Foundation for Women (CBFW) - NEN
Mentor Development Program. This program aims
to build mentoring skills, and give information on
entrepreneurial marketing, fnance and fundraising, so
participants could hand-hold women entrepreneurs
starting businesses.
The CBFW-NEN program sessions involve both faculty
mentors and entrepreneurs in its two modules, Getting
to Market and Entrepreneurial Finance. This helps
faculty participants build on their knowledge of taking
a product or service successfully to market, as well as
learn critical concepts and tools for fnancing options,
valuations, structuring deals
and exit strategies.
Participants get to apply their
learning by mentoring the
entrepreneurs who are part
of the program. Kaustubh
was assigned Savita Rajeev,
who had founded Springs
Innovations! to nurture the
creative thinking of young
people, in 2006. In the fve
years, Savita had executed
over 130 projects. She had
reached out to more than
3000 children and her
products were well received.
However fnancially, her
venture was still not doing
well.
Kaustubh helped Savita focus on revenue generating
options, marketing, and product development and
delivery.
One of the critical steps was to profle the market.
Kaustubh asked her incisive questions like: Who is
your market? Who understands you? By addressing
these questions, she was able to zero into the needs
and requirements of her market and customize her
products accordingly. Kaustubh encouraged her to re-
NEN IMPACT
• Established an innovation lab on
campus
• Developed a number of programs on
entrepreneurship for this students
• Enabled starting up of over a dozen
ventures by students on campus
• Successfully transformed from an
entrepreneur to an entrepreneur
mentor, supporting students and
growth stage entrepreneurs
think the venture’s core oferings and position it better
so the audience could connect with it. She realised
the venture’s core oferings – innovation and creative
expressions were not tangible concepts. She needed
to communicate her oferings clearly to her customers.
She created strong messaging using videos and visual
presentations, that helped them understand what she
could do and how it would beneft them.
From targeting individual students directly, Savita
started looking at corporates. She acquired Kokuyo
Camlin, Kelloggs and others Fortune 500 frms as
customers. Thanks to Kaustubh’s guidance, she was
able to increase her impact – reaching six times the
number of young people that she could earlier, in a
given time.
A sustained period of one-on-one mentoring with
Kaustubh helped – Savita says, “Kaustubh helped me
steadily gain confdence in my ideas, decisions and
most importantly, my imagination.”
Kaustubh facilitated a tie up of the We School with MIT,
Massachusetts for a Venture Mentoring Platform. We
School has now set up a formal six-member mentoring
board on campus to support entrepreneurs. Kaustubh
himself is currently supporting 5 student entrepreneurs
and an equal number of practicing entrepreneurs; 12
students mentored by him have successfully started
ventures in the last three years.
Prof. Kaustubh is not just an inspiring entrepreneurship
educator and mentor, evangelizing entrepreneurship
on campus and in the community. He is a driving
force behind various initiatives on campus, like the
innovation cell and Business Design Program, and We
School’s focus on innovation. He is clear proof of the
heights faculty can reach when it comes to equipping
themselves, tapping into community resources and
making an impact on the entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Knowledge and skill building through NEN’s
training are very practical. For example, I have absolutely
no credentials to teach anything related to entrepreneurial
fnance. Te Entrepreneurial Finance course ofered by John
Mullins of London Business School has however helped
me a lot in terms of structuring commercial facts to run
businesses and giving it a theoretical framework. Today I
ofer the Entrepreneurial Finance course on campus and the
students like the practical approach to complex information
on fnance. NEN intervention has helped me a lot.”
— Prof. Kaustubh Dhargalkar, L. N.
Welingkar Institute of Management Development & Research, Mumbai
Venturing into
Entrepreneurship
Education
11
The entrepreneurial revolution: Role
of academia
Global leaders are conscious of the need to unlock entrepreneurial capabilities
to meet the challenges of the 21st century. Te attention of governments across
the world has been on creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship.
Our observation in India as well is that leading companies today recruit for
skills and talent, rather than knowledge; young people demand the opportunity
to ‘make it big’ within India’s new, vibrant economy. Te government of India
is also increasingly emphasizing the need for an entrepreneurial generation,
naming this the ‘Decade of Innovation.’
Educational systems however, particularly in most of Asia and Africa, are
unprepared for entrepreneurship education – they are still grappling with
the tradition lecture mode of teaching, dependent on rote learning and
regurgitation in examinations. Tis is as true for primary education as it is
for higher education. Entrepreneurship education on the other hand rests on
experiential learning methodology and ‘doing’ as a way of self-learning.
A student typically learns through engagement with entrepreneurs,
use of frameworks getting hands-on experiences in diferent aspects of
entrepreneurship like product development, sales, and working with teams.
Tis helps build her/his skill, attitude and confdence to be able to be start-
up. Tis calls for highly unconventional methods of teaching and learning
that educational institutes and their faculty must adopt in order to enable
entrepreneurship education.
Entrepreneurship education therefore calls for a revolutionary approach from
the heart of educational eco-system driven by inspiring, progressive, skilled,
experienced and networked faculty leaders. Tese faculty leaders work with
successful entrepreneurs to initiate, support and drive entrepreneurship
activities on campus, the institute’s leadership to focus on entrepreneurship
education and development holistically, invest in their own understanding of
venture creation, entrepreneurial issues and entrepreneurs’ attitudes, launch
courses, drive campus companies, support students entrepreneurs and help
graduating students launch their entrepreneurial careers.
Introduction
“Preparing today’s students for
success and eventual leadership
in the new global marketplace
is the most important
responsibility in education
today... Entrepreneurship
education is an important tool
to achieving these objectives
[and]...should be universally
available to provide all students
with opportunities to explore
and fulfl their potential.”
- From an Aspen Institute Youth
Entrepreneurship Strategy Group publication
12
NEN’s decade long experience in institutional capacity building in India shows
that such inspired, skilled and networked faculty are a force by themselves and
are creating mini entrepreneurship revolutions on campuses across India!
What an educator needs to know
NEN has a key focus on identifying and developing such faculty leaders,
equipping them with knowledge, skills, networks and relevant content. We
believe emerging nations need such faculty in large numbers to transform
their countries through entrepreneurship education. In their economies,
unlike in the Silicon Valley, a young person’s tryst with entrepreneurship
may be less due to default environment and more by design. At academic
campuses across Asia and Africa, one has to develop an eco-system that will
allow students to be exposed to entrepreneurship and have the opportunity to
grow their engagement till they start thriving as entrepreneurial individuals
and as entrepreneurs. Te activities and opportunities must enable this
development - going from simple, easy to engage programs to intense, more
direct experiences of entrepreneurship.
Hence, a good campus has a diverse set of programs from the very basic and
introductory to the advanced and focused, catering to this development cycle
of entrepreneurial individuals as they progress. Faculty teams typically initiate,
develop, refne, facilitate and manage these programs to give their students the
best chance to be entrepreneurial and become entrepreneurs.
To do this, faculty members need knowledge, skills and exposure which range
from conceptual understanding of venture creation to knowledge of issues
that start-ups typically face at diferent points in the development of their
companies, as well as ways to support them in overcoming routine issues. Te
best of the faculty are able to apply this knowledge and exposure in systematic
ways; they are able to to hand-hold aspiring and new entrepreneurs using
highly impactful pedagogies, methodologies and experiential tools in both
inside class room and outside class room formats.
It changed
my way of teaching.
Te program’s value-
add was that it opened
up new perspectives
and opportunities with
its hands-on approach.
Te program attendees
interacted with six to
seven entrepreneurs
over three days
and went through
several case studies.
From teaching
entrepreneurship,
it has helped me
to start doing
entrepreneurship.”
— Radhika Meenakshi Shankar,
Director, Wise Owl Consulting,
Hyderabad
13
Leading-Edge Global
Practices
Academic institutes stay at the
forefront of entrepreneurship
education with access to world-class
teaching methodology and research
without having to leave India’s
shores
Nation-Wide
Resources
Faculty become part of
India’s largest network
of entrepreneurship
educators, exponentially
increasing the resources
available to their institutes
KEY
OPPORTUNITIES
FOR ACADEMIC
INSTITUTES
Strategic
Development Of
Entrepreneurial
Campus
Seamlessly integrated
courses help institutes to
systematically develop
a vibrant, high-impact
entrepreneurship ecosystem
Immediate Impact
Faculty come out able to
implement action-oriented
programs that are geared
for immediate impact
14
NEN supports academic institutes in building capacity for entrepreneurship
development. More specifcally this refers to the capacity of
a) People – faculty, networks of entrepreneurs, investors and experts;
b) Programs – a wide bouquet of oferings including courses, workshops,
Campus Company initiatives and start-up internships
c) Infrastructure – platforms like student-run E Cells, innovation centers and
incubators that enable sustainability of entrepreneurship development.
Institutional capacity building activities include an on-the-ground consulting
practice, support with teaching materials, a leadership program for NEN
student E Cell leaders, a volunteer bank of more than 4000 entrepreneurs
and investors who participate and contribute as mentors, guest speakers
and / or facilitators of workshops; and, most importantly, the NEN Faculty
Development Courses. NEN trains and certifes faculty across the network
to produce entrepreneurship educators and mentors who can design and run
high-impact entrepreneurship programs on campus.
Focus on Capacity Building
I have
always had a very
nice experience with
the NEN-led courses
and this time afer
attending ‘Business
Models and Business
Plans: Getting It
Right’ course, I am
more confdent about
imparting knowledge
about business models
to the students as a
mentor.”
Latika Dhuria
Vivekananda Institute of
Technology (VIT), Jaipur
15
STARTUP
SHOWCASE
PARTICIPANTS
ACTIVITIES
EXPERT RESOURCES
Alumni
Entrepreneurs
Faculty
Advisors
PARTICIPANTS
ACTIVITIES
EXPERT RESOURCES
Entrepreneurs
Educators
Mentors
PARTICIPANTS
ACTIVITIES
EXPERT RESOURCES
Entrepreneurs
Administrators
Mentors
Educators
Investors
Campus Entrepreneurship Eco-System
WF-NEN’s approach to entrepreneurship development
at academic institutions
Unaware Students
Aspiring Entrepreneurs
Student Entrepreneurs
Aspiring Entrepreneurs
Student Entrepreneurs
Startups
Startups
Entrepreneur Firms in Community
Alumni, Others
E Talks & E Summits
Exercises & Games
Panel Discussions
Competitions: Ideas & B-Plan
36-Hour Startups
Startup Showcase
Startup Jobs
Hands-on Course
Campus Company Program
Structured Mentoring
Advanced Topic Courses
Startup Internship
Startup Consulting
Tech Product Development
Mentoring
Training
Access to: Infrastructure,
Funding, Networks
Create entrepreneurial
skills and experience
Inspire and engage
entrepreneurship
exposure & interest
Build
knowledge
& skills
Gain
experience
PANEL
DISCUSSIONS
WORKSHOPS
N
E
N
-
C
A
M
P
U
S
S
U
P
P
O
R
T
IN
F
R
A
S
T
R
U
C
T
U
R
E
36-HOUR
STARTUPS
Grow the
business
1
2
Support entrepreneurial
knowledge, resources,
networks 3
STRUCTURED
MENTORING
TECH PRODUCT
DEVELOPMENT
Connect to
network
Get focused
guidance
* IEDC : Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Center
EDC : Entrepreneur Development Cell
Faculty at the heart of capacity building
NEN’s member academic institutes are at the forefront of entrepreneurial change in India. Responding to the demands
from their own students, corporate India, and society at large, the institutes are building programs and courses that
create and support India’s next generation of entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial leaders.
Tis transformation is lead by evangelical faculty members who have invested in years of learning, practice and work
with aspiring and new start-ups to bring about this change.
NEN has enabled this change by putting together a wide array of faculty development programs focusing on concepts,
pedagogy and experiential content. Tailored especially for emerging economies, these programs equip faculty members
to build a results-oriented entrepreneurial ecosystem on campus, such as what one might experience at top institutes
like Stanford University, MIT, or Babson College in the United States; and leading institutes in India, like IIT Bombay
and IIM Ahmedabad.
16
3000+ new faculty members in various core disciplines engaged in
entrepreneurship
Nearly 2000 trained at various levels
1347
Foundation
Teaching Level
418
Advanced
Teaching Level
201
Mentor
Level
India’s largest entrepreneurship educator community
Trained faculty members are able to develop and run programs that build
students’ awareness and excitement about entrepreneurship; the programs help
them develop an entrepreneurial mindset and gain the skills, knowledge and
confdence to succeed either as entrepreneurial leaders within organizations
or to start their own ventures. At the advanced level, NEN’s courses develop
participants’ ability to directly support entrepreneurs – through mentoring,
incubation, or by running executive education courses.
What began as a community of just a dozen entrepreneurship educators in
2003 is today a network of over 1500 faculty actively engaged in a variety of
programs such as facilitating student club activities, innovation centres and
campus companies, and mentoring entrepreneurs and student ventures. Te
challenge now is to systematize entrepreneurship as a mainstream discipline
of education to leverage and sustain the level of excellence achieved by these
educators and institutes.
Without my
professor, I would
never have started up. I
was a total novice with
just an idea. It was he
who encouraged me to
pursue it and guided
me through the entire
process, and even
connected me to the
right people who could
help. He has been the
driving force behind
my start-up. ”
— Aswin Yogesh, student
entrepreneur, founder of Fluids
- a milkshake kiosk
Saveetha Engineering College,
Chennai
17
About the programs
Faculty Development Programs are meant to help improve faculty members’
conceptual knowledge and understanding, their skill of facilitating learning and
their exposure and experience with start-ups. Programs develop fundamental
skill sets required to teach entrepreneurship and help faculty become
efective mentors. Faculty leaders transform from novices in entrepreneurship
education to expert entrepreneur educators and mentors. Te illustration
below provides an overview of the layered levels of the programs and their
output and goals. A more detailed list of programs is provided later in this
booklet.
18
Advantages of the programs
Tere are several reasons why NEN’s Faculty Development Programs are
useful for faculty. Some of the more obvious ones include:
Staying ahead with cutting-edge methods
NEN’s Faculty Development Programs introduce participants to cutting-
edge teaching methods with a focus on participant-centric learning and
experiential methods. Participants in the advanced courses and mentor
development programs get to work with, and alongside entrepreneurs in the
classroom, perhaps a frst time for many. Additionally, NEN constantly brings
new, efective and the latest learning and pedagogical trends to the faculty in
its network.
Strong conceptual understanding
All of NEN’s programs focus on understanding core concepts in venture
creation—that apply to entrepreneurs anywhere in the world in any industry
at diferent stages of the start-ups’ life cycle. Tey enable faculty to understand
the overall context of the start-ups’ life cycle and issues more clearly.
19
Direct experience
Faculty Development Programs are designed to help faculty gain direct
experience of certain entrepreneurial aspects and tools. Tese courses-help
‘do’ entrepreneurship rather than just learn entrepreneurship. Further, the
courses contain insights drawn from practitioners and experts which enable
learning of a highly practical nature. Shared peer experiences within the class-
room too add to this knowledge.
Structured learning with high applicability
Te programs enable and equip faculty to efectively design and lead relevant
programs for their own students or entrepreneurs immediately afer the
training. Tis is because these courses are facilitated by highly experienced
educators and professionals who bring in best practices both from inside
India and around the world.
Strong peer networking: NEN Faculty Network
An important beneft for faculty that engage in NEN’s programs is the
powerful network of entrepreneurship educators that they become a part of.
NEN faculty learn from each other, teach on each other’s campuses and co-
teach programs.
Range of learning content and tools
Faculty who are a part of NEN have access to a very wide range of learning
content, curricula, tools and frameworks suitable for emerging economies
that can be plugged into diferent kinds of programs. Additionally, they have
access to NEN’s team of experts who can help design and structure content for
diferent kinds of audiences.
Access to strategic models
NEN has experimented with, refned and established highly efective ways to
develop a campus that enables students to become more entrepreneurial and
start-up their ventures. Faculty have access to these methods and models -
both through training, and through use of NEN’s guides.
20
Te quality and experience of the teaching
faculty is very high. Tey come with superior
domain knowledge that is combined with their
experience of having worked or taught in that
feld. So they are able to create content and deliver
programs in a way that the audience derives
immense value.”
— Somayajulu Garimella, Professor,
International Management Institute, New Delhi
NEN seems to have got the hang of how to do this in
two or three diferent ways. One, the program is well-structured,
they have structured the learning for the faculty in such a way that
the whole teaching experience is very actionable. Ten, you have
material which you can take to your campus and teach students.
And third is the ambience they create, the teams that they make,
the way they match various types of faculty from diferent domains
within the teams and then group them with an entrepreneur thus
making the whole process very experiential.
Te learning is of a far higher quality than it would have been
through a textbook or through a simple lecture. It is not an
inspirational course that they ofer but rather a very actionable
course.’’
— Kiran Desai, Faculty,
Mukesh Patel School of Technology Management, NMIMS University
Armed with formidable experience
in teaching entrepreneurship for over
two decades, Radhika Meenakshi is
an entrepreneur, educator and mentor
specializing in support for SMEs and
women entrepreneurs.
While working at her husband’s automotive-machinery manufacturing
unit, Bala Tripura Sundari saw how the industry struggles to fnd adequately
trained technical professionals. This galvanized her to start Involute
Institute of Technical Training, which trains students with diplomas and
engineering degrees, for the automotive industry.
Bala soon realized that she needed help in grasping the fundamentals of
running a business: for example, which markets should she tap into? How?
While she was making strategic decisions, how could she be sure that
those were the right ones?
This was when one-on-one mentoring sessions helped bring the required
focus and rigour. Her mentor, Prof. Radhika Meenakshi Shankar, an NEN
faculty member helped her analyze the market and the right resources to
tap into. For example, while she initially targeted markets in Karnataka,
Chennai and Maharashtra, she had not really paid attention to the market
in her own city, Hyderabad. Radhika advised her to tap into the local
market,showing how there was actually a huge market and potential for
what she was doing.
