SDSU Undergraduate Entrepreneurship Courses

Build Your Entrepreneurial Skills through our Undergraduate Program

 

students in classOur undergraduate courses provide a foundation in which to start building entrepreneurial competencies early. A diverse range in the fields of study allow for interdisciplinary ideas that can be applied to entrepreneurship. Using a combination of in-class learning combined with outside programs, the Lavin Center is able to develop the next generation of entrepreneurs.

Below are the course requirements for completion of the undergraduate Management Specialization in Entrepreneurship at San Diego State University:

 

Business Administration Core Courses

    • BA 300 - Ethical Decision Making in Business
    • BA 310 - Foundations of Business in a Global Environment
    • BA 323 - Fundamentals of Finance
    • BA 350 - Management and Organization Behavior
    • BA 360 - Introduction to Operations and Supply Chain Management
    • BA 370 -Marketing
    • BA 405 - International Business Strategy and Integration
  • Entrepreneurship Major

    • MIS 301: Statistical Analysis for Business
    • MGT 358: Fundamentals of Entrepreneurship
    • MGT 401: Business Internship
    • MGT 444: Business Ethics & Corporate Governance
    • MGT 460: Business Plan Development
    • MGT 475: Leadership in Organizations
  • Electives - (9 units selected from the following)

    • MGT 353: Creativity and Innovation
    • MGT 355: International Entrepreneurship
    • MGT 452: Family Business Management
    • MGT 455: Social Entrepreneurship
    • MGT 459: Franchise Management
    • MGT 498: Investigation and Report
    • JMS 480: Principles of Public Relations

Entrepreneurial Finance provides the financial foundation for starting a business. This course will enable you to develop financial management tools and techniques that you will use over the following life cycle stages of a venture: development, start up, rapid growth and maturity. In addition you will be able to apply the finance tools learned in this course to the areas of market opportunity, competitive position, composition, and sources of financing of the ventures. Upon completion of this course you will have the knowledge to finance an entrepreneurial venture, identify key investors and understand all stages of investment for the entrepreneurial firm.

    • SLOs
      • Identify the financing process of the entrepreneurial business.
      • Identify the key elements of a good business plan.
      • Perform financial analysis and plan as applied to startups and forecast free cash flow.
      • Employ corporate finance principles (such as contingent claims and contracting theory) for the analytical valuation of new ventures.
      • Identify the role of private equity investors - for example, angels, VCs, vendors - in startups.
      • Analyze the process through which entrepreneurs and private equity investors exit their investments.
    • Faculty
      • Jaemin Kim
      • Kamal Haddad

Fundamentals of Entrepreneurship lays the foundation of entrepreneurship. Upon completion of this course you will be able to identify entrepreneurial opportunities, define your customer and seek to create a product that meets a need, as well as understand the basic principles of financial management.

    • SLOs
      • Explain why entrepreneurship can be viewed as arising out of the intersection of enterprising people and opportunities.
        Define entrepreneurial opportunities and explain why such opportunities exist.
      • Explain why cognitive processes provide an important foundation for understanding creativity and opportunity recognition.
      • Explain why entrepreneurs need to gather several kinds of information before launching their new ventures and describe the nature of that information.
      • Explain the difference between human capital and social capital and indicate why he founding team of new ventures should be high in both.
      • Explain the basic principles of financial management, including balance sheets, income statements, and cash flow statements.
      • Define real customer need and explain why an entrepreneur should seek to develop a product or service that meets a real need.
      • Describe how entrepreneurs can prevent others from learning about their business ideas, and list the barriers entrepreneurs can use to prevent competitors from imitating these ideas.
    • Faculty
      • Congcong Zheng
      • Kimberly Davis King
      • Tanya Hertz

This course is a hands-on experience with a business or nonprofit organization. Through this course you will refine your project planning and implementation skills, apply your knowledge to an organization, and develop the appropriate benchmarks.

    • SLOs
      • Plan and implement a complex project within a finite time period.
      • Apply management theory to organizational cultural environments.
      • Coordinate financial resources, materials, and machines to solve management problems.
      • Employ people skills to solve management problems.
      • Develop benchmarks to measure progress against project activities.
    • Faculty
      • Michael L. Sloan
      • William Sannwald

This course will allow you to understand the core concepts of managing a family business. Skills developed in this course range from succession planning, governance, and the identification of unique assets and vulnerabilities of family businesses, to understanding the intricate nature of family culture, family communication, and family conflict.

    • SLOs
      • Understand the impact of family business on economic activity worldwide.
      • Understand the unique assets and vulnerabilities of family enterprises.
      • Understand the role of the CEO in governance, management, and the transfer of power.
      • Understand the relationship between the role of the board, the family council, and top management in providing effective governance for family business continuity key family dynamics.
      • Identify the various stakeholders and the role of trust among family members and their impact on succession and continuity.
      • Discuss the developmental needs and challenges of next generation leaders.
      • Analyze the effect of estate taxes on ownership transfer across generations of family business owners and the implications of ownership structures on the competitive advantages of family businesses.
      • Explain the importance of strategic planning to family business continuity.
      • Explore the critical role and challenges that non-family managers play in family owned operations.
      • Analyze the impact of family culture, family communication, family conflict, and family unity and explore their interaction effects on the family business.
    • Faculty
      • Carmen Bianchi

Completion of this course will give you the skills and knowledge to identify critical issues, generate creative solutions for these issues, and develop the skills to effectively commercialize your innovations.

    • SLOs
      • Explain the influence of problem solving techniques, team processes, and environmental conditions on creativity in organizations.
      • Describe the innovation process, including the innovation value chain, the role of champions, and commercializing an innovation.
      • Explain the process involved in managing creativity or innovation effectively and apply this knowledge to your own creative idea or innovation.
      • Analyze organizational practices that facilitate creativity and innovation.
      • Develop case study analysis skills (specifically, identifying critical issues in case studies and applying course material to case studies).
    • Faculty
      • Amy Randel
      • Bernhard Schroeder