How do I manage a startup effectively? What are the most important aspects of project management? What kind of leadership style should I use?
Every founder faces these questions during early stages of a startup venture and has to reconsider them frequently while his/her enterprise steadily grows.

In this course, students will be able to tackle these questions with a problem based learning approach by taking the role of a startup coach and manage a project team of 4 students working on the development of a startup idea.

The ability to coach others is an often over-looked core competency for leaders. This course will give students an opportunity to learn the fundamental skills of coaching, so they can become coaching leaders. This course is designed to be very experiential. While conceptual frameworks will be introduced through readings, lectures, demonstrations and discussions, the only real way to learn coaching skills is to practice coaching. After gaining profound knowledge regarding business planning, business model design, project management and leadership styles, the students will lead and coach a respective project team. Students will support their teams by offering guidance and advice in developing a startup idea and give individual feedback on pre-defined milestones (e.g. problem-solution fit, customer discovery, growth hacking, etc.).

This seminar aims at students who are interested in learning profound skills in how to manage a start-up through its respective development phases (‘Startup Rollercoaster’) by leading a project team hands-on.

After completing this course, students will have the ability to:

• search for, recognise and evaluate innovative business ideas,
• develop business ideas using appropriate methods and tools,
• identify customers and their needs,
• analyse and evaluate the environment around a business idea,
• develop sustainable business models,
• apply creativity techniques.

Furthermore the students will acquire relevant complementary skills:

Project management:

• successfully managing innovative (therefore less structured) projects
• reaching decisions under uncertainty
• managing several different stakeholders at once
• summarising the most important project results in a business proposal

Leadership:

• lead a project team effectively
• use well-established leadership styles and analyze or prepare for challenging situations
• identify and adapt to leadership styles and attitudes of individuals
• efficiency through recognising and utilising individual strengths of team members
• dealing with various work methods, opinions and perspectives

Communication:

• lively discussions and interactive workshops
• structuring complex data (project results), presenting them in writing and orally to various target groups

- 1 ½ day kick-off event with theoretical input, expert talks, interactive workshops on opportunity recognition and idea generation, teambuilding challenges and networking opportunities

- Team work on real-world startup projects under the supervision of lecturers and external coaches

- Workshops on pre-defined milestones with experts from the Austrian startup environment (e.g. Daniel Cronin, hokify, TheVentury, i5invest, etc.)

- Regular coachings and co-working sessions in accordance with the progress of the teams

- Final pitch session in front of jury

- Documentation of analyses and results in a final report

The final grade will depend on:

• 30 % in-class training (group assessment)
• 60 % reflection paper (individual assessment for interim (30%) and final (30%))
• 10 % literature test (individual assessment)

In order to pass the class, all of these performance indicators have to be positive!

Note: The aim of the compulsory literature test (01.10.2019 betweeen 8.00 am and 9.00 am ) is to examine the necessary basic as well as specific knowledge in order to successfully work on your project. If the literature test is not successfully passed, the Analyst Support Program (ASP) will be automatically applied. Within the Analyst Support Program, an individual performance has to be carried out, instead of working in a group. In case of non-participation (only due to illness), a medical certificate must be presented. An alternative date will be offered for this purpose. You will receive detailed information about the content and location of the test after registration to the course.

Students enrolled in the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Specialization Program.

Please note that course registration is binding. The moment your registration is received, it is regarded as a clear commitment on your part. Students cannot transfer to another course (once the add/drop period is over) with no exceptions, as it would be unfair to other students (who might not have gotten into the course of their choice because of the spot you registered for). The number of students accepted to the course will only be expanded if there is no space in any other course 4/5.

Recommendation: Students should already have completed one project course of the specialization entrepreneurship & innovation.

Richard Olbrecht, MSc: richard.olbrecht@wu.ac.at

Dr. Kathrin Reinsberger: kathrin.reinsberger@wu.ac.at