This turned out to be the critical turn-around for her business and Bala
shares she starting making revenues right away!
Prof. Radhika started her career as a management faculty in fnance and
commerce. For over two decades, she has taught at many reputed colleges
A Resourceful Mentor Impacts Thousands!
I had reached
the stage where my
business was surviving
literally hand to
mouth. Tanks to Prof.
Radhika Meenakshi
Shankar, all that is an
old story now. She
helped me re-organize
and streamline the way
I managed fnances.”
— Bhupendra Singh, Founder,
TechWINE, New Delhi
TechWINE, Bhupendra Singh’s Delhi-based venture, was constantly
strapped for cash. Client payments were always delayed and he was
never able to pay vendors on time. Running a company that installed
fber cables, and maintained software and hardware systems,
Bhupendra’s primary issues were lack of product clarity and a haywire
cash fow process which was afecting his working capital.
Identifying this, his mentor Prof. Radhika Meenakshi Shankar helped
him re-organize and streamline the way he managed his fnances. She
worked with him to do an activity-based costing in order to prioritize
his business segments; restructured payments to allow an advance
payment cycle from clients and a delayed payment cycle to vendors;
and trimmed needless expenses by moving all transactions online.
and universities across India. She is a consultant at the
Centre for Entrepreneurship Development, ALEAP and
has recently turned an entrepreneur, having founded
Wise Owl Consultancy in Hyderabad.
WiseOwl provides consulting, training and mentoring
for entrepreneurs and corporates. Radhika supports
a number of academic institutes and non-profts. She
is also on the advisory board of a few start-ups. She
has established a personal network with investors
and banks and, very importantly, entrepreneurial
organizations too.
Engaging students
Radhika’s interest in entrepreneurship development
was kindled while she doing her doctoral study on
Change Management of MSMEs. As a faculty of fnance
at BITS Pilani, Goa campus, Radhika had got involved
with the E Week 2006 celebrations, when the students
asked her for help in creating an entrepreneur case,
‘The Lala’s Hotel’ which looked at how an MBA graduate
innovates his father’s small business operations.
The experience encouraged her to attend NEN’s
Faculty Development Program during 2007-2008. The
experiential format and well-designed pedagogy of
NEN’s courses equipped her with extensive knowledge
and skills in the area of entrepreneurship. She soon took
these courses to her college students and community
entrepreneurs, customizing them as per their needs.
At Amity University, an NEN member institute, Radhika
launched an E Cell ‘Ideate’ that engaged students in
entrepreneurial activities. The E Cell raised awareness
on entrepreneurship through social media and blogs.
It also organised E Melas, where students whose
ideas were vetted, setup stalls to sell various items on
campus. Creating a business plan and accounts after
the exercise gave students a hands-on experience of
running a venture.
Teaching courses in Entrepreneurship and Finance, with
an NEN-infuenced syllabus, gave her an extra edge,
says Radhika. There was a sea change in her teaching
methodology – she reworked the content to make
it very application-oriented and experiential, using
practical exercises and real-life cases. “Students loved
it,” she says, efusive in her praise for NEN’s pedagogy.
Not only did Radhika evangelize entrepreneurship in
her own campus and E Cell, she also reached out to
E Cells in other institutes like IIT Delhi and IIT Kanpur,
soon becoming an advisor there as well.
Radhika also helped launch Amity’s BBA program in
Family Business Management, that provides students
skills and knowledge to deal with the complexities
and intricacies of running a family business. Further, as
part of Amity’s contract with the defence department,
she developed an Executive Education Program in
Entrepreneurship for the Armed Forces under the
Defense Rehabilitation Program. She continues the
engagement with the armed forces at Hyderabad
through her consultancy WiseOwl.
Through WiseOwl, Radhika also consults with Vignan
University Guntur and Vasavi College, Hyderabad. She
is helping the Vasavi management with entrepreneurial
activities, setting up a formal MSME incubator and
designing IP strategy. She is also helping her alma
mater, PSG Krishnammal College set up an incubator
at Annur and the Periyar Maniammai University at
Thanjavur to setup a Technology Business Incubator.
One of Radhika’s mentees was Krishna, an
entrepreneurship graduate from Babson’s College,
volunteering with Bhumi, an NGO working for the
upliftment of the poor. Krishna was setting up a
micro-entrepreneurship platform for residents
of Rasoolpura, a large slum in Hyderabad. With
Radhika’s support, she worked out a model where
micro-entrepreneurs like carpenters, electricians
and plumbers could team up to provide household
management services.
Though the group disbanded later when Krishna
moved out, Radhika considers the initiative a
success – she says, “It brought awareness of
entrepreneurship and showed how people can
work together.” They also brought out a database
of micro-entrepreneurs. Radhika continues her
association with Bhumi and its women’s Self Help
Groups, helping small entrepreneurs with advice
and funding leads.
Community impact
In 2009, Radhika attended ‘Tools for Growing
your Business’ , a Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women
Entrepreneurs’ Workshop. It provided faculty
participants with the content, delivery, and application
techniques to enable them to deliver a Growing Your
Business (GYB) workshop to women entrepreneurs in
their own communities. The Goldman Sach’s 10000
Women initiative seeks to expand “the entrepreneurial
talent and managerial pool in developing and emerging
economies - especially among women.”
In 2011, she followed up with the Kick-Starting Ventures
workshop. The course had John Mullins of London
Business School providing a framework for evaluating
business ideas and setting business goals. It helped
attendees provide mentoring and run short-duration
courses for entrepreneurs on the critical issues in
starting a new venture.
Radhika says, “The program opened up new
perspectives and opportunities with its hands-on
approach. It changed the
way I teach.” The program
attendees went through
several case studies and
mentoring dry runs.
Since then, Radhika has
engaged and taught nearly
1400 entrepreneur aspirants
over 27 workshops. Of
the 1400, more than 612
are women. She has also
conducted seven programs
for women entrepreneurs.
Radhika teaches the Acara
– IIHS course on Funding
for Social Entrepreneurs,
2 day program. She is the
facilitator for workshops at
National Institute of Micro,
Small and Medium Enterprises (NIMSME) conducted
for participants from India and other SAARC countries.
As a consultant for Association for Lady Entrepreneurs
of Andhra Pradesh (ALEAP), she supports Women’s Self
Help Groups and micro-entrepreneurs. ALEAP is a 20-
year old organization supporting women’s economic
empowerment. The CED division focuses on training
and consultancy for women entrepreneurs.
Radhika is working with Dr Reddy Foundation on
skills training, and supporting their Train the Trainer
program. She supports ventures with starting up,
business model, cost efciency for business process
etc.
Radhika’s programs reach out to rural corners of
Andhra Pradesh where she teaches ideation, business
modelling, costing and setting up of a venture. She
has also taken sessions in about 10 entrepreneurship
awareness camps across Ranga Reddy district,
Warangal, Ongole, Vijayawada, Tirupati, and Hyderabad
reaching out to more than 200-250 students each time.
Radhika also heads the South East Chapter of BYST, a
youth business mentorship organisation. They identify
young growth entrepreneurs, especially women, help
them get loan-ready. She was instrumental in getting
an MoU with Indian Overseas
Bank for loans for women
entrepreneurs. For instance,
she helped Usha, a young
businesswoman expand
her 12 year beauty parlour
operations, with a loan of Rs
6 lakhs. She is also helping
her refne her revenue model
beyond beauty services,
getting into retail sale of
beauty products.
Prof. Radhika Meenakshi is
a multi-faceted personality
and has created a strong
personal brand for herself,
over the years. With a
special focus on women
and MSMEs, she has helped
hundreds if not thousands
of entrepreneurs learn and execute better, as they
launched and build their businesses.
NEN IMPACT
• Developed a course in family business
for students
• Developed an Executive Education
Program in Entrepreneurship for the
Armed Forces.
• Supports a number of academic
institutes and non-profts. On the
advisory board of a few start-ups.
• Taught nearly 1400 entrepreneur
aspirants over 27 workshops. Of the
1400, more than 612 are women. She
has conducted seven programs for
women since August of 2011.
Faculty
Development
Courses
27
Developing Relevant Content
NEN’s venture life cycle framework maps the knowledge, skills and information needed at various stages
by entrepreneurs. Tis framework ofers a fairly simple way of mapping the needs of the learner at diferent
stages of entrepreneurship. Many needs span across the life cycle. However, as you will note, some are fairly
unique to particular stages of development of the venture.
Typically, the NEN foundation-level faculty development courses are around the pre venture and early
stages of venture life cycle and campus entrepreneurship essentials. NEN’s Advanced Topics and Mentor
Development Programs cover aspects relevant to early growth, growth and maturity stages of the venture
life cycle.
Entrepreneurial
Thinking
Opportunity
Stabilize Growth
Maturity/
Exit
Business Model
Managing your First
Customers
Revenue vs Capital
Expenditure, Working
Capital, Boot Strapping
Risk Awareness, Break-
even Analysis
Legal Aspects:
Registering a Company,
Early Stage
Compliances
Increasing Customer
Base
Startups - Strategies,
Techniques & Tools
Intellectual Property
Rights - What & How
to Manage IP
Preparing for
Growth: Acquiring
New Resources,
Establishing Processes
Early Stage
R
E
V
E
N
U
E
TIME
Exploratory Pre Venture
Startup Phase Post Survival
Break Even
Team Building, Sales, Project Management,
Managing Money
Company formaton- how
Accountng & Legal
compliances
Sources of money
for early stage cos.
Govt. schemes for
funding innovatons/
ideas
Seed Stage funders
Sources of money
for proto-typing &
testng the product
Techniques
Model Framework
Market Analysis
Techniques
Business Planning &
Risks & Rewards for
an Entrepreneur
Techniques to be
Typical Venture Life
Cycle
Visioning Growth
to Reach New Markets
Growth Financing: Sources of Finance
(Private Equity, Cash Flow, Debt)
Financial Statement Analysis
Advantage
Expanding the Team, Hiring and Retaining
Process & Systems Approach,
Pricing,
Networking
Book Value
Customer / Market
Driving your Product
Building a Team - Why
& How
Every Idea is not
an Opportunity,
Opportunity
Frameworks
Failure & its Fund raising: Going
public, VCs, Banks
Exit strategies: IPO,
Mergers, Partnerships;
Buyout/Sale
Entrepreneurial
Resourcefulness
Solving, Opportunity
Team Building,
Plan
Strategic Thinking
INFORMATION
N
E
N
C
O
U
R
S
E
S
Entrepreneurial Campus
3. Building Technology Ventures
It Right
3. Successful Growth: Project to Process
Retaining Talent
Advantage
Tools for Growth Venture Capital,
Angel Funding and Debt: Raising
Capital for your Entrepreneurial
Venture
Mentor Skills Finishing School
High Impact Infrastructure Design
Turnaround
Growth
Maturity
K
N
O
W
L
E
D
G
E
S
K
I
L
L
S
NEN VENTURE LIFE CYCLE APPROACH
IT tools for growing
businesses
IPR laws & guidelines,
Taxatons
Technology transfer facilites
Sources of new technologies
Growth stage funders
Entrepreneurial
Thinking
Opportunity
Stabilize Growth
Maturity/
Exit
Business Model
Managing your First
Customers
Revenue vs Capital
Expenditure, Working
Capital, Boot Strapping
Risk Awareness, Break-
even Analysis
Legal Aspects:
Registering a Company,
Early Stage
Compliances
Increasing Customer
Base
Startups - Strategies,
Techniques & Tools
Intellectual Property
Rights - What & How
to Manage IP
Preparing for
Growth: Acquiring
New Resources,
Establishing Processes
Early Stage
R
E
V
E
N
U
E
TIME
Exploratory Pre Venture
Startup Phase Post Survival
Break Even
Team Building, Sales, Project Management,
Managing Money
Company formaton- how
Accountng & Legal
compliances
Sources of money
for early stage cos.
Govt. schemes for
funding innovatons/
ideas
Seed Stage funders
Sources of money
for proto-typing &
testng the product
Techniques
Model Framework
Market Analysis
Techniques
Business Planning &
Risks & Rewards for
an Entrepreneur
Techniques to be
Typical Venture Life
Cycle
Visioning Growth
to Reach New Markets
Growth Financing: Sources of Finance
(Private Equity, Cash Flow, Debt)
Financial Statement Analysis
Advantage
Expanding the Team, Hiring and Retaining
Process & Systems Approach,
Pricing,
Networking
Book Value
Customer / Market
Driving your Product
Building a Team - Why
& How
Every Idea is not
an Opportunity,
Opportunity
Frameworks
Failure & its Fund raising: Going
public, VCs, Banks
Exit strategies: IPO,
Mergers, Partnerships;
Buyout/Sale
Entrepreneurial
Resourcefulness
Solving, Opportunity
Team Building,
Plan
Strategic Thinking
INFORMATION
N
E
N
C
O
U
R
S
E
S
Entrepreneurial Campus
3. Building Technology Ventures
It Right
3. Successful Growth: Project to Process
Retaining Talent
Advantage
Tools for Growth Venture Capital,
Angel Funding and Debt: Raising
Capital for your Entrepreneurial
Venture
Mentor Skills Finishing School
High Impact Infrastructure Design
Turnaround
Growth
Maturity
K
N
O
W
L
E
D
G
E
S
K
I
L
L
S
NEN VENTURE LIFE CYCLE APPROACH
IT tools for growing
businesses
IPR laws & guidelines,
Taxatons
Technology transfer facilites
Sources of new technologies
Growth stage funders
28
Entrepreneurial
Thinking
Opportunity
Stabilize Growth
Business Model
Managing your First
Customers
Revenue vs Capital
Expenditure, Working
Capital, Boot Strapping
Risk Awareness, Break-
even Analysis
Legal Aspects:
Registering a Company,
Early Stage
Compliances
Increasing Customer
Base
Startups - Strategies,
Techniques & Tools
Intellectual Property
Rights - What & How
to Manage IP
Preparing for
Growth: Acquiring
New Resources,
Establishing Processes
Team Building, Sales, Project Management,
Managing Money
Company formaton- how
Accountng & Legal
compliances
Sources of money
for early stage cos.
Govt. schemes for
funding innovatons/
ideas
Seed Stage funders
Sources of money
for proto-typing &
testng the product
Techniques
Model Framework
Market Analysis
Techniques
Business Planning &
Risks & Rewards for
an Entrepreneur
Techniques to be
Typical Venture Life
Cycle
Visioning Growth
to Reach New Markets
Growth Financing: Sources of Finance
(Private Equity, Cash Flow, Debt)
Financial Statement Analysis
Advantage
Expanding the Team, Hiring and Retaining
Process & Systems Approach,
Pricing,
Networking
Book Value
Customer / Market
Driving your Product
Building a Team - Why
& How
Every Idea is not
an Opportunity,
Opportunity
Frameworks
Failure & its Fund raising: Going
public, VCs, Banks
Exit strategies: IPO,
Mergers, Partnerships;
Buyout/Sale
Entrepreneurial
Resourcefulness
Solving, Opportunity
Team Building,
Plan
Strategic Thinking
INFORMATION
K
N
O
W
L
E
D
G
E
S
K
I
L
L
S
IT tools for growing
businesses
IPR laws & guidelines,
Taxatons
Technology transfer facilites
Sources of new technologies
Growth stage funders
Maturity/
Exit
Exploratory Pre Venture Startup Phase Post Survival Expansion Sustain
NEN VENTURE LIFE CYCLE APPROACH: KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS MAP
29
NEN Faculty Development Courses Portfolio
Faculty transformation and development
NEN faculty members, equipped by its Faculty Development Programs, are
at the forefront, leading the entrepreneurship ecosystem development in their
own campuses and in the community; creating and supporting entrepreneurs
and contributing to economic development through indirect creation of jobs.
NEN’s Faculty Development Programs are ofered in four categories:
Foundation Courses, Advanced Topics, High Impact Infrastructure Design,
and Mentor Development.
30
Foundation Courses
Foundation courses provide orientation on entrepreneurship and establish
the relevance of entrepreneurship to students, institutes and faculty. Core
concepts and frameworks are taught using experiential, participant-centric
outbound exercises, games, videos, cases and expert interactions.
Tese programs also provide key inputs around entrepreneurship program
design and build the ability to develop and lead a wide range of activities on
campus such as workshops, courses, internships and campus companies.
Who should apply
Tese courses are appropriate for faculty members who are new to
entrepreneurship education and interested in implementing programs
that help students develop a solid foundation of entrepreneurial skills
and knowledge. It helps them understand how to start with creating the
entrepreneurship ecosystem on campus.
31
a. NEN Orientation Program
Tis program introduces faculty to the exciting world of entrepreneurship
education, where innovative teaching methods and content energizes young
people, unleashing their talents and ambitions. Te program covers the
components of an entrepreneurship ecosystem on campus and the lifecycle
of a venture. It outlines fundamental entrepreneurial skills and concepts,
and introduces faculty to exercises and games they can run as-is in order
to build awareness and engagement among students. Most importantly, the
Orientation Program connects faculty to colleagues across the country and
introduces them to NEN resources. It also outlines their role as NEN faculty
leaders.
b. Kick-starting the Entrepreneurial Campus
Tis particular module equips faculty members to run engaging
entrepreneurship programs – that go beyond generating awareness and
actually begin developing key skills and knowledge. Te course provides solid
grounding in efective entrepreneurship teaching methodologies with an
emphasis on experiential learning. Faculty members who undergo this course
are able to design, develop and run programs that arm students with basic
entrepreneurship skills including idea generation, opportunity evaluation,
business modelling, creating back-of-the envelope cash fows, negotiation and
sales.
c. Building Technology Ventures
Tis course has been designed exclusively for engineering and technology
faculty. It unravels the entrepreneurial process for technology ventures and
integrates entrepreneurship into engineering education. Te course equips
faculty with skills necessary to enable students translate an idea into a
fundable technology business. It focuses on identifying the commercial value
of innovations which might otherwise remain prototypes. Te emphasis is on
building the capacity of a technology entrepreneur, assessing need opportunity,
developing a marketable product, patenting and licensing, building the right
team, raising money and creating value for the customer and the venture. It
contains experiential activities and insights from experts required for creating
real world scalable technology ventures in the real world.
