Week 31: Creativity, Innovation and Entrepreneurship (Module 7)

Week 31 saw us start and finish module 7 which was comprised of a single course: MBA 843 Creativity, Innovation and Entrepreneurship. This course was taught by Dr. Kelley A. Packalen. Kelley's background and her unique teaching style made this a great course. Although we covered a lot, the course was as nice to us as it could be.

Topics covered:

• Why Entrepreneurship matters even if you aren't an entrepreneur
• Are you an entrepreneur?
• Creativity & Innovation In-action
• The entrepreneurial process
• Capitalizing on sources of innovation
• Corporate innovation
• The business plan
• Getting the deal done
• Growing the venture
• Making the pitch
• Meeting the entrepreneur
• Putting the pieces together

We had several guest speakers. One notable one was Dany Battat of Battat Toys. In addition we had a local entrepreneur pitch his idea to us, which we had to evaluate using the framework we created. Also, each team had to pitch their "top" idea to the class as though the class were a group of angel investors. There was a few computer simulations too, which were neat to learn from and we did a lot of discussion centered learning in class.

We also had a the president of Barclay Capital, Jerry del Missier, come in and give the class a talk on the financial crisis. He is a Queen's MBA alum from '87.

This weekend we are having a "festivus"! Should be a blast!

Next week is the capstone simulation. It promises to be a very difficult week. There is 107 page manual to read prior to Monday's class. One more week...