"Are management graduates meant to be corporate servants or corporate masters? As a responsible member of the student community, what steps would you take to promote entrepreneurship among B-school students? Suggest implementable solutions."
MBA is meant to teach a management graduate to manage a business. Its core intention is to provide him/her with the knowledge on the principles of how a firm runs and the activities involved with the same. Now it is the student’s prerogative to either choose to execute the vision of a company joined or to start of a firm from scratch and execute that successfully.
But inherently in our MBA structure, we have tended to tilt more towards serving the corporate houses rather than create a framework for people to startup on their own. This of course is because at the end of the day, it is less risky to join a corporate with a set of responsibilities and a paycheck and therefore is typically more palatable to the majority of the b-school population. However as has been observed, the knowledge gained from setting up an enterprise even if it eventually fails is often equivalent to multiple years of work experience.
Hence, it is necessary to within the curriculum and framework of the MBA not totally erode the concept of entrepreneurship and find some ways of promoting it:
Ø Incorporate papers on entrepreneurship within the course curriculum.
Ø A functioning entrepreneurship-cell run by the students but guided by professors & supported by alumni who are currently entrepreneurs goes a long way in supporting those who choose to move into entrepreneurship. Having a Venture Capitalist as a partner in such a cell is the icing on the cake.
Ø Run regular contests that promote business plans. These happen on a regular basis already and will be enhanced if the opportunity presents it self to present such a B-plan to a group of VCs who would be willing to provide a seed fund for the same.
Ø Finally, provide an option - as has been done in institutes such as IIM A&B - for students who wish to move into entrepreneurship, the chance to sit for placements in the college the next year in case their effort fails or they wish to close down. This in some way hedges their bets and in some cases will provide the necessary impetus for someone on he wall to take a decision in favor of starting his own enterprise
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