I thank
the entire NEN
community - for
organizing such
invaluable sessions,
for both entrepreneurs
and those interested
in the area. Beyond
just learning and
networking, such
experiences are
extremely refreshing
and open our minds to
a whole new world of
ideas.“
- Sangeetha Deiveegarajan,
Faculty Mentor,
Great Lakes Wealth Advisors,
Chennai
32
Advanced Topics
Advanced Topics courses ofer in-depth knowledge and skills to faculty on
key aspects crucial to start-ups – business models, sales, getting to market,
raising money, building a team, managing cash and IP management. Tese
courses involve application of core concepts and frameworks to solve issues
along the early and growth stage of the venture. Advanced pedagogies with
live entrepreneur cases, investors and experts, case studies on emerging
economies, tools and videos are used in the classroom. Emphasis is on
immediate application of learning in the classroom and practicing on campus.
Who should apply
Tese courses are suitable for faculty members with some experience in
entrepreneurship education who are keen on advancing their knowledge and
helping entrepreneurs successfully start-up and manage their ventures.
33
Had a
very knowledgeable
three days and my
understanding of
numbers has defnitely
increased. Tis
platform gave me a
complete new opening
with three days of out-
of-the-box thinking,
networking with many
faculty members and
entrepreneurs, and
sharing ideas, all of
which will probably be
life changers for me.”
— Jaya Nagarmath,
Entrepreneur
Investor Shoppee, Mumbai
a. Business Models and Business Plans
An intensive three-day program, the Business Models and Business Plans
program equips faculty with the necessary knowledge to guide entrepreneurs
and students in understanding the key elements of a business concept. Using
case studies, videos and research materials, participants learn to assess
business opportunities, examine fnancing options, design business models,
and fnally, write structured business plans. By the end of the program, faculty
will have a solid understanding of the key diferences between business plans
and models and what goes into building each.
b. Getting to Market: Commercializing Your
Idea
Te toughest hurdle for many entrepreneurs is getting their products of the
drawing board and into the marketplace.
• How do you acquire your frst customer?
• How do you price your product or service?
• How do you build your customer base?
are some of the most common concerns entrepreneurs usually have. Restricted
by limited capital, connections and resources, they must come up with innovative
solutions. Tese apply to product uniqueness, market research, development,
pricing and marketing. Getting to Market efectively explores these challenges
and arms faculty with an assortment of tools and techniques to help entrepreneurs
overcome them in as cost efective and time efcient manner as possible.
c. Venture Capital, Angel Funding and Debt:
Raising Capital for Your Entrepreneurial
Venture
Tis program addresses key questions that challenge all entrepreneurs: how
much money can and should be raised, when should it be raised and from
whom, what is a reasonable valuation of the company, and how should funding
be structured? Tis course comprehensively explores the fnancial tools needed
by an entrepreneur in starting his or her own business. By studying real-life
business cases and learning from professors, investors and entrepreneurs,
participants gain insights into both the investors’ and entrepreneurs’ points of
view in funding a venture. Participants also get a practical framework they can
use to secure investment for high potential businesses.
d. Successful Growth: Project to Process
In most start-ups, the intense demand on the entrepreneur’s time and resources
makes the concept of spending time on process seem a luxury. Process
however is actually a ‘force multiplier’. When implemented efectively, good
business processes streamline a start-up’s daily operations, bring in efciency,
34
While I was
teaching marketing
and management
studies, it was only
because of NEN that
I started to bring in
the entrepreneurship
element. Te many
programs conducted
by NEN have
helped me a lot
in understanding
and appreciating
entrepreneurs.
Whenever I have asked
a mentee to approach
NEN, I have always
received support.”
— Haseena Sayed,
Associate Professor and NEN
Faculty Mentor, Jai Hind
College, Mumbai
and allow the entrepreneur to focus on matters of higher importance. In
Successful Growth: Project to Process, participants explore the critical
frameworks required to build efective processes involving all key business
functions in a start-up. Successful graduates of this unique program gain the
skills, confdence and knowledge required to help entrepreneurs build robust
systems and processes that vastly expand organizational capabilities.
e. Building Start-up Organizations: Hiring
and Retaining Talent
Knowing how companies recruit and manage their people is particularly
important for entrepreneurs. It is true that competitive advantage ofen comes
from acquiring and employing human assets efectively. In this background,
Building Organizations and Managing People for Strategic Advantage helps
participants systematically and strategically explore complex aspects of
managing an organization's human assets. For many entrepreneurs, the most
pressing challenges are how to locate and recruit talented people, how to
manage and keep them, and how to build a high growth, long-term, sustainable
frm. Te course provides a good understanding of how to overcome these
challenges by addressing four critical areas: organizational architecture for
strategic advantage, leadership and motivation, team building, and negotiation
in entrepreneurial settings.
f. IP Strategies for Building Competitive
Advantage
In today’s fercely competitive world, it isn’t enough for entrepreneurs
to just innovate and execute. Tey must also actively adopt strategies to
protect and exploit their innovations. IP Strategies for Building Competitive
Advantage reveals the dynamics of Intellectual Property (IP) and lays bare
the fundamental IP concepts and legal and business strategies applicable to
start-ups. By the end of the program, faculty members are equipped to help
entrepreneurs identify their IP assets and design efective IP strategies to
achieve organizational objectives.
g. Practical Ethics: Succeeding in a
Transparent World
Tis is a unique course built on the foundation of Giving Voice to Values
(GVV), a research and curriculum development program housed and
supported by Babson College. Te course is designed to enable participants
evaluate the importance of ethics with the intention of identifying and
practicing actionable strategies for value driven leadership. Graduates of this
course gain an introduction to the GVV curricular development process and
are capable of helping entrepreneurs identify what is right and also making
it happen. Tey learn how to help individuals build and practice the skills
needed to recognize, speak and act on their values when conficts arise.
35
For the campus entrepreneurship ecosystem to mature and realize the
potential to create and support entrepreneurs, advance infrastructure in the
form of innovation centers, incubators and entrepreneurship support centers
need to be developed. High-impact Infrastructure Design courses address
this need for greater in-depth knowledge and exposure for faculty involved in
initiating and establishing infrastructure on campus. Tese programs enable
them to understand the means and dynamics of infrastructure development
and to strive to make these platforms world class.
Who should apply
Tese programs are appropriate for faculty members who are seriously
involved in building the campus entrepreneurship ecosystem and are desirous
of setting up the requisite infrastructure on campus to create and support
entrepreneurs.
High Impact Infrastructure Design
36
Faculty who
have attended the
NEN led courses are
able to get students
enthused about
entrepreneurship.
Tey are able to
convince students,
clarify doubts, impart
skills and provide
valuable inputs. And
they are able to do
this very efectively.
More importantly, the
students are convinced
that their faculty have
the knowledge to
guide them. Terefore,
the impact is very, very
large.”
— Dr. Kerron Reddy,
CEO, Acharya Institute of
Management and Sciences,
Bangalore
a. Developing Advanced Infrastructure:
IEDC/EDCs, Mentoring Units and Incubators
Te Advanced Infrastructure program arms faculty members with the
know-how for securing funds from government agencies to create advanced
infrastructure and skills that are required to design and implement innovation
driven entrepreneurship programs on campus. Tese programs engage
students in exploring entrepreneurial opportunities, practicing starting a
venture and commercializing innovations. Each of these programs enables
students to innovate, develop practical insights, experiences and skills to start
enterprises, obtain mentoring support and incubate their ventures on campus.
b. Building IP in Academic Campuses
Tis course helps faculty members equip themselves to guide, protect as well
as leverage technology innovations by students on campus. Tey explore
types of innovation in India and in diferent technology campuses across
the globe, patterns of technology development and efects of the internal
and external environment on innovations. Tis course emphasizes the need
for protecting IP through patenting and provides the information to do so
successfully. Faculty members become familiar with the process of patenting
and the nuances in patent protection. Tey undergo a hands-on workshop
that illustrates the steps involved in patent search as a frst step towards
preparing to protect IP. Various ways to monetize IP as investment collateral
through commercialization, technology transfer and licensing are also dealt
with alongside the fundamentals of creating an IP policy. Faculty members
get to know how to reach out to resources such as consultants and IP experts
to successfully build and protect IP.
c. Tools for Successful Business Incubation
Business incubation is a popular tool in entrepreneurship development.
However, while it may be easy to set up the physical facility, efective incubation
is extremely difcult to implement. Business incubator programs are designed
to help accelerate the development of entrepreneurial companies by providing
entrepreneurs with not only facilities, but also the expertise, networks and
tools they need to make their ventures successful. Tools for Successful Business
Incubation helps faculty members understand the requirements of a successful
business incubator program and equips them with the necessary resources.
Te course covers the most common needs of start-up entrepreneurial frms,
the barriers they face, and inputs on how business incubators can promote
their development.
37
Within academic institutes, the faculty plays a critical role
as the frst point of contact for young students aspiring
to be entrepreneurs. Tese faculty members, particularly
those with industry or entrepreneurial background, when
trained, exposed and provided experience progressively,
become efective entrepreneur mentors. NEN Mentor
Development Programs cover concepts and skills of
entrepreneurship along the venture life cycle, the best
teaching methods for entrepreneurs, an understanding
of how to mentor new and practicing entrepreneurs, how
to develop networks and match external resources to the
needs of entrepreneurs.
Te wide range of NEN’s mentor development training
programs is characterized by:
» Multiple levels of intervention, such as
• Classroom orientation
• Practice sessions
• Apprenticeship for structured mentoring
engagement
• Sharing of best practices
» Diverse approach and treatment to efectively
deal with
• ‘Wannabe’ entrepreneurs
• New start-ups and growth-stage entrepreneurs
» Multi-layered and progressive nature of
• Topics based on stage of venture
• Depth of subject matter covered depending on
the audience
Who should apply
Tese courses are suitable for faculty members with
experience in entrepreneurship education and those who
are passionate about and keen on advancing their skills
to help entrepreneurs tackle challenges faced at various
stages of their venture’s development.
Mentor Development Programs
38
a. Mentoring Skills Finishing
School (MSFS)
Tis is a proactive two-day course ofered to select faculty
members on recommendation by the NEN consulting
team based on the faculty’s on-the-ground performance.
Te course is specifcally designed to enable participants
work efciently with entrepreneurs in the pre-venture
and early stage of the venture. Eligibility for this course
depends upon efective implementation of what has been
learnt in the foundation and advance courses undertaken
earlier by the faculty.
Topics include opportunity evaluation, business models,
business planning, estimation of fnances, raising money
and customer development. Further, mentor observation
sessions and practice mentoring sessions enable faculty
members to improve their grasp on the subject and its
applicability. Individual attention during the course and
continued one-to-one support afer the course while
the mentoring apprenticeship is on, ensures that faculty
members gain substantial mentoring knowledge and
skills from the course.
b. Entrepreneur Educator and
Mentor Round Tables
For impact to be realized, entrepreneur educators and
mentors need to have not only knowledge and skills
but networks too. Tese educators with industry or
entrepreneurial background, when trained, exposed
and provided with opportunities to network, become
efective mentors. One of the important ways in which
faculty members can hone their skills is by networking
among themselves and sharing their experiences and best
practices of training and mentoring entrepreneurs.
Select educators and mentors from the community
are brought together on this platform to facilitate this
in addition to gathering inputs for devising newer
engagement methodologies with entrepreneurs. While
interacting with one another, faculty members gain
new connections and knowledge from the exchange of
impactful mentoring and training practices.
c. Tools for Growth
Tere are certain points in a venture’s development
where entrepreneurs need the most help - certainly while
starting up and ofen as they grow, Mentors therefore
need to be prepared to work with entrepreneurs at the
latter stage to help them assess growth opportunities,
learn how to manage cash for growth, and develop the
required organizational capabilities. Tools for Growth
is a unique, hands-on course developed in partnership
with London Business School, under the Goldman Sachs
10,000 Women Program. During the multiple modules
of the course, faculty members work with entrepreneur
participants - immediately applying the tools they are
learning and helping entrepreneurs develop action
plans to use the tools and techniques to address growth
challenges.
d. Kick-starting Ventures
In this module, participants learn how to mentor start-
up ventures. During the intense, hands-on course,
participants gain a very good understanding of many of
the vital issues related to starting a high-potential start-up
including assessing opportunities, testing business plans
and understanding organizational requirements for the
early stages of company growth. Trough case studies,
working with entrepreneurs and hands-on exercises,
participants build their ability to coach new entrepreneurs
through to manage obstacles while deciding whether
to start the venture, developing the right strategy, and
actually launching the business. During the course,
faculty members work with entrepreneur participants
in developing an action plan to apply the tools and
techniques learned, to the entrepreneur’s starting up
challenges. Te course was developed in partnership with
the London Business School under the Goldman Sachs
10,000 Women Program.
Te mentoring support I have received
from the NEN Faculty has been crucial to
my success. Apart from introducing me to
new costing techniques, my mentor gave me
practical insights on expanding my supplier
base – an issue I had been struggling with for
a while. In just four months of mentoring,
not only has my production doubled, but my
revenue has jumped by 25 percent!”
— Mohit Soni, Entrepreneur
Baba Metal Works, Nanded, Maharashtra
With his evangelical enthusiasm towards
entrepreneurship and support from NEN, Prof.
Soumya Chakraborty mentors entrepreneurs,
helping them network and connect to the larger
entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Connecting Young Entrepreneurs to the Ecosystem
Bhupesh Sharma is shrinking the traditional windmill. His start-up Breson
specialises in designing small wind turbines and pumps. His small windmills
can be placed on rooftops and can be used as a backup power option. They
are expected to become a cost-efective solution for generating renewable
energy at cheaper rates for the retail market.
Bhupesh, a former Business Design student at the We School, Bangalore,
had won the top position at NEN Tata First Dot in 2012. Prof. Soumya
Chakraborty, his mentor, points out Bhupesh’s success as an example of
how a student venture can thrive in a conducive entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Bhupesh, who attributes much of his success to active mentoring by
the faculty at his institute, developed the idea in his campus. A series of
brainstorming sessions between the two resulted in Bhupesh taking
to piloting his product in the corporate market frst rather than directly
entering the retail sector. Further, through his mentor’s network and leads,
Bhupesh was successful in getting a few customers too.
Attending NEN’s Entrepreneurship Educator’s Course (EEC) during 2007-08,
while a faculty at ISBR Business School, Bangalore, got Soumya interested in
teaching entrepreneurship. He soon started conducting entrepreneurship-
related workshops for students. Under his stewardship, Innocentive, ISBR’s
E Cell, become the national champions at NEN’s Entrepreneurship Week
India, 2009, from among 400 institutes from 30 cities!
Currently Manager – Management Development Centre and Faculty - HR
and OB at the Bangalore campus of We School (formerly Welingkar Institute
of Management Development and Research), Bangalore, Prof. Soumya is
an NEN-certifed entrepreneurship mentor.
Now, in his ffth year at We School, he is focusing on evangelizing
entrepreneurship to students. He notes, “Out of 15 students who evince
interest in entrepreneurship, at least one of them turns out to be serious
about entrepreneurship.”
Upon joining We School, Soumya worked on resuscitating the defunct
E Cell Praarambh on campus. The E Cell, though functioning informally,
responds to request for help from students keen on venturing into
Prof. Soumya
brings a spirit of
academic enquiry into
our discussions forcing
us to address elements
in our business model
which we would have
otherwise ignored.
He has been most
generous in opening
up his network to us,
thereby expanding our
access to experienced
individuals in our
sector.
—Suneel Pillai, Founder,
Kollido, Bangalore
business. Recently, students Karan and Madhur got
support to start a waste management venture; they are
piloting a plan to process waste into compost and have
already started getting revenues.
With NEN’s guidance, We School has taken a holistic
approach to developing entrepreneurship. The institute
has programs to create awareness on entrepreneurship,
programs that hand-hold students starting up as well
as several classroom and experiential programs. Along
with his colleague Dr. Madhavi Lokhande, Soumya has
organized entrepreneurship workshops, and other
events, like Pappu Can’t Sell Sala – an initiation program
into entrepreneurship for the junior batch at We School,
Srijan – a business plan contest and E Idiots – an inter-
college entrepreneurship festival.
Soumya has, like other evangelical faculty in the NEN
network, built and enhanced his own knowledge
and understanding of entrepreneurship through
the NEN Faculty development programs. He
acknowledges the Kickstarting Your Ventures program
that helped him gain an understanding of critical
issues in starting a high-potential startup, including
assessing opportunities, testing business plans, and
understanding organizational requirements of early-
stage companies.
The Tools for Growth
workshop prepared
him to work with
entrepreneurs at the
growth stage - to help
them assess growth
opportunities; learn
how to manage cash for
growth; and develop the
required organizational
capabilities.
Soumya credits the
support received from
NEN. “I think the whole
support system that NEN
has created for faculty is
excellent!” He adds that
the advantage of NEN’s
faculty training programs
is that these have a very clear outcome-oriented
structure, which enables the faculty to implement
the learning on campus. He cites an example, “After
we did the Entrepreneur Educator Course, we went
back and actually designed a course for (student)
entrepreneurship.”
Soumya has put the knowledge gained over the years
through NEN programs and through peer interaction
to good use - he is closely associated with a unique
prototype and innovation lab on We School Bangalore
campus, which is based on the InnoWe lab at We
School, Mumbai.
Over the years, Soumya has mentored a dozen student
entrepreneurs. He is currently mentoring a couple of
students and a couple of young entrepreneurs. One of
them is an IIMC alumnus who has founded an internet
start-up which provides information on various
products available for rent in diferent cities. The
young entrepreneur is working with Soumya to handle
challenges like scalability and managing demand.
