Imagine if, as an employer, your employees had the entrepreneurial skills required to produce innovative ideas and increase the competitive advantage of your business.

Imagine if as an employee you had the entrepreneurial skills needed to identify and exploit new business opportunities, progressing your career to the next level.

Through this unique University of Warwick programme you will learn how to develop, focus, and test your entrepreneurial ability, arriving at a business proposition with ambitious yet attainable objectives.

• You want to test the commercial potential of your ideas and plan a route to market
• You wish to have a greater impact on the future direction of your organisation and boost your own career

What will you get out of it?

• Focus on your own capabilities and skills, and analyse external competitive and market forces.
• Establish a framework for generating new ideas
• Develop the ability to evaluate and expand enterprise ideas into feasible projects with profit potential
• Examine and practice the process of transforming feasible projects into fully developed business plans
• Identify potential resources and a support network for your venture
• Communicate your business ideas more effectively and develop the communication skills necessary for a successful entrepreneurial career
• Leave the course with a fully developed and critically appraised business plan

Which businesses will benefit?

• Those who are developing new ventures and need entrepreneurial employees to implement them
• Those with newly recruited staff who need to be immersed into an enterprise culture
• Those with a team in need of rejuvenation who are required to deliver creative solutions to organisational problems
• An organisation considering product development or diversification in order to create new revenue streams

• A renewed enthusiasm for change amongst employees
• Develop a burgeoning entrepreneurial culture with a focus on maintaining and increasing  competitive advantage through innovation
• Gain proactive and forward thinking individuals with the ability to create and plan the right solution for the business with confidence

Course content:  

The course consists of approximately 15 hours of online study to be completed at your own pace. This will get you thinking about all of the key issues and help you to make a contribution to the 3 days of face-to-face study.

Course leader: Keith Morton

Module 1: Developing a Business Opportunity

• Overview of entrepreneurship and enterprise
• Developing awareness of your own entrepreneurship competencies
• Evaluating your own business ideas
• Drafting your pitch

Module 2: Business Planning

• The importance of the business plan
• Your mission and exit strategy
• Understanding the market e.g. customer profiling, pest analysis, customer benchmarking, SWOT analysis
• Marketing Mix
• Hygiene factors
• Producing the offer
• Financial forecasting
• Getting money
• Your human resources
• Evaluating the business planning processing
• The business plan

Class based element – 3 days

Audit

• Refresh on distance learning modules: ‘Developing a business opportunity’ and ‘Business Planning’
• Introduce the MORFA (Markets, Objectives, Resources, Financials, Abilities), Start-up Framework
• Self-Assessment on your Goals and Abilities
• Networks: Mind Map your own contacts and their contacts
• My Brand 1. What does your brand say about you?

Idea generation

Using Networks to generate ideas. Getting people you know to tell you what they want from a product/service

• Core text work: ‘20/20’
• New idea generation using the Innovation/Creativity Checklist
• Visioning the Future – BHAGS (Big Hairy Audacious Goals)
• PESTLE to identify Opportunities for you and Threats for others

Market focus

• Market – draw the Customer
• Segmentation and Differentiation
• Finance 1 – Pricing and Variable Costs, Gross Profit

Planning your launch

• Resources – what will your launch needs be?
• Finance 2 – Fixed Costs and Net Profit
• Sales Forecasting and Cash Flow
• Funding the Venture – what do different investors look for?
• ‘Best Laid Plans’ Book and Checklist

• Presenting and Communicating the Business
• My Brand 2 – The Company
• The Entrepreneur
• Briefing for Business Plan Assignment

Assessment

This will take the form of a fully prepared Business Plan, whether for a real business start-up idea or for something you imagine you might do in the future. It will be expected to contain:

• Description of the Business proposition
• Clear Objectives for 1-3 years
• Market Plan
• Operations Plan
• Resource Plan
• Financial Projections for 12 months, Cashflow and Profit and Loss
• Details of External Agents who will support and advise the Business

Booking information

Venue: RDI Midland Management Centre, Coventry. West Midlands.

Duration:  2 days online and 3 days face-to-face

Fees:  £995 per person. Discounts available for multiple bookings.

Looking for an In-Company solution?

If you have a number of staff who are interested in this programme we can look at delivering a tailored solution at a site near you. For further details please contact Karen Swift: kswift@rdi.co.uk .

RDI partners with UK universities to offer distance learning courses.  

RDi offers online study for a range of UK university courses.