Another entrepreneur Soumya is mentoring, is Suneel
Pillai, founder of a soon to-be-launched online platform.
Suneel acknowledges his support in helping him redo
his business model, “Prof. Soumya has been involved
with our start-up from
the very beginning and
he brings a spirit of
academic enquiry into
our discussions forcing
us to address elements
in our business model
which we would have
otherwise ignored.”
Even more importantly,
Soumya opened up
his network to the
young team, thereby
expanding their access to
experienced individuals
in the sector.
NEN’s vast network
enables students and
mentors to tap into
various leads, be it for
NEN IMPACT
• Designed a short course on entrepreneurship
for MBA students
• Helped setup a prototype and innovation lab
on Bangalore campus
• Mentored many community entrepreneurs and
graduate entrepreneurs
• Maximized connects for entrepreneurs to
network resources including funding, expertise
etc.
• NEN faculty expert and facilitator for diferent
entrepreneurship programs across Bangalore
• Develops and customises entrepreneurship
programs for various academic institutes.
funding or industry expertise or potential customers.
Soumya credits the support of the NEN network that
facilitated an automotive electronics start-up he was
mentoring, get funded by the startup accelerator
Morpheus.
As an NEN Faculty Leader, Soumya has acquired the
capability to develop programs as per the need and
requirement of B-School campuses across the country.
Invited to be part of the NEN Entrepreneurship Educator
Panel, Prof. Soumya works as a resource in developing
courseware and training entrepreneurship educators in
and around Bangalore.
Personal Growth
Formerly an Assistant Professor in Corporate Relations
with ISBR Business School, Bangalore, Soumya worked
in recruitment before getting back to academics.
His initiation into NEN and interactions with
entrepreneurs helped Soumya realize that he was
enjoying the experience while also learning a lot in
the process. One of the direct outcomes of working
with various entrepreneurs on their projects is that his
network is constantly expanding to include venture
capitalists, entrepreneurs, non-profts and experts in
the ecosystem. Another efect of NEN’s programs is the
transformation in his teaching style which has become
highly experiential and includes a number of case
studies and activities.
Over the years, Soumya has transformed into a strong
entrepreneurship educator and mentor, utilizing
NEN’s training and content resources, and the several
opportunities he has had to network with peers and
share best practices with international and national
experts.
He was awarded the Ramaswamy P Aiyar – Best Young
Teacher Award 2013 as recognition of his immense
contribution to teaching, innovative pedagogy,
executive education, international collaborations,
student mentoring and development, research and
entrepreneurial support.
Ask him what the core of being an entrepreneurship
faculty is, and Soumya says, “You need to have
entrepreneurial passion, without which you cannot
go and teach entrepreneurship. If you don’t love the
subject, you can’t teach it.”
Te
NEN
Community
45
Content Contributors
Faculty who have signifcantly contributed to NEN’s content and faculty development resources over
the past years include:
Edward Rubesch
Faculty Member of Entrepreneurship, Director of Centre for Sustainable Enterprise, Tammasat
University, Tailand
Edward Rubesch combines a mixture of practical and academic entrepreneurial experience. A
founder of four companies, he also assists the Director of the Technology Licensing Ofce for
Tailand’s National Science and Technology Development Agency. He holds a Master of Science
degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a PhD from Tammasat University.
He is active in academic research in the areas of entrepreneurship and innovation in developing
countries.
John Mullins
Associate Professor of Management Practice in Entrepreneurship and Marketing at the London Business
School, UK
An award-winning teacher and facilitator, John Mullins brings to his teaching and research 20 years
of executive experience in high growth American retailing frms including the two ventures he
founded and the one he took public. He has authored two defning books for entrepreneurs, Te
New Business Road Test and Getting to Plan B. John has served on the boards of many fast growing
entrepreneurial companies, and consults with and ofers executive education in fve continents.
He earned his MBA at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and his PhD at the University of
Minnesota.
When we work in emerging economies, we at NEN are
very conscious of two things:
1) Our faculty and entrepreneurs deserve the best and
need to be at the cutting edge of thinking and learning,
and
2) Not everything that is applicable in the West can
directly be applied in an emerging economy.
We ensure that we constantly stay tuned to the needs
of our audience by taking the following approach to
developing or curating the right content, pedagogy
and methodologies - we identify leading thinkers in
entrepreneurship learning from across the world with
original, useful conceptual frameworks and practical
content. We then work with them to blend these
frameworks and pieces of content with the needs of
entrepreneurs and faculty in emerging economies, using
appropriate teaching tools and methodologies that make
them most useful.
Contributing faculty with whom NEN has co-designed,
or co-opted its programs have come from Stanford,
London Business School, Babson, Indian Institutes of
Management – Ahmedabad and Bangalore, Indian
Institute of Technology – Bombay and Kanpur, University
of Columbia, and Tammassat University, Tailand,
among others.
46
Murray Low
Director of Entrepreneurship Education, Te Eugene Lang Entrepreneurship Center, Columbia Business
School, USA
Murray Low is an experienced entrepreneur and a leading authority on entrepreneurship in
independent, corporate and not-for-proft settings. As the founder of the Columbia Entrepreneurship
Program, he has worked to make entrepreneurship a viable career option for MBA graduates. He has
also worked to improve business education in developing countries, particularly in Africa. He has
published widely in academic and practitioner journals and is a regular commentator in the media. He
holds an MBA and a PhD from the University of Pennsylvania.
Tina Seelig
Professor, Dept of Management Science and Engineering (MS&E), Executive Director for the Stanford
Technology Ventures Program (STVP), the entrepreneurship centre, Stanford University, USA
Tina Seelig teaches courses on creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship and has won several awards,
including the Gordon Prize which recognizes her as a national leader in engineering education, and the
2008 National Olympus Innovation Award. She has written 16 popular science books and educational
games. Her latest books are What I Wish I Knew When I Was 20 (2009), and inGenius: A Crash Course
on Creativity (2012). She earned her PhD from Stanford University Medical School where she studied
neuroscience.
Radhika Meenakshi
Founder, Wise Owl Consulting, Hyderabad, India
Radhika Meenakshi has over 20 years of teaching and consulting experience at reputed academic
institutes. She heads several entrepreneurship bodies and specializes in working with MSMEs
and women entrepreneurs. Her work can be described as a viral campaign for entrepreneurship,
transgressing languages, regions and scale of ventures reaching hundreds of entrepreneurs.
She actively mentors student start-ups and community entrepreneurs. She holds a PhD in
entrepreneurship.
Rajeev Roy
Entrepreneurship Program Consultant, Oman
Rajeev Roy has a blend of industry and entrepreneurial experience. His entrepreneurial ventures range
from food processing, dairy, aquaculture and micro fnance to business process outsourcing. He has
authored a book titled Entrepreneurship, several papers on entrepreneurship and has written over 80
case studies. He regularly conducts Entrepreneurship Development Programs in Chile and Canada,
and at the Sellinger Business School at Baltimore, USA. Rajeev holds an MBA from IIM, Ahmedabad
and a PhD from Utkal University.
Raj Shankar
Principal Business Strategist, Ichiban Business Consultants, Chennai, India
Raj Shankar is the co-founder of Ichiban, a global management consultancy. He spearheads
business innovation consulting and technology consulting practices. An author of three books on
entrepreneurship, he is an avid blogger, columnist and researcher. He is a visiting faculty at various
colleges in India, and works with business incubators to mentor start-ups. A certifed NEN mentor, he
holds an MBA from the Symbiosis Institute of International Business, Pune.
47
Rakesh Basant
Professor of Economics and Chairperson, Center for Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship at IIM
Ahmedabad, India
Rakesh Basant is an accomplished economist who is passionate about innovation and entrepreneurship.
He specializes in science and technology and in patents. He has been a consultant to various
organizations including the World Bank. As a recipient of the Ford Foundation’s post-doctoral
fellowship in economics, he was a visiting research fellow at the Economic Growth Center, Yale
University, USA. He has published widely. He received his PhD from Gujarat University, Ahmedabad.
Somayajulu Garimella
Professor, Marketing, SP Jain Institute of Management and Research, Mumbai, India
Somayajulu Garimella is a graduate of world-class entrepreneurship educator courses, including
Entrepreneurship Education Colloquium on Participant Centered Learning (EECPCL) at Harvard
Business School, Boston, Certifcate Course for Entrepreneurship Trainers (CEPT) by ISB, Hyderabad,
and Entrepreneurship Educators Course (EEC) by NEN. He regularly consults with and mentors
start-up frms. He holds an MBA from University of Texas and a PhD in Management from Osmania
University.
C Amarnath
Professor and PI, Society of Innovation and
Entrepreneurship, IIT Bombay
Ashish Pande y
Assistant Professor of OB/HRM, Shailesh J School of
Management, IIT Bombay
B V Ph ani
Associate Professor, Finance & Entrepreneurship,
Coordinator, SIDBI Innovation Incubation Center, IIT
Kanpur
Deepak Roy
Head, Center of Excellence - Entrepreneurship
Development, SCMHRD, Pune
DVR Seshadri
Adjunct Faculty , Strategy and Marketing, IIM Bangalore
Hema Krishnamurthy
Visiting Faculty, Finance and Accounting, IIM Bangalore
and Ranchi
James Barlow
Director of Entrepreneurial Leadership, Tufs University
Mary Gentile
Director, Giving Voice to Values and Sr Research Scholar,
Babson College
Poyni Bhat
Chief Operating Ofcer, SINE, IIT B
Purvi Seth
CEO, Shilputsi Consultants, Mumbai
Raj Bhat
Chief Evangelist at enterprisers.in and Chief Knowledge
ofcer at Ourea Capital Advisors and Entrepreneur Trainer
and Mentor, Mumbai
Rajeev S
Director at Asian School of Business and Visiting faculty
IIM Bangalore and Ahmedabad
Rama Velamuri
Professor of Entrepreneurship and Chair of the Department
of Strategy and Entrepreneurship, CEIBS, Shangai
Vasanti Venugopal
Entrepreneurship Educator and Researcher, Bangalore
University
Other faculty include
A unique aspect of the NEN Faculty
development programs is the wonderful mix of
talent you meet in class, comprising entrepreneurs,
and faculty from various felds. Tis fosters diverse
perspectives and strengthens learning. Today the
way we handle entrepreneurship topics in class has
truly transformed.
Being a NEN faculty gives you a great sense of
pride and happiness in terms of contributing
something great which could ignite the mind and
create future leaders who in turn make a great
impact on the society at large.”
Prof.Arya Kumar,
Chief, Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership, BITS Pilani
Te NEN Community
National Entrepreneurship Network (NEN) inspires, educates and supports high-potential entrepreneurs to create
high-value jobs. NEN does this by building institutional capacity and a robust entrepreneurial eco-system.
The Trust
Initiated in 2003 by the Wadhwani Foundation, the non-proft NEN was co-founded with IIT Bombay, IIM
Ahmedabad, BITS-Pilani, SP Jain Institute of Management & Research, and the Institute of Bioinformatics and Applied
Biotechnology, Bangalore.
NEN’s operations in India are managed by K Srikrishna, its Executive Director. Trustees include Dr. Romesh Wadhwani,
Chairman of the Wadhwani Foundation and Sunita Singh, Co-founder and Senior Director of NEN.
The Network
Today, NEN represents India’s largest and most vibrant entrepreneurial community. Te backbone of the NEN
Community comprises of more than 550 member academic institutes with 1200 entrepreneurship faculty and 400
student E Cells; NEN E Clubs, driven by the NEN Alumni and open to the public. Tese bodies organize an astonishing
breadth and depth of programs across the country that create and support entrepreneurs. In addition, the NEN
members support each other individually to realize their entrepreneurial ambitions.
Wadhwani Foundation
Founded in 2003, the Wadhwani Foundation embarked upon its mission of economic acceleration by focusing on
leveraging India’s growing human potential. Subsequently, the Foundation expanded into the US and other countries.
India is expected to add 250-300 million people to the workforce by 2022. It is imperative that large-scale job creation
and skill development supported by public policies are needed not only to accelerate economic growth but also to avoid
demographic disaster.
During the last decade, Wadhwani Foundation launched fve major initiatives in India to address the above need
by promoting entrepreneurial and career skills, creating opportunities for the disabled, encouraging innovation, and
catalyzing policy changes.
In the US, to address the persistently high youth and displaced-worker unemployment issue, Wadhwani Foundation
launched the ‘Race to a Job’ initiative in 2012. Tis initiative leverages technology to bridge the gap between the skills
acquired in high schools and community colleges and those required by the industry.
50
NEN Partners
Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women Program have partnered with NEN for specifc programs in women’s leadership and
mentoring and training of women.
NEN maintains a public-private partnership with the Government of India through its Department of Science and
Technology (DST). Tis partnership goes to support NEN’s capacity building work and training of entrepreneurs. NEN
is the primary driver for a joint program currently underway to develop best practices, metrics and methodologies for
successful incubation and innovation programs in India’s engineering institutions.
Amongst corporations, the Tata Group has been a consistent supporter and partner of NEN across multiple years
actively building the entrepreneurial eco-system in India particularly by creating a key recognition and showcase
platform for student entrepreneurs and young start-ups.
Technology giant IBM has also supported NEN over multiple years including NEN’s mentoring platform. IBM
scientists, management and employees across the organization have actively volunteered their time to work towards
mentoring and helping entrepreneurs.
SAP Global has partnered with NEN to focus on continually building up more mentoring capacity and plan to impact
entrepreneur growth positively by creating and supporting high quality mentors.
Fab Women Foundation Trust works with NEN to identify bottlenecks and challenges in women entrepreneurs’
growth and scale-up, and to provide support to overcome these barriers and achieve their growth potential.
Helion Venture Partners, Facebook and Intuit have been other corporate supporters and sponsors of various NEN
Activities. Microsof partners with NEN to provide entrepreneurs with access to development tools through its
Dreamspark and Bizspark initiatives.
Support from these organizations has enabled NEN to train almost 2000 individual faculty members over the past
seven years; many of these individuals have multiple levels of training and skill enhancement support.
As a result of their knowledge and growing interest in entrepreneurship, NEN today has a network of more than 1200
faculty members in India who are supporting entrepreneurship development in diferent ways on academic campuses.
Additionally, NEN has been able to provide scholarships partially or fully covering their course participation fee to a
large number of these faculty members thanks to support from partners.
doc_876874397.pdf
Venturing Into Entrepreneurship Education
1
Contents
Venturing into Entrepreneurship Education 10
Focus on Capacity Building 15
NEN Faculty Development Courses Portfolio
Foundation Courses 30
a. NEN Orientation Program
b. Kick-starting the Entrepreneurial Campus
c. Building Technology Ventures
Advanced Topics 32
a. Business Models and Business Plans
b. Getting to Market: Commercializing Your idea
c. Venture Capital, Angel Funding and Debt: Raising Capital for Your Entrepreneurial Venture
d. Successful Growth: Project to Process
e. Building Start-up Organizations: Hiring and Retaining Talent
f. IP Strategies for Building Competitive Advantage
g. Practical Ethics: Succeeding in a Transparent World
High Impact Infrastructure Design 35
a. Developing Advanced Infrastructure: IEDC/EDCs, Mentoring Units and Incubators
b. Building IP in Academic Campuses
c. Tools for Successful Business Incubation
Mentor Development Programs 37
a. Mentoring Skills Finishing School
b. Entrepreneur Educator and Mentor Round Tables
c. Tools for Growth
d. Kick-starting Ventures
The NEN Community 44
Faculty Success Stories
Kaustubh Dharghalkar: Enabling the Entrepreneurship Ecosystem 4
Radhika Meenakshi Shankar: A Resourceful Mentor Impacts Thousands! 22
Soumya Chakraborty: Connecting Young Entrepreneurs to the Ecosystem 41
At the We School, Mumbai, entrepreneurship,
innovation and design are not just taught, they are
put in practice. One faculty member has played a
signifcant role in creating this environment.
5
In November 2011, Priyanka Amar wrote a business plan for a venture to
help people set up urban farms or kitchen gardens in densely populated
Mumbai. She was a student of the Business Design Program at the We
School (formerly Welingkar Institute of Management Development &
Research), and was mentored by NEN Faculty Leader Prof. Kaustubh
Dhargalkar in her initiative.
Having developed kitchen gardens at home, she wanted to take it up at a
professional level and help others do the same. Kaustubh vetted her plan;
with his help, she carried out extensive market research to understand
what impact the business can make. She started of soon after graduation
with just one maali (gardener) and an investment of 50,000 Rupees from
her personal savings. Kaustubh helped her in networking with customers,
including households, builders and corporates, and reaching out to
investors. He had also helped plan for scaling up, getting visibility and
brand positioning.
Cut to 2014, Priyanka and her venture iKheti has a growing list of customers
and plans to pitch to investors. In no time, her venture had matured into
a team of eight. Priyanka credits her mentor for showing her the right
direction – helping her decide to take up entrepreneurship, instead of
opting for placements!
Prof. Kaustubh had joined Welingkar as a professor in 2006. Soon after, with
his deep interest in entrepreneurship, he reached out to NEN and started
engaging with the network’s activities. This also helped him setup the E
Cell as a student-run initiative to encourage entrepreneurship.
In the last three years (2010 – 2013), more than a dozen businesses have
been started by We School students on campus and many of them continue
to build their ventures even after passing out. Apart from iKheti, Campus
Companies that became full-fedged ventures include Opulent Infotech,
Vibrant Holidays and Zapp Party Solutions.
Enabling the Entrepreneurship Ecosystem
Even afer
fve years, Springs
Innovations! was not
out of the woods.
Prof. Kaustubh started
mentoring me actively
specially in revenue
generating options,
marketing, and
product development
and delivery. He
helped me steadily
gain confdence in my
ideas, decisions and
most importantly, my
imagination.”
— Savita Rajeev, founder of
Springs Innovations!
6
Innovation at Welingkar
In 2008, We School launched an innovation lab called InnoWE Center for
Innovation and Memetics, under Kaustubh’s leadership. One of the key focus
areas of the lab is business design management, which helps businesses
to improve their ability to solve problems and innovate, based on design
thinking methodologies. The centre also looks at memetics, an emerging
feld that explores the relationship between socio-cultural trends and
business opportunities.
The innovation lab was a pioneering concept – the earliest such initiative
in any B-school in the country. Completely self-funded by the institute, it
is open to all students on campus and serves as a space for students to
brainstorm and prototype their ideas. According to Kaustubh, “It has
become a magnet attracting more students and an efective support
system for ventures.” InnoWe also organizes activities like ideation contests,
toy-making contests, concept shows, meetings with entrepreneurs, and
flm-making contests.
The success of the lab and the impact of Kaustubh’s innovation-centric
approach are evident in the number of students associated with the
Business Design Program, one of the programs at InnoWE. From just 30
students initially, over 60 students are part of the program today. Many of
these students are actively starting new ventures based on what they have
learnt in the lab.
The Business Design Program integrates design thinking and innovation
process into mainstream management subjects. It ofers a holistic view
of the human aspects in business, the economic, social, cultural and
technological context of the environment, and a research orientation,
analytical and leadership skills.
The Business Design Program also includes a credit-based elective on
entrepreneurship in the second year of the course. Kaustubh incorporated
many ideas from NEN programs he had attended into this course. His
own experience as an entrepreneur — he had had a 15-year stint running
companies he had founded, before moving into teaching — helps him
give students a practical view of entrepreneurship.
My
introduction to
structured and formal
mentoring was
through NEN. Teir
Mentor Development
Programs organized
in partnership with
Goldman Sachs
and Cherie Blair
Foundation for
Women, was very
useful. I got hands-
on experience
in mentoring,
with a couple of
entrepreneurs
allocated to each of us
faculty members to
mentor, as part of the
program.
- Prof. Kaustubh Dhargalkar
Personal Growth
With a passionate interest and belief in innovation
and entrepreneurship, and his experience as an
entrepreneur, Prof. Kaustubh is now an efective
educator, start-up mentor and academic leader. He
currently is:
• Associate Dean, Business Design and Innovation,
We School
• Head, InnoWE Center, We School
• Mentor at the Center for Innovation and Enterprise,
IIM, Ahmedabad. Facilitator of workshops for
entrepreneur associations
• Contributor of articles on entrepreneurship.
Over the years, Kaustubh had sought out various
courses to enhance his own
learning. In 2007-8, Kaustubh
had attended the year-
long NEN Entrepreneurship
Educator’s Course (EEC)
comprising of a series
of Faculty Development
Workshops, co-developed
by NEN and Stanford
University’s Technology
Ventures Program (STVP). The
training under international
entrepreneurship educators
like Tina Seelig from Stanford
and John Mullins from
London Business School, and
access to world-class content
helped develop programs
for his own students.
He started conducting
workshops for students and motivating them to view
entrepreneurship as a career option.
While the introductory courses gave Kaustubh the
knowledge, skills to start facilitating entrepreneurship,
Tools for Growth, a Mentor Development Course that
Kaustubh attended in 2010, exposed him to a formal
mentoring process. It equipped him to support
growth stage entrepreneurs. Participants in this
course conducted under the Goldman Sachs 10,000
Women Program help their mentees assess growth
opportunities, learn how to manage cash for growth,
and develop the required organizational capabilities.
In 2011, Kaustubh participated in the year-long
Cherie Blair Foundation for Women (CBFW) - NEN
Mentor Development Program. This program aims
to build mentoring skills, and give information on
entrepreneurial marketing, fnance and fundraising, so
participants could hand-hold women entrepreneurs
starting businesses.
The CBFW-NEN program sessions involve both faculty
mentors and entrepreneurs in its two modules, Getting
to Market and Entrepreneurial Finance. This helps
faculty participants build on their knowledge of taking
a product or service successfully to market, as well as
learn critical concepts and tools for fnancing options,
valuations, structuring deals
and exit strategies.
Participants get to apply their
learning by mentoring the
entrepreneurs who are part
of the program. Kaustubh
was assigned Savita Rajeev,
who had founded Springs
Innovations! to nurture the
creative thinking of young
people, in 2006. In the fve
years, Savita had executed
over 130 projects. She had
reached out to more than
3000 children and her
products were well received.
However fnancially, her
venture was still not doing
well.
Kaustubh helped Savita focus on revenue generating
options, marketing, and product development and
delivery.
One of the critical steps was to profle the market.
Kaustubh asked her incisive questions like: Who is
your market? Who understands you? By addressing
these questions, she was able to zero into the needs
and requirements of her market and customize her
products accordingly. Kaustubh encouraged her to re-
NEN IMPACT
• Established an innovation lab on
campus
• Developed a number of programs on
entrepreneurship for this students
• Enabled starting up of over a dozen
ventures by students on campus
• Successfully transformed from an
entrepreneur to an entrepreneur
mentor, supporting students and
growth stage entrepreneurs
think the venture’s core oferings and position it better
so the audience could connect with it. She realised
the venture’s core oferings – innovation and creative
expressions were not tangible concepts. She needed
to communicate her oferings clearly to her customers.
She created strong messaging using videos and visual
presentations, that helped them understand what she
could do and how it would beneft them.
From targeting individual students directly, Savita
started looking at corporates. She acquired Kokuyo
Camlin, Kelloggs and others Fortune 500 frms as
customers. Thanks to Kaustubh’s guidance, she was
able to increase her impact – reaching six times the
number of young people that she could earlier, in a
given time.
A sustained period of one-on-one mentoring with
Kaustubh helped – Savita says, “Kaustubh helped me
steadily gain confdence in my ideas, decisions and
most importantly, my imagination.”
Kaustubh facilitated a tie up of the We School with MIT,
Massachusetts for a Venture Mentoring Platform. We
School has now set up a formal six-member mentoring
board on campus to support entrepreneurs. Kaustubh
himself is currently supporting 5 student entrepreneurs
and an equal number of practicing entrepreneurs; 12
students mentored by him have successfully started
ventures in the last three years.
Prof. Kaustubh is not just an inspiring entrepreneurship
educator and mentor, evangelizing entrepreneurship
on campus and in the community. He is a driving
force behind various initiatives on campus, like the
innovation cell and Business Design Program, and We
School’s focus on innovation. He is clear proof of the
heights faculty can reach when it comes to equipping
themselves, tapping into community resources and
making an impact on the entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Knowledge and skill building through NEN’s
training are very practical. For example, I have absolutely
no credentials to teach anything related to entrepreneurial
fnance. Te Entrepreneurial Finance course ofered by John
Mullins of London Business School has however helped
me a lot in terms of structuring commercial facts to run
businesses and giving it a theoretical framework. Today I
ofer the Entrepreneurial Finance course on campus and the
students like the practical approach to complex information
on fnance. NEN intervention has helped me a lot.”
— Prof. Kaustubh Dhargalkar, L. N.
Welingkar Institute of Management Development & Research, Mumbai
Venturing into
Entrepreneurship
Education
11
The entrepreneurial revolution: Role
of academia
Global leaders are conscious of the need to unlock entrepreneurial capabilities
to meet the challenges of the 21st century. Te attention of governments across
the world has been on creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship.
Our observation in India as well is that leading companies today recruit for
skills and talent, rather than knowledge; young people demand the opportunity
to ‘make it big’ within India’s new, vibrant economy. Te government of India
is also increasingly emphasizing the need for an entrepreneurial generation,
naming this the ‘Decade of Innovation.’
Educational systems however, particularly in most of Asia and Africa, are
unprepared for entrepreneurship education – they are still grappling with
the tradition lecture mode of teaching, dependent on rote learning and
regurgitation in examinations. Tis is as true for primary education as it is
for higher education. Entrepreneurship education on the other hand rests on
experiential learning methodology and ‘doing’ as a way of self-learning.
A student typically learns through engagement with entrepreneurs,
use of frameworks getting hands-on experiences in diferent aspects of
entrepreneurship like product development, sales, and working with teams.
Tis helps build her/his skill, attitude and confdence to be able to be start-
up. Tis calls for highly unconventional methods of teaching and learning
that educational institutes and their faculty must adopt in order to enable
entrepreneurship education.
Entrepreneurship education therefore calls for a revolutionary approach from
the heart of educational eco-system driven by inspiring, progressive, skilled,
experienced and networked faculty leaders. Tese faculty leaders work with
successful entrepreneurs to initiate, support and drive entrepreneurship
activities on campus, the institute’s leadership to focus on entrepreneurship
education and development holistically, invest in their own understanding of
venture creation, entrepreneurial issues and entrepreneurs’ attitudes, launch
courses, drive campus companies, support students entrepreneurs and help
graduating students launch their entrepreneurial careers.
Introduction
“Preparing today’s students for
success and eventual leadership
in the new global marketplace
is the most important
responsibility in education
today... Entrepreneurship
education is an important tool
to achieving these objectives
[and]...should be universally
available to provide all students
with opportunities to explore
and fulfl their potential.”
- From an Aspen Institute Youth
Entrepreneurship Strategy Group publication
12
NEN’s decade long experience in institutional capacity building in India shows
that such inspired, skilled and networked faculty are a force by themselves and
are creating mini entrepreneurship revolutions on campuses across India!
What an educator needs to know
NEN has a key focus on identifying and developing such faculty leaders,
equipping them with knowledge, skills, networks and relevant content. We
believe emerging nations need such faculty in large numbers to transform
their countries through entrepreneurship education. In their economies,
unlike in the Silicon Valley, a young person’s tryst with entrepreneurship
may be less due to default environment and more by design. At academic
campuses across Asia and Africa, one has to develop an eco-system that will
allow students to be exposed to entrepreneurship and have the opportunity to
grow their engagement till they start thriving as entrepreneurial individuals
and as entrepreneurs. Te activities and opportunities must enable this
development - going from simple, easy to engage programs to intense, more
direct experiences of entrepreneurship.
Hence, a good campus has a diverse set of programs from the very basic and
introductory to the advanced and focused, catering to this development cycle
of entrepreneurial individuals as they progress. Faculty teams typically initiate,
develop, refne, facilitate and manage these programs to give their students the
best chance to be entrepreneurial and become entrepreneurs.
To do this, faculty members need knowledge, skills and exposure which range
from conceptual understanding of venture creation to knowledge of issues
that start-ups typically face at diferent points in the development of their
companies, as well as ways to support them in overcoming routine issues. Te
best of the faculty are able to apply this knowledge and exposure in systematic
ways; they are able to to hand-hold aspiring and new entrepreneurs using
highly impactful pedagogies, methodologies and experiential tools in both
inside class room and outside class room formats.
It changed
my way of teaching.
Te program’s value-
add was that it opened
up new perspectives
and opportunities with
its hands-on approach.
Te program attendees
interacted with six to
seven entrepreneurs
over three days
and went through
several case studies.
From teaching
entrepreneurship,
it has helped me
to start doing
entrepreneurship.”
— Radhika Meenakshi Shankar,
Director, Wise Owl Consulting,
Hyderabad
13
Leading-Edge Global
Practices
Academic institutes stay at the
forefront of entrepreneurship
education with access to world-class
teaching methodology and research
without having to leave India’s
shores
Nation-Wide
Resources
Faculty become part of
India’s largest network
of entrepreneurship
educators, exponentially
increasing the resources
available to their institutes
KEY
OPPORTUNITIES
FOR ACADEMIC
INSTITUTES
Strategic
Development Of
Entrepreneurial
Campus
Seamlessly integrated
courses help institutes to
systematically develop
a vibrant, high-impact
entrepreneurship ecosystem
Immediate Impact
Faculty come out able to
implement action-oriented
programs that are geared
for immediate impact
14
NEN supports academic institutes in building capacity for entrepreneurship
development. More specifcally this refers to the capacity of
a) People – faculty, networks of entrepreneurs, investors and experts;
b) Programs – a wide bouquet of oferings including courses, workshops,
Campus Company initiatives and start-up internships
c) Infrastructure – platforms like student-run E Cells, innovation centers and
incubators that enable sustainability of entrepreneurship development.
Institutional capacity building activities include an on-the-ground consulting
practice, support with teaching materials, a leadership program for NEN
student E Cell leaders, a volunteer bank of more than 4000 entrepreneurs
and investors who participate and contribute as mentors, guest speakers
and / or facilitators of workshops; and, most importantly, the NEN Faculty
Development Courses. NEN trains and certifes faculty across the network
to produce entrepreneurship educators and mentors who can design and run
high-impact entrepreneurship programs on campus.
Focus on Capacity Building
I have
always had a very
nice experience with
the NEN-led courses
and this time afer
attending ‘Business
Models and Business
Plans: Getting It
Right’ course, I am
more confdent about
imparting knowledge
about business models
to the students as a
mentor.”
Latika Dhuria
Vivekananda Institute of
Technology (VIT), Jaipur
15
STARTUP
SHOWCASE
PARTICIPANTS
ACTIVITIES
EXPERT RESOURCES
Alumni
Entrepreneurs
Faculty
Advisors
PARTICIPANTS
ACTIVITIES
EXPERT RESOURCES
Entrepreneurs
Educators
Mentors
PARTICIPANTS
ACTIVITIES
EXPERT RESOURCES
Entrepreneurs
Administrators
Mentors
Educators
Investors
Campus Entrepreneurship Eco-System
WF-NEN’s approach to entrepreneurship development
at academic institutions
Unaware Students
Aspiring Entrepreneurs
Student Entrepreneurs
Aspiring Entrepreneurs
Student Entrepreneurs
Startups
Startups
Entrepreneur Firms in Community
Alumni, Others
E Talks & E Summits
Exercises & Games
Panel Discussions
Competitions: Ideas & B-Plan
36-Hour Startups
Startup Showcase
Startup Jobs
Hands-on Course
Campus Company Program
Structured Mentoring
Advanced Topic Courses
Startup Internship
Startup Consulting
Tech Product Development
Mentoring
Training
Access to: Infrastructure,
Funding, Networks
Create entrepreneurial
skills and experience
Inspire and engage
entrepreneurship
exposure & interest
Build
knowledge
& skills
Gain
experience
PANEL
DISCUSSIONS
WORKSHOPS
N
E
N
-
C
A
M
P
U
S
S
U
P
P
O
R
T
IN
F
R
A
S
T
R
U
C
T
U
R
E
36-HOUR
STARTUPS
Grow the
business
1
2
Support entrepreneurial
knowledge, resources,
networks 3
STRUCTURED
MENTORING
TECH PRODUCT
DEVELOPMENT
Connect to
network
Get focused
guidance
* IEDC : Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Center
EDC : Entrepreneur Development Cell
Faculty at the heart of capacity building
NEN’s member academic institutes are at the forefront of entrepreneurial change in India. Responding to the demands
from their own students, corporate India, and society at large, the institutes are building programs and courses that
create and support India’s next generation of entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial leaders.
Tis transformation is lead by evangelical faculty members who have invested in years of learning, practice and work
with aspiring and new start-ups to bring about this change.
NEN has enabled this change by putting together a wide array of faculty development programs focusing on concepts,
pedagogy and experiential content. Tailored especially for emerging economies, these programs equip faculty members
to build a results-oriented entrepreneurial ecosystem on campus, such as what one might experience at top institutes
like Stanford University, MIT, or Babson College in the United States; and leading institutes in India, like IIT Bombay
and IIM Ahmedabad.
16
3000+ new faculty members in various core disciplines engaged in
entrepreneurship
Nearly 2000 trained at various levels
1347
Foundation
Teaching Level
418
Advanced
Teaching Level
201
Mentor
Level
India’s largest entrepreneurship educator community
Trained faculty members are able to develop and run programs that build
students’ awareness and excitement about entrepreneurship; the programs help
them develop an entrepreneurial mindset and gain the skills, knowledge and
confdence to succeed either as entrepreneurial leaders within organizations
or to start their own ventures. At the advanced level, NEN’s courses develop
participants’ ability to directly support entrepreneurs – through mentoring,
incubation, or by running executive education courses.
What began as a community of just a dozen entrepreneurship educators in
2003 is today a network of over 1500 faculty actively engaged in a variety of
programs such as facilitating student club activities, innovation centres and
campus companies, and mentoring entrepreneurs and student ventures. Te
challenge now is to systematize entrepreneurship as a mainstream discipline
of education to leverage and sustain the level of excellence achieved by these
educators and institutes.
Without my
professor, I would
never have started up. I
was a total novice with
just an idea. It was he
who encouraged me to
pursue it and guided
me through the entire
process, and even
connected me to the
right people who could
help. He has been the
driving force behind
my start-up. ”
— Aswin Yogesh, student
entrepreneur, founder of Fluids
- a milkshake kiosk
Saveetha Engineering College,
Chennai
17
About the programs
Faculty Development Programs are meant to help improve faculty members’
conceptual knowledge and understanding, their skill of facilitating learning and
their exposure and experience with start-ups. Programs develop fundamental
skill sets required to teach entrepreneurship and help faculty become
efective mentors. Faculty leaders transform from novices in entrepreneurship
education to expert entrepreneur educators and mentors. Te illustration
below provides an overview of the layered levels of the programs and their
output and goals. A more detailed list of programs is provided later in this
booklet.
18
Advantages of the programs
Tere are several reasons why NEN’s Faculty Development Programs are
useful for faculty. Some of the more obvious ones include:
Staying ahead with cutting-edge methods
NEN’s Faculty Development Programs introduce participants to cutting-
edge teaching methods with a focus on participant-centric learning and
experiential methods. Participants in the advanced courses and mentor
development programs get to work with, and alongside entrepreneurs in the
classroom, perhaps a frst time for many. Additionally, NEN constantly brings
new, efective and the latest learning and pedagogical trends to the faculty in
its network.
Strong conceptual understanding
All of NEN’s programs focus on understanding core concepts in venture
creation—that apply to entrepreneurs anywhere in the world in any industry
at diferent stages of the start-ups’ life cycle. Tey enable faculty to understand
the overall context of the start-ups’ life cycle and issues more clearly.
19
Direct experience
Faculty Development Programs are designed to help faculty gain direct
experience of certain entrepreneurial aspects and tools. Tese courses-help
‘do’ entrepreneurship rather than just learn entrepreneurship. Further, the
courses contain insights drawn from practitioners and experts which enable
learning of a highly practical nature. Shared peer experiences within the class-
room too add to this knowledge.
Structured learning with high applicability
Te programs enable and equip faculty to efectively design and lead relevant
programs for their own students or entrepreneurs immediately afer the
training. Tis is because these courses are facilitated by highly experienced
educators and professionals who bring in best practices both from inside
India and around the world.
Strong peer networking: NEN Faculty Network
An important beneft for faculty that engage in NEN’s programs is the
powerful network of entrepreneurship educators that they become a part of.
NEN faculty learn from each other, teach on each other’s campuses and co-
teach programs.
Range of learning content and tools
Faculty who are a part of NEN have access to a very wide range of learning
content, curricula, tools and frameworks suitable for emerging economies
that can be plugged into diferent kinds of programs. Additionally, they have
access to NEN’s team of experts who can help design and structure content for
diferent kinds of audiences.
Access to strategic models
NEN has experimented with, refned and established highly efective ways to
develop a campus that enables students to become more entrepreneurial and
start-up their ventures. Faculty have access to these methods and models -
both through training, and through use of NEN’s guides.
20
Te quality and experience of the teaching
faculty is very high. Tey come with superior
domain knowledge that is combined with their
experience of having worked or taught in that
feld. So they are able to create content and deliver
programs in a way that the audience derives
immense value.”
— Somayajulu Garimella, Professor,
International Management Institute, New Delhi
NEN seems to have got the hang of how to do this in
two or three diferent ways. One, the program is well-structured,
they have structured the learning for the faculty in such a way that
the whole teaching experience is very actionable. Ten, you have
material which you can take to your campus and teach students.
And third is the ambience they create, the teams that they make,
the way they match various types of faculty from diferent domains
within the teams and then group them with an entrepreneur thus
making the whole process very experiential.
Te learning is of a far higher quality than it would have been
through a textbook or through a simple lecture. It is not an
inspirational course that they ofer but rather a very actionable
course.’’
— Kiran Desai, Faculty,
Mukesh Patel School of Technology Management, NMIMS University
Armed with formidable experience
in teaching entrepreneurship for over
two decades, Radhika Meenakshi is
an entrepreneur, educator and mentor
specializing in support for SMEs and
women entrepreneurs.
While working at her husband’s automotive-machinery manufacturing
unit, Bala Tripura Sundari saw how the industry struggles to fnd adequately
trained technical professionals. This galvanized her to start Involute
Institute of Technical Training, which trains students with diplomas and
engineering degrees, for the automotive industry.
Bala soon realized that she needed help in grasping the fundamentals of
running a business: for example, which markets should she tap into? How?
While she was making strategic decisions, how could she be sure that
those were the right ones?
This was when one-on-one mentoring sessions helped bring the required
focus and rigour. Her mentor, Prof. Radhika Meenakshi Shankar, an NEN
faculty member helped her analyze the market and the right resources to
tap into. For example, while she initially targeted markets in Karnataka,
Chennai and Maharashtra, she had not really paid attention to the market
in her own city, Hyderabad. Radhika advised her to tap into the local
market,showing how there was actually a huge market and potential for
what she was doing.
This turned out to be the critical turn-around for her business and Bala
shares she starting making revenues right away!
Prof. Radhika started her career as a management faculty in fnance and
commerce. For over two decades, she has taught at many reputed colleges
A Resourceful Mentor Impacts Thousands!
I had reached
the stage where my
business was surviving
literally hand to
mouth. Tanks to Prof.
Radhika Meenakshi
Shankar, all that is an
old story now. She
helped me re-organize
and streamline the way
I managed fnances.”
— Bhupendra Singh, Founder,
TechWINE, New Delhi
TechWINE, Bhupendra Singh’s Delhi-based venture, was constantly
strapped for cash. Client payments were always delayed and he was
never able to pay vendors on time. Running a company that installed
fber cables, and maintained software and hardware systems,
Bhupendra’s primary issues were lack of product clarity and a haywire
cash fow process which was afecting his working capital.
Identifying this, his mentor Prof. Radhika Meenakshi Shankar helped
him re-organize and streamline the way he managed his fnances. She
worked with him to do an activity-based costing in order to prioritize
his business segments; restructured payments to allow an advance
payment cycle from clients and a delayed payment cycle to vendors;
and trimmed needless expenses by moving all transactions online.
and universities across India. She is a consultant at the
Centre for Entrepreneurship Development, ALEAP and
has recently turned an entrepreneur, having founded
Wise Owl Consultancy in Hyderabad.
WiseOwl provides consulting, training and mentoring
for entrepreneurs and corporates. Radhika supports
a number of academic institutes and non-profts. She
is also on the advisory board of a few start-ups. She
has established a personal network with investors
and banks and, very importantly, entrepreneurial
organizations too.
Engaging students
Radhika’s interest in entrepreneurship development
was kindled while she doing her doctoral study on
Change Management of MSMEs. As a faculty of fnance
at BITS Pilani, Goa campus, Radhika had got involved
with the E Week 2006 celebrations, when the students
asked her for help in creating an entrepreneur case,
‘The Lala’s Hotel’ which looked at how an MBA graduate
innovates his father’s small business operations.
The experience encouraged her to attend NEN’s
Faculty Development Program during 2007-2008. The
experiential format and well-designed pedagogy of
NEN’s courses equipped her with extensive knowledge
and skills in the area of entrepreneurship. She soon took
these courses to her college students and community
entrepreneurs, customizing them as per their needs.
At Amity University, an NEN member institute, Radhika
launched an E Cell ‘Ideate’ that engaged students in
entrepreneurial activities. The E Cell raised awareness
on entrepreneurship through social media and blogs.
It also organised E Melas, where students whose
ideas were vetted, setup stalls to sell various items on
campus. Creating a business plan and accounts after
the exercise gave students a hands-on experience of
running a venture.
Teaching courses in Entrepreneurship and Finance, with
an NEN-infuenced syllabus, gave her an extra edge,
says Radhika. There was a sea change in her teaching
methodology – she reworked the content to make
it very application-oriented and experiential, using
practical exercises and real-life cases. “Students loved
it,” she says, efusive in her praise for NEN’s pedagogy.
Not only did Radhika evangelize entrepreneurship in
her own campus and E Cell, she also reached out to
E Cells in other institutes like IIT Delhi and IIT Kanpur,
soon becoming an advisor there as well.
Radhika also helped launch Amity’s BBA program in
Family Business Management, that provides students
skills and knowledge to deal with the complexities
and intricacies of running a family business. Further, as
part of Amity’s contract with the defence department,
she developed an Executive Education Program in
Entrepreneurship for the Armed Forces under the
Defense Rehabilitation Program. She continues the
engagement with the armed forces at Hyderabad
through her consultancy WiseOwl.
Through WiseOwl, Radhika also consults with Vignan
University Guntur and Vasavi College, Hyderabad. She
is helping the Vasavi management with entrepreneurial
activities, setting up a formal MSME incubator and
designing IP strategy. She is also helping her alma
mater, PSG Krishnammal College set up an incubator
at Annur and the Periyar Maniammai University at
Thanjavur to setup a Technology Business Incubator.
One of Radhika’s mentees was Krishna, an
entrepreneurship graduate from Babson’s College,
volunteering with Bhumi, an NGO working for the
upliftment of the poor. Krishna was setting up a
micro-entrepreneurship platform for residents
of Rasoolpura, a large slum in Hyderabad. With
Radhika’s support, she worked out a model where
micro-entrepreneurs like carpenters, electricians
and plumbers could team up to provide household
management services.
Though the group disbanded later when Krishna
moved out, Radhika considers the initiative a
success – she says, “It brought awareness of
entrepreneurship and showed how people can
work together.” They also brought out a database
of micro-entrepreneurs. Radhika continues her
association with Bhumi and its women’s Self Help
Groups, helping small entrepreneurs with advice
and funding leads.
Community impact
In 2009, Radhika attended ‘Tools for Growing
your Business’ , a Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women
Entrepreneurs’ Workshop. It provided faculty
participants with the content, delivery, and application
techniques to enable them to deliver a Growing Your
Business (GYB) workshop to women entrepreneurs in
their own communities. The Goldman Sach’s 10000
Women initiative seeks to expand “the entrepreneurial
talent and managerial pool in developing and emerging
economies - especially among women.”
In 2011, she followed up with the Kick-Starting Ventures
workshop. The course had John Mullins of London
Business School providing a framework for evaluating
business ideas and setting business goals. It helped
attendees provide mentoring and run short-duration
courses for entrepreneurs on the critical issues in
starting a new venture.
Radhika says, “The program opened up new
perspectives and opportunities with its hands-on
approach. It changed the
way I teach.” The program
attendees went through
several case studies and
mentoring dry runs.
Since then, Radhika has
engaged and taught nearly
1400 entrepreneur aspirants
over 27 workshops. Of
the 1400, more than 612
are women. She has also
conducted seven programs
for women entrepreneurs.
Radhika teaches the Acara
– IIHS course on Funding
for Social Entrepreneurs,
2 day program. She is the
facilitator for workshops at
National Institute of Micro,
Small and Medium Enterprises (NIMSME) conducted
for participants from India and other SAARC countries.
As a consultant for Association for Lady Entrepreneurs
of Andhra Pradesh (ALEAP), she supports Women’s Self
Help Groups and micro-entrepreneurs. ALEAP is a 20-
year old organization supporting women’s economic
empowerment. The CED division focuses on training
and consultancy for women entrepreneurs.
Radhika is working with Dr Reddy Foundation on
skills training, and supporting their Train the Trainer
program. She supports ventures with starting up,
business model, cost efciency for business process
etc.
Radhika’s programs reach out to rural corners of
Andhra Pradesh where she teaches ideation, business
modelling, costing and setting up of a venture. She
has also taken sessions in about 10 entrepreneurship
awareness camps across Ranga Reddy district,
Warangal, Ongole, Vijayawada, Tirupati, and Hyderabad
reaching out to more than 200-250 students each time.
Radhika also heads the South East Chapter of BYST, a
youth business mentorship organisation. They identify
young growth entrepreneurs, especially women, help
them get loan-ready. She was instrumental in getting
an MoU with Indian Overseas
Bank for loans for women
entrepreneurs. For instance,
she helped Usha, a young
businesswoman expand
her 12 year beauty parlour
operations, with a loan of Rs
6 lakhs. She is also helping
her refne her revenue model
beyond beauty services,
getting into retail sale of
beauty products.
Prof. Radhika Meenakshi is
a multi-faceted personality
and has created a strong
personal brand for herself,
over the years. With a
special focus on women
and MSMEs, she has helped
hundreds if not thousands
of entrepreneurs learn and execute better, as they
launched and build their businesses.
NEN IMPACT
• Developed a course in family business
for students
• Developed an Executive Education
Program in Entrepreneurship for the
Armed Forces.
• Supports a number of academic
institutes and non-profts. On the
advisory board of a few start-ups.
• Taught nearly 1400 entrepreneur
aspirants over 27 workshops. Of the
1400, more than 612 are women. She
has conducted seven programs for
women since August of 2011.
Faculty
Development
Courses
27
Developing Relevant Content
NEN’s venture life cycle framework maps the knowledge, skills and information needed at various stages
by entrepreneurs. Tis framework ofers a fairly simple way of mapping the needs of the learner at diferent
stages of entrepreneurship. Many needs span across the life cycle. However, as you will note, some are fairly
unique to particular stages of development of the venture.
Typically, the NEN foundation-level faculty development courses are around the pre venture and early
stages of venture life cycle and campus entrepreneurship essentials. NEN’s Advanced Topics and Mentor
Development Programs cover aspects relevant to early growth, growth and maturity stages of the venture
life cycle.
Entrepreneurial
Thinking
Opportunity
Stabilize Growth
Maturity/
Exit
Business Model
Managing your First
Customers
Revenue vs Capital
Expenditure, Working
Capital, Boot Strapping
Risk Awareness, Break-
even Analysis
Legal Aspects:
Registering a Company,
Early Stage
Compliances
Increasing Customer
Base
Startups - Strategies,
Techniques & Tools
Intellectual Property
Rights - What & How
to Manage IP
Preparing for
Growth: Acquiring
New Resources,
Establishing Processes
Early Stage
R
E
V
E
N
U
E
TIME
Exploratory Pre Venture
Startup Phase Post Survival
Break Even
Team Building, Sales, Project Management,
Managing Money
Company formaton- how
Accountng & Legal
compliances
Sources of money
for early stage cos.
Govt. schemes for
funding innovatons/
ideas
Seed Stage funders
Sources of money
for proto-typing &
testng the product
Techniques
Model Framework
Market Analysis
Techniques
Business Planning &
Risks & Rewards for
an Entrepreneur
Techniques to be
Typical Venture Life
Cycle
Visioning Growth
to Reach New Markets
Growth Financing: Sources of Finance
(Private Equity, Cash Flow, Debt)
Financial Statement Analysis
Advantage
Expanding the Team, Hiring and Retaining
Process & Systems Approach,
Pricing,
Networking
Book Value
Customer / Market
Driving your Product
Building a Team - Why
& How
Every Idea is not
an Opportunity,
Opportunity
Frameworks
Failure & its Fund raising: Going
public, VCs, Banks
Exit strategies: IPO,
Mergers, Partnerships;
Buyout/Sale
Entrepreneurial
Resourcefulness
Solving, Opportunity
Team Building,
Plan
Strategic Thinking
INFORMATION
N
E
N
C
O
U
R
S
E
S
Entrepreneurial Campus
3. Building Technology Ventures
It Right
3. Successful Growth: Project to Process
Retaining Talent
Advantage
Tools for Growth Venture Capital,
Angel Funding and Debt: Raising
Capital for your Entrepreneurial
Venture
Mentor Skills Finishing School
High Impact Infrastructure Design
Turnaround
Growth
Maturity
K
N
O
W
L
E
D
G
E
S
K
I
L
L
S
NEN VENTURE LIFE CYCLE APPROACH
IT tools for growing
businesses
IPR laws & guidelines,
Taxatons
Technology transfer facilites
Sources of new technologies
Growth stage funders
Entrepreneurial
Thinking
Opportunity
Stabilize Growth
Maturity/
Exit
Business Model
Managing your First
Customers
Revenue vs Capital
Expenditure, Working
Capital, Boot Strapping
Risk Awareness, Break-
even Analysis
Legal Aspects:
Registering a Company,
Early Stage
Compliances
Increasing Customer
Base
Startups - Strategies,
Techniques & Tools
Intellectual Property
Rights - What & How
to Manage IP
Preparing for
Growth: Acquiring
New Resources,
Establishing Processes
Early Stage
R
E
V
E
N
U
E
TIME
Exploratory Pre Venture
Startup Phase Post Survival
Break Even
Team Building, Sales, Project Management,
Managing Money
Company formaton- how
Accountng & Legal
compliances
Sources of money
for early stage cos.
Govt. schemes for
funding innovatons/
ideas
Seed Stage funders
Sources of money
for proto-typing &
testng the product
Techniques
Model Framework
Market Analysis
Techniques
Business Planning &
Risks & Rewards for
an Entrepreneur
Techniques to be
Typical Venture Life
Cycle
Visioning Growth
to Reach New Markets
Growth Financing: Sources of Finance
(Private Equity, Cash Flow, Debt)
Financial Statement Analysis
Advantage
Expanding the Team, Hiring and Retaining
Process & Systems Approach,
Pricing,
Networking
Book Value
Customer / Market
Driving your Product
Building a Team - Why
& How
Every Idea is not
an Opportunity,
Opportunity
Frameworks
Failure & its Fund raising: Going
public, VCs, Banks
Exit strategies: IPO,
Mergers, Partnerships;
Buyout/Sale
Entrepreneurial
Resourcefulness
Solving, Opportunity
Team Building,
Plan
Strategic Thinking
INFORMATION
N
E
N
C
O
U
R
S
E
S
Entrepreneurial Campus
3. Building Technology Ventures
It Right
3. Successful Growth: Project to Process
Retaining Talent
Advantage
Tools for Growth Venture Capital,
Angel Funding and Debt: Raising
Capital for your Entrepreneurial
Venture
Mentor Skills Finishing School
High Impact Infrastructure Design
Turnaround
Growth
Maturity
K
N
O
W
L
E
D
G
E
S
K
I
L
L
S
NEN VENTURE LIFE CYCLE APPROACH
IT tools for growing
businesses
IPR laws & guidelines,
Taxatons
Technology transfer facilites
Sources of new technologies
Growth stage funders
28
Entrepreneurial
Thinking
Opportunity
Stabilize Growth
Business Model
Managing your First
Customers
Revenue vs Capital
Expenditure, Working
Capital, Boot Strapping
Risk Awareness, Break-
even Analysis
Legal Aspects:
Registering a Company,
Early Stage
Compliances
Increasing Customer
Base
Startups - Strategies,
Techniques & Tools
Intellectual Property
Rights - What & How
to Manage IP
Preparing for
Growth: Acquiring
New Resources,
Establishing Processes
Team Building, Sales, Project Management,
Managing Money
Company formaton- how
Accountng & Legal
compliances
Sources of money
for early stage cos.
Govt. schemes for
funding innovatons/
ideas
Seed Stage funders
Sources of money
for proto-typing &
testng the product
Techniques
Model Framework
Market Analysis
Techniques
Business Planning &
Risks & Rewards for
an Entrepreneur
Techniques to be
Typical Venture Life
Cycle
Visioning Growth
to Reach New Markets
Growth Financing: Sources of Finance
(Private Equity, Cash Flow, Debt)
Financial Statement Analysis
Advantage
Expanding the Team, Hiring and Retaining
Process & Systems Approach,
Pricing,
Networking
Book Value
Customer / Market
Driving your Product
Building a Team - Why
& How
Every Idea is not
an Opportunity,
Opportunity
Frameworks
Failure & its Fund raising: Going
public, VCs, Banks
Exit strategies: IPO,
Mergers, Partnerships;
Buyout/Sale
Entrepreneurial
Resourcefulness
Solving, Opportunity
Team Building,
Plan
Strategic Thinking
INFORMATION
K
N
O
W
L
E
D
G
E
S
K
I
L
L
S
IT tools for growing
businesses
IPR laws & guidelines,
Taxatons
Technology transfer facilites
Sources of new technologies
Growth stage funders
Maturity/
Exit
Exploratory Pre Venture Startup Phase Post Survival Expansion Sustain
NEN VENTURE LIFE CYCLE APPROACH: KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS MAP
29
NEN Faculty Development Courses Portfolio
Faculty transformation and development
NEN faculty members, equipped by its Faculty Development Programs, are
at the forefront, leading the entrepreneurship ecosystem development in their
own campuses and in the community; creating and supporting entrepreneurs
and contributing to economic development through indirect creation of jobs.
NEN’s Faculty Development Programs are ofered in four categories:
Foundation Courses, Advanced Topics, High Impact Infrastructure Design,
and Mentor Development.
30
Foundation Courses
Foundation courses provide orientation on entrepreneurship and establish
the relevance of entrepreneurship to students, institutes and faculty. Core
concepts and frameworks are taught using experiential, participant-centric
outbound exercises, games, videos, cases and expert interactions.
Tese programs also provide key inputs around entrepreneurship program
design and build the ability to develop and lead a wide range of activities on
campus such as workshops, courses, internships and campus companies.
Who should apply
Tese courses are appropriate for faculty members who are new to
entrepreneurship education and interested in implementing programs
that help students develop a solid foundation of entrepreneurial skills
and knowledge. It helps them understand how to start with creating the
entrepreneurship ecosystem on campus.
31
a. NEN Orientation Program
Tis program introduces faculty to the exciting world of entrepreneurship
education, where innovative teaching methods and content energizes young
people, unleashing their talents and ambitions. Te program covers the
components of an entrepreneurship ecosystem on campus and the lifecycle
of a venture. It outlines fundamental entrepreneurial skills and concepts,
and introduces faculty to exercises and games they can run as-is in order
to build awareness and engagement among students. Most importantly, the
Orientation Program connects faculty to colleagues across the country and
introduces them to NEN resources. It also outlines their role as NEN faculty
leaders.
b. Kick-starting the Entrepreneurial Campus
Tis particular module equips faculty members to run engaging
entrepreneurship programs – that go beyond generating awareness and
actually begin developing key skills and knowledge. Te course provides solid
grounding in efective entrepreneurship teaching methodologies with an
emphasis on experiential learning. Faculty members who undergo this course
are able to design, develop and run programs that arm students with basic
entrepreneurship skills including idea generation, opportunity evaluation,
business modelling, creating back-of-the envelope cash fows, negotiation and
sales.
c. Building Technology Ventures
Tis course has been designed exclusively for engineering and technology
faculty. It unravels the entrepreneurial process for technology ventures and
integrates entrepreneurship into engineering education. Te course equips
faculty with skills necessary to enable students translate an idea into a
fundable technology business. It focuses on identifying the commercial value
of innovations which might otherwise remain prototypes. Te emphasis is on
building the capacity of a technology entrepreneur, assessing need opportunity,
developing a marketable product, patenting and licensing, building the right
team, raising money and creating value for the customer and the venture. It
contains experiential activities and insights from experts required for creating
real world scalable technology ventures in the real world.
I thank
the entire NEN
community - for
organizing such
invaluable sessions,
for both entrepreneurs
and those interested
in the area. Beyond
just learning and
networking, such
experiences are
extremely refreshing
and open our minds to
a whole new world of
ideas.“
- Sangeetha Deiveegarajan,
Faculty Mentor,
Great Lakes Wealth Advisors,
Chennai
32
Advanced Topics
Advanced Topics courses ofer in-depth knowledge and skills to faculty on
key aspects crucial to start-ups – business models, sales, getting to market,
raising money, building a team, managing cash and IP management. Tese
courses involve application of core concepts and frameworks to solve issues
along the early and growth stage of the venture. Advanced pedagogies with
live entrepreneur cases, investors and experts, case studies on emerging
economies, tools and videos are used in the classroom. Emphasis is on
immediate application of learning in the classroom and practicing on campus.
Who should apply
Tese courses are suitable for faculty members with some experience in
entrepreneurship education who are keen on advancing their knowledge and
helping entrepreneurs successfully start-up and manage their ventures.
33
Had a
very knowledgeable
three days and my
understanding of
numbers has defnitely
increased. Tis
platform gave me a
complete new opening
with three days of out-
of-the-box thinking,
networking with many
faculty members and
entrepreneurs, and
sharing ideas, all of
which will probably be
life changers for me.”
— Jaya Nagarmath,
Entrepreneur
Investor Shoppee, Mumbai
a. Business Models and Business Plans
An intensive three-day program, the Business Models and Business Plans
program equips faculty with the necessary knowledge to guide entrepreneurs
and students in understanding the key elements of a business concept. Using
case studies, videos and research materials, participants learn to assess
business opportunities, examine fnancing options, design business models,
and fnally, write structured business plans. By the end of the program, faculty
will have a solid understanding of the key diferences between business plans
and models and what goes into building each.
b. Getting to Market: Commercializing Your
Idea
Te toughest hurdle for many entrepreneurs is getting their products of the
drawing board and into the marketplace.
• How do you acquire your frst customer?
• How do you price your product or service?
• How do you build your customer base?
are some of the most common concerns entrepreneurs usually have. Restricted
by limited capital, connections and resources, they must come up with innovative
solutions. Tese apply to product uniqueness, market research, development,
pricing and marketing. Getting to Market efectively explores these challenges
and arms faculty with an assortment of tools and techniques to help entrepreneurs
overcome them in as cost efective and time efcient manner as possible.
c. Venture Capital, Angel Funding and Debt:
Raising Capital for Your Entrepreneurial
Venture
Tis program addresses key questions that challenge all entrepreneurs: how
much money can and should be raised, when should it be raised and from
whom, what is a reasonable valuation of the company, and how should funding
be structured? Tis course comprehensively explores the fnancial tools needed
by an entrepreneur in starting his or her own business. By studying real-life
business cases and learning from professors, investors and entrepreneurs,
participants gain insights into both the investors’ and entrepreneurs’ points of
view in funding a venture. Participants also get a practical framework they can
use to secure investment for high potential businesses.
d. Successful Growth: Project to Process
In most start-ups, the intense demand on the entrepreneur’s time and resources
makes the concept of spending time on process seem a luxury. Process
however is actually a ‘force multiplier’. When implemented efectively, good
business processes streamline a start-up’s daily operations, bring in efciency,
34
While I was
teaching marketing
and management
studies, it was only
because of NEN that
I started to bring in
the entrepreneurship
element. Te many
programs conducted
by NEN have
helped me a lot
in understanding
and appreciating
entrepreneurs.
Whenever I have asked
a mentee to approach
NEN, I have always
received support.”
— Haseena Sayed,
Associate Professor and NEN
Faculty Mentor, Jai Hind
College, Mumbai
and allow the entrepreneur to focus on matters of higher importance. In
Successful Growth: Project to Process, participants explore the critical
frameworks required to build efective processes involving all key business
functions in a start-up. Successful graduates of this unique program gain the
skills, confdence and knowledge required to help entrepreneurs build robust
systems and processes that vastly expand organizational capabilities.
e. Building Start-up Organizations: Hiring
and Retaining Talent
Knowing how companies recruit and manage their people is particularly
important for entrepreneurs. It is true that competitive advantage ofen comes
from acquiring and employing human assets efectively. In this background,
Building Organizations and Managing People for Strategic Advantage helps
participants systematically and strategically explore complex aspects of
managing an organization's human assets. For many entrepreneurs, the most
pressing challenges are how to locate and recruit talented people, how to
manage and keep them, and how to build a high growth, long-term, sustainable
frm. Te course provides a good understanding of how to overcome these
challenges by addressing four critical areas: organizational architecture for
strategic advantage, leadership and motivation, team building, and negotiation
in entrepreneurial settings.
f. IP Strategies for Building Competitive
Advantage
In today’s fercely competitive world, it isn’t enough for entrepreneurs
to just innovate and execute. Tey must also actively adopt strategies to
protect and exploit their innovations. IP Strategies for Building Competitive
Advantage reveals the dynamics of Intellectual Property (IP) and lays bare
the fundamental IP concepts and legal and business strategies applicable to
start-ups. By the end of the program, faculty members are equipped to help
entrepreneurs identify their IP assets and design efective IP strategies to
achieve organizational objectives.
g. Practical Ethics: Succeeding in a
Transparent World
Tis is a unique course built on the foundation of Giving Voice to Values
(GVV), a research and curriculum development program housed and
supported by Babson College. Te course is designed to enable participants
evaluate the importance of ethics with the intention of identifying and
practicing actionable strategies for value driven leadership. Graduates of this
course gain an introduction to the GVV curricular development process and
are capable of helping entrepreneurs identify what is right and also making
it happen. Tey learn how to help individuals build and practice the skills
needed to recognize, speak and act on their values when conficts arise.
35
For the campus entrepreneurship ecosystem to mature and realize the
potential to create and support entrepreneurs, advance infrastructure in the
form of innovation centers, incubators and entrepreneurship support centers
need to be developed. High-impact Infrastructure Design courses address
this need for greater in-depth knowledge and exposure for faculty involved in
initiating and establishing infrastructure on campus. Tese programs enable
them to understand the means and dynamics of infrastructure development
and to strive to make these platforms world class.
Who should apply
Tese programs are appropriate for faculty members who are seriously
involved in building the campus entrepreneurship ecosystem and are desirous
of setting up the requisite infrastructure on campus to create and support
entrepreneurs.
High Impact Infrastructure Design
36
Faculty who
have attended the
NEN led courses are
able to get students
enthused about
entrepreneurship.
Tey are able to
convince students,
clarify doubts, impart
skills and provide
valuable inputs. And
they are able to do
this very efectively.
More importantly, the
students are convinced
that their faculty have
the knowledge to
guide them. Terefore,
the impact is very, very
large.”
— Dr. Kerron Reddy,
CEO, Acharya Institute of
Management and Sciences,
Bangalore
a. Developing Advanced Infrastructure:
IEDC/EDCs, Mentoring Units and Incubators
Te Advanced Infrastructure program arms faculty members with the
know-how for securing funds from government agencies to create advanced
infrastructure and skills that are required to design and implement innovation
driven entrepreneurship programs on campus. Tese programs engage
students in exploring entrepreneurial opportunities, practicing starting a
venture and commercializing innovations. Each of these programs enables
students to innovate, develop practical insights, experiences and skills to start
enterprises, obtain mentoring support and incubate their ventures on campus.
b. Building IP in Academic Campuses
Tis course helps faculty members equip themselves to guide, protect as well
as leverage technology innovations by students on campus. Tey explore
types of innovation in India and in diferent technology campuses across
the globe, patterns of technology development and efects of the internal
and external environment on innovations. Tis course emphasizes the need
for protecting IP through patenting and provides the information to do so
successfully. Faculty members become familiar with the process of patenting
and the nuances in patent protection. Tey undergo a hands-on workshop
that illustrates the steps involved in patent search as a frst step towards
preparing to protect IP. Various ways to monetize IP as investment collateral
through commercialization, technology transfer and licensing are also dealt
with alongside the fundamentals of creating an IP policy. Faculty members
get to know how to reach out to resources such as consultants and IP experts
to successfully build and protect IP.
c. Tools for Successful Business Incubation
Business incubation is a popular tool in entrepreneurship development.
However, while it may be easy to set up the physical facility, efective incubation
is extremely difcult to implement. Business incubator programs are designed
to help accelerate the development of entrepreneurial companies by providing
entrepreneurs with not only facilities, but also the expertise, networks and
tools they need to make their ventures successful. Tools for Successful Business
Incubation helps faculty members understand the requirements of a successful
business incubator program and equips them with the necessary resources.
Te course covers the most common needs of start-up entrepreneurial frms,
the barriers they face, and inputs on how business incubators can promote
their development.
37
Within academic institutes, the faculty plays a critical role
as the frst point of contact for young students aspiring
to be entrepreneurs. Tese faculty members, particularly
those with industry or entrepreneurial background, when
trained, exposed and provided experience progressively,
become efective entrepreneur mentors. NEN Mentor
Development Programs cover concepts and skills of
entrepreneurship along the venture life cycle, the best
teaching methods for entrepreneurs, an understanding
of how to mentor new and practicing entrepreneurs, how
to develop networks and match external resources to the
needs of entrepreneurs.
Te wide range of NEN’s mentor development training
programs is characterized by:
» Multiple levels of intervention, such as
• Classroom orientation
• Practice sessions
• Apprenticeship for structured mentoring
engagement
• Sharing of best practices
» Diverse approach and treatment to efectively
deal with
• ‘Wannabe’ entrepreneurs
• New start-ups and growth-stage entrepreneurs
» Multi-layered and progressive nature of
• Topics based on stage of venture
• Depth of subject matter covered depending on
the audience
Who should apply
Tese courses are suitable for faculty members with
experience in entrepreneurship education and those who
are passionate about and keen on advancing their skills
to help entrepreneurs tackle challenges faced at various
stages of their venture’s development.
Mentor Development Programs
38
a. Mentoring Skills Finishing
School (MSFS)
Tis is a proactive two-day course ofered to select faculty
members on recommendation by the NEN consulting
team based on the faculty’s on-the-ground performance.
Te course is specifcally designed to enable participants
work efciently with entrepreneurs in the pre-venture
and early stage of the venture. Eligibility for this course
depends upon efective implementation of what has been
learnt in the foundation and advance courses undertaken
earlier by the faculty.
Topics include opportunity evaluation, business models,
business planning, estimation of fnances, raising money
and customer development. Further, mentor observation
sessions and practice mentoring sessions enable faculty
members to improve their grasp on the subject and its
applicability. Individual attention during the course and
continued one-to-one support afer the course while
the mentoring apprenticeship is on, ensures that faculty
members gain substantial mentoring knowledge and
skills from the course.
b. Entrepreneur Educator and
Mentor Round Tables
For impact to be realized, entrepreneur educators and
mentors need to have not only knowledge and skills
but networks too. Tese educators with industry or
entrepreneurial background, when trained, exposed
and provided with opportunities to network, become
efective mentors. One of the important ways in which
faculty members can hone their skills is by networking
among themselves and sharing their experiences and best
practices of training and mentoring entrepreneurs.
Select educators and mentors from the community
are brought together on this platform to facilitate this
in addition to gathering inputs for devising newer
engagement methodologies with entrepreneurs. While
interacting with one another, faculty members gain
new connections and knowledge from the exchange of
impactful mentoring and training practices.
c. Tools for Growth
Tere are certain points in a venture’s development
where entrepreneurs need the most help - certainly while
starting up and ofen as they grow, Mentors therefore
need to be prepared to work with entrepreneurs at the
latter stage to help them assess growth opportunities,
learn how to manage cash for growth, and develop the
required organizational capabilities. Tools for Growth
is a unique, hands-on course developed in partnership
with London Business School, under the Goldman Sachs
10,000 Women Program. During the multiple modules
of the course, faculty members work with entrepreneur
participants - immediately applying the tools they are
learning and helping entrepreneurs develop action
plans to use the tools and techniques to address growth
challenges.
d. Kick-starting Ventures
In this module, participants learn how to mentor start-
up ventures. During the intense, hands-on course,
participants gain a very good understanding of many of
the vital issues related to starting a high-potential start-up
including assessing opportunities, testing business plans
and understanding organizational requirements for the
early stages of company growth. Trough case studies,
working with entrepreneurs and hands-on exercises,
participants build their ability to coach new entrepreneurs
through to manage obstacles while deciding whether
to start the venture, developing the right strategy, and
actually launching the business. During the course,
faculty members work with entrepreneur participants
in developing an action plan to apply the tools and
techniques learned, to the entrepreneur’s starting up
challenges. Te course was developed in partnership with
the London Business School under the Goldman Sachs
10,000 Women Program.
Te mentoring support I have received
from the NEN Faculty has been crucial to
my success. Apart from introducing me to
new costing techniques, my mentor gave me
practical insights on expanding my supplier
base – an issue I had been struggling with for
a while. In just four months of mentoring,
not only has my production doubled, but my
revenue has jumped by 25 percent!”
— Mohit Soni, Entrepreneur
Baba Metal Works, Nanded, Maharashtra
With his evangelical enthusiasm towards
entrepreneurship and support from NEN, Prof.
Soumya Chakraborty mentors entrepreneurs,
helping them network and connect to the larger
entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Connecting Young Entrepreneurs to the Ecosystem
Bhupesh Sharma is shrinking the traditional windmill. His start-up Breson
specialises in designing small wind turbines and pumps. His small windmills
can be placed on rooftops and can be used as a backup power option. They
are expected to become a cost-efective solution for generating renewable
energy at cheaper rates for the retail market.
Bhupesh, a former Business Design student at the We School, Bangalore,
had won the top position at NEN Tata First Dot in 2012. Prof. Soumya
Chakraborty, his mentor, points out Bhupesh’s success as an example of
how a student venture can thrive in a conducive entrepreneurial ecosystem.
Bhupesh, who attributes much of his success to active mentoring by
the faculty at his institute, developed the idea in his campus. A series of
brainstorming sessions between the two resulted in Bhupesh taking
to piloting his product in the corporate market frst rather than directly
entering the retail sector. Further, through his mentor’s network and leads,
Bhupesh was successful in getting a few customers too.
Attending NEN’s Entrepreneurship Educator’s Course (EEC) during 2007-08,
while a faculty at ISBR Business School, Bangalore, got Soumya interested in
teaching entrepreneurship. He soon started conducting entrepreneurship-
related workshops for students. Under his stewardship, Innocentive, ISBR’s
E Cell, become the national champions at NEN’s Entrepreneurship Week
India, 2009, from among 400 institutes from 30 cities!
Currently Manager – Management Development Centre and Faculty - HR
and OB at the Bangalore campus of We School (formerly Welingkar Institute
of Management Development and Research), Bangalore, Prof. Soumya is
an NEN-certifed entrepreneurship mentor.
Now, in his ffth year at We School, he is focusing on evangelizing
entrepreneurship to students. He notes, “Out of 15 students who evince
interest in entrepreneurship, at least one of them turns out to be serious
about entrepreneurship.”
Upon joining We School, Soumya worked on resuscitating the defunct
E Cell Praarambh on campus. The E Cell, though functioning informally,
responds to request for help from students keen on venturing into
Prof. Soumya
brings a spirit of
academic enquiry into
our discussions forcing
us to address elements
in our business model
which we would have
otherwise ignored.
He has been most
generous in opening
up his network to us,
thereby expanding our
access to experienced
individuals in our
sector.
—Suneel Pillai, Founder,
Kollido, Bangalore
business. Recently, students Karan and Madhur got
support to start a waste management venture; they are
piloting a plan to process waste into compost and have
already started getting revenues.
With NEN’s guidance, We School has taken a holistic
approach to developing entrepreneurship. The institute
has programs to create awareness on entrepreneurship,
programs that hand-hold students starting up as well
as several classroom and experiential programs. Along
with his colleague Dr. Madhavi Lokhande, Soumya has
organized entrepreneurship workshops, and other
events, like Pappu Can’t Sell Sala – an initiation program
into entrepreneurship for the junior batch at We School,
Srijan – a business plan contest and E Idiots – an inter-
college entrepreneurship festival.
Soumya has, like other evangelical faculty in the NEN
network, built and enhanced his own knowledge
and understanding of entrepreneurship through
the NEN Faculty development programs. He
acknowledges the Kickstarting Your Ventures program
that helped him gain an understanding of critical
issues in starting a high-potential startup, including
assessing opportunities, testing business plans, and
understanding organizational requirements of early-
stage companies.
The Tools for Growth
workshop prepared
him to work with
entrepreneurs at the
growth stage - to help
them assess growth
opportunities; learn
how to manage cash for
growth; and develop the
required organizational
capabilities.
Soumya credits the
support received from
NEN. “I think the whole
support system that NEN
has created for faculty is
excellent!” He adds that
the advantage of NEN’s
faculty training programs
is that these have a very clear outcome-oriented
structure, which enables the faculty to implement
the learning on campus. He cites an example, “After
we did the Entrepreneur Educator Course, we went
back and actually designed a course for (student)
entrepreneurship.”
Soumya has put the knowledge gained over the years
through NEN programs and through peer interaction
to good use - he is closely associated with a unique
prototype and innovation lab on We School Bangalore
campus, which is based on the InnoWe lab at We
School, Mumbai.
Over the years, Soumya has mentored a dozen student
entrepreneurs. He is currently mentoring a couple of
students and a couple of young entrepreneurs. One of
them is an IIMC alumnus who has founded an internet
start-up which provides information on various
products available for rent in diferent cities. The
young entrepreneur is working with Soumya to handle
challenges like scalability and managing demand.
Another entrepreneur Soumya is mentoring, is Suneel
Pillai, founder of a soon to-be-launched online platform.
Suneel acknowledges his support in helping him redo
his business model, “Prof. Soumya has been involved
with our start-up from
the very beginning and
he brings a spirit of
academic enquiry into
our discussions forcing
us to address elements
in our business model
which we would have
otherwise ignored.”
Even more importantly,
Soumya opened up
his network to the
young team, thereby
expanding their access to
experienced individuals
in the sector.
NEN’s vast network
enables students and
mentors to tap into
various leads, be it for
NEN IMPACT
• Designed a short course on entrepreneurship
for MBA students
• Helped setup a prototype and innovation lab
on Bangalore campus
• Mentored many community entrepreneurs and
graduate entrepreneurs
• Maximized connects for entrepreneurs to
network resources including funding, expertise
etc.
• NEN faculty expert and facilitator for diferent
entrepreneurship programs across Bangalore
• Develops and customises entrepreneurship
programs for various academic institutes.
funding or industry expertise or potential customers.
Soumya credits the support of the NEN network that
facilitated an automotive electronics start-up he was
mentoring, get funded by the startup accelerator
Morpheus.
As an NEN Faculty Leader, Soumya has acquired the
capability to develop programs as per the need and
requirement of B-School campuses across the country.
Invited to be part of the NEN Entrepreneurship Educator
Panel, Prof. Soumya works as a resource in developing
courseware and training entrepreneurship educators in
and around Bangalore.
Personal Growth
Formerly an Assistant Professor in Corporate Relations
with ISBR Business School, Bangalore, Soumya worked
in recruitment before getting back to academics.
His initiation into NEN and interactions with
entrepreneurs helped Soumya realize that he was
enjoying the experience while also learning a lot in
the process. One of the direct outcomes of working
with various entrepreneurs on their projects is that his
network is constantly expanding to include venture
capitalists, entrepreneurs, non-profts and experts in
the ecosystem. Another efect of NEN’s programs is the
transformation in his teaching style which has become
highly experiential and includes a number of case
studies and activities.
Over the years, Soumya has transformed into a strong
entrepreneurship educator and mentor, utilizing
NEN’s training and content resources, and the several
opportunities he has had to network with peers and
share best practices with international and national
experts.
He was awarded the Ramaswamy P Aiyar – Best Young
Teacher Award 2013 as recognition of his immense
contribution to teaching, innovative pedagogy,
executive education, international collaborations,
student mentoring and development, research and
entrepreneurial support.
Ask him what the core of being an entrepreneurship
faculty is, and Soumya says, “You need to have
entrepreneurial passion, without which you cannot
go and teach entrepreneurship. If you don’t love the
subject, you can’t teach it.”
Te
NEN
Community
45
Content Contributors
Faculty who have signifcantly contributed to NEN’s content and faculty development resources over
the past years include:
Edward Rubesch
Faculty Member of Entrepreneurship, Director of Centre for Sustainable Enterprise, Tammasat
University, Tailand
Edward Rubesch combines a mixture of practical and academic entrepreneurial experience. A
founder of four companies, he also assists the Director of the Technology Licensing Ofce for
Tailand’s National Science and Technology Development Agency. He holds a Master of Science
degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a PhD from Tammasat University.
He is active in academic research in the areas of entrepreneurship and innovation in developing
countries.
John Mullins
Associate Professor of Management Practice in Entrepreneurship and Marketing at the London Business
School, UK
An award-winning teacher and facilitator, John Mullins brings to his teaching and research 20 years
of executive experience in high growth American retailing frms including the two ventures he
founded and the one he took public. He has authored two defning books for entrepreneurs, Te
New Business Road Test and Getting to Plan B. John has served on the boards of many fast growing
entrepreneurial companies, and consults with and ofers executive education in fve continents.
He earned his MBA at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and his PhD at the University of
Minnesota.
When we work in emerging economies, we at NEN are
very conscious of two things:
1) Our faculty and entrepreneurs deserve the best and
need to be at the cutting edge of thinking and learning,
and
2) Not everything that is applicable in the West can
directly be applied in an emerging economy.
We ensure that we constantly stay tuned to the needs
of our audience by taking the following approach to
developing or curating the right content, pedagogy
and methodologies - we identify leading thinkers in
entrepreneurship learning from across the world with
original, useful conceptual frameworks and practical
content. We then work with them to blend these
frameworks and pieces of content with the needs of
entrepreneurs and faculty in emerging economies, using
appropriate teaching tools and methodologies that make
them most useful.
Contributing faculty with whom NEN has co-designed,
or co-opted its programs have come from Stanford,
London Business School, Babson, Indian Institutes of
Management – Ahmedabad and Bangalore, Indian
Institute of Technology – Bombay and Kanpur, University
of Columbia, and Tammassat University, Tailand,
among others.
46
Murray Low
Director of Entrepreneurship Education, Te Eugene Lang Entrepreneurship Center, Columbia Business
School, USA
Murray Low is an experienced entrepreneur and a leading authority on entrepreneurship in
independent, corporate and not-for-proft settings. As the founder of the Columbia Entrepreneurship
Program, he has worked to make entrepreneurship a viable career option for MBA graduates. He has
also worked to improve business education in developing countries, particularly in Africa. He has
published widely in academic and practitioner journals and is a regular commentator in the media. He
holds an MBA and a PhD from the University of Pennsylvania.
Tina Seelig
Professor, Dept of Management Science and Engineering (MS&E), Executive Director for the Stanford
Technology Ventures Program (STVP), the entrepreneurship centre, Stanford University, USA
Tina Seelig teaches courses on creativity, innovation, and entrepreneurship and has won several awards,
including the Gordon Prize which recognizes her as a national leader in engineering education, and the
2008 National Olympus Innovation Award. She has written 16 popular science books and educational
games. Her latest books are What I Wish I Knew When I Was 20 (2009), and inGenius: A Crash Course
on Creativity (2012). She earned her PhD from Stanford University Medical School where she studied
neuroscience.
Radhika Meenakshi
Founder, Wise Owl Consulting, Hyderabad, India
Radhika Meenakshi has over 20 years of teaching and consulting experience at reputed academic
institutes. She heads several entrepreneurship bodies and specializes in working with MSMEs
and women entrepreneurs. Her work can be described as a viral campaign for entrepreneurship,
transgressing languages, regions and scale of ventures reaching hundreds of entrepreneurs.
She actively mentors student start-ups and community entrepreneurs. She holds a PhD in
entrepreneurship.
Rajeev Roy
Entrepreneurship Program Consultant, Oman
Rajeev Roy has a blend of industry and entrepreneurial experience. His entrepreneurial ventures range
from food processing, dairy, aquaculture and micro fnance to business process outsourcing. He has
authored a book titled Entrepreneurship, several papers on entrepreneurship and has written over 80
case studies. He regularly conducts Entrepreneurship Development Programs in Chile and Canada,
and at the Sellinger Business School at Baltimore, USA. Rajeev holds an MBA from IIM, Ahmedabad
and a PhD from Utkal University.
Raj Shankar
Principal Business Strategist, Ichiban Business Consultants, Chennai, India
Raj Shankar is the co-founder of Ichiban, a global management consultancy. He spearheads
business innovation consulting and technology consulting practices. An author of three books on
entrepreneurship, he is an avid blogger, columnist and researcher. He is a visiting faculty at various
colleges in India, and works with business incubators to mentor start-ups. A certifed NEN mentor, he
holds an MBA from the Symbiosis Institute of International Business, Pune.
47
Rakesh Basant
Professor of Economics and Chairperson, Center for Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship at IIM
Ahmedabad, India
Rakesh Basant is an accomplished economist who is passionate about innovation and entrepreneurship.
He specializes in science and technology and in patents. He has been a consultant to various
organizations including the World Bank. As a recipient of the Ford Foundation’s post-doctoral
fellowship in economics, he was a visiting research fellow at the Economic Growth Center, Yale
University, USA. He has published widely. He received his PhD from Gujarat University, Ahmedabad.
Somayajulu Garimella
Professor, Marketing, SP Jain Institute of Management and Research, Mumbai, India
Somayajulu Garimella is a graduate of world-class entrepreneurship educator courses, including
Entrepreneurship Education Colloquium on Participant Centered Learning (EECPCL) at Harvard
Business School, Boston, Certifcate Course for Entrepreneurship Trainers (CEPT) by ISB, Hyderabad,
and Entrepreneurship Educators Course (EEC) by NEN. He regularly consults with and mentors
start-up frms. He holds an MBA from University of Texas and a PhD in Management from Osmania
University.
C Amarnath
Professor and PI, Society of Innovation and
Entrepreneurship, IIT Bombay
Ashish Pande y
Assistant Professor of OB/HRM, Shailesh J School of
Management, IIT Bombay
B V Ph ani
Associate Professor, Finance & Entrepreneurship,
Coordinator, SIDBI Innovation Incubation Center, IIT
Kanpur
Deepak Roy
Head, Center of Excellence - Entrepreneurship
Development, SCMHRD, Pune
DVR Seshadri
Adjunct Faculty , Strategy and Marketing, IIM Bangalore
Hema Krishnamurthy
Visiting Faculty, Finance and Accounting, IIM Bangalore
and Ranchi
James Barlow
Director of Entrepreneurial Leadership, Tufs University
Mary Gentile
Director, Giving Voice to Values and Sr Research Scholar,
Babson College
Poyni Bhat
Chief Operating Ofcer, SINE, IIT B
Purvi Seth
CEO, Shilputsi Consultants, Mumbai
Raj Bhat
Chief Evangelist at enterprisers.in and Chief Knowledge
ofcer at Ourea Capital Advisors and Entrepreneur Trainer
and Mentor, Mumbai
Rajeev S
Director at Asian School of Business and Visiting faculty
IIM Bangalore and Ahmedabad
Rama Velamuri
Professor of Entrepreneurship and Chair of the Department
of Strategy and Entrepreneurship, CEIBS, Shangai
Vasanti Venugopal
Entrepreneurship Educator and Researcher, Bangalore
University
Other faculty include
A unique aspect of the NEN Faculty
development programs is the wonderful mix of
talent you meet in class, comprising entrepreneurs,
and faculty from various felds. Tis fosters diverse
perspectives and strengthens learning. Today the
way we handle entrepreneurship topics in class has
truly transformed.
Being a NEN faculty gives you a great sense of
pride and happiness in terms of contributing
something great which could ignite the mind and
create future leaders who in turn make a great
impact on the society at large.”
Prof.Arya Kumar,
Chief, Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership, BITS Pilani
Te NEN Community
National Entrepreneurship Network (NEN) inspires, educates and supports high-potential entrepreneurs to create
high-value jobs. NEN does this by building institutional capacity and a robust entrepreneurial eco-system.
The Trust
Initiated in 2003 by the Wadhwani Foundation, the non-proft NEN was co-founded with IIT Bombay, IIM
Ahmedabad, BITS-Pilani, SP Jain Institute of Management & Research, and the Institute of Bioinformatics and Applied
Biotechnology, Bangalore.
NEN’s operations in India are managed by K Srikrishna, its Executive Director. Trustees include Dr. Romesh Wadhwani,
Chairman of the Wadhwani Foundation and Sunita Singh, Co-founder and Senior Director of NEN.
The Network
Today, NEN represents India’s largest and most vibrant entrepreneurial community. Te backbone of the NEN
Community comprises of more than 550 member academic institutes with 1200 entrepreneurship faculty and 400
student E Cells; NEN E Clubs, driven by the NEN Alumni and open to the public. Tese bodies organize an astonishing
breadth and depth of programs across the country that create and support entrepreneurs. In addition, the NEN
members support each other individually to realize their entrepreneurial ambitions.
Wadhwani Foundation
Founded in 2003, the Wadhwani Foundation embarked upon its mission of economic acceleration by focusing on
leveraging India’s growing human potential. Subsequently, the Foundation expanded into the US and other countries.
India is expected to add 250-300 million people to the workforce by 2022. It is imperative that large-scale job creation
and skill development supported by public policies are needed not only to accelerate economic growth but also to avoid
demographic disaster.
During the last decade, Wadhwani Foundation launched fve major initiatives in India to address the above need
by promoting entrepreneurial and career skills, creating opportunities for the disabled, encouraging innovation, and
catalyzing policy changes.
In the US, to address the persistently high youth and displaced-worker unemployment issue, Wadhwani Foundation
launched the ‘Race to a Job’ initiative in 2012. Tis initiative leverages technology to bridge the gap between the skills
acquired in high schools and community colleges and those required by the industry.
50
NEN Partners
Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women Program have partnered with NEN for specifc programs in women’s leadership and
mentoring and training of women.
NEN maintains a public-private partnership with the Government of India through its Department of Science and
Technology (DST). Tis partnership goes to support NEN’s capacity building work and training of entrepreneurs. NEN
is the primary driver for a joint program currently underway to develop best practices, metrics and methodologies for
successful incubation and innovation programs in India’s engineering institutions.
Amongst corporations, the Tata Group has been a consistent supporter and partner of NEN across multiple years
actively building the entrepreneurial eco-system in India particularly by creating a key recognition and showcase
platform for student entrepreneurs and young start-ups.
Technology giant IBM has also supported NEN over multiple years including NEN’s mentoring platform. IBM
scientists, management and employees across the organization have actively volunteered their time to work towards
mentoring and helping entrepreneurs.
SAP Global has partnered with NEN to focus on continually building up more mentoring capacity and plan to impact
entrepreneur growth positively by creating and supporting high quality mentors.
Fab Women Foundation Trust works with NEN to identify bottlenecks and challenges in women entrepreneurs’
growth and scale-up, and to provide support to overcome these barriers and achieve their growth potential.
Helion Venture Partners, Facebook and Intuit have been other corporate supporters and sponsors of various NEN
Activities. Microsof partners with NEN to provide entrepreneurs with access to development tools through its
Dreamspark and Bizspark initiatives.
Support from these organizations has enabled NEN to train almost 2000 individual faculty members over the past
seven years; many of these individuals have multiple levels of training and skill enhancement support.
As a result of their knowledge and growing interest in entrepreneurship, NEN today has a network of more than 1200
faculty members in India who are supporting entrepreneurship development in diferent ways on academic campuses.
Additionally, NEN has been able to provide scholarships partially or fully covering their course participation fee to a
large number of these faculty members thanks to support from partners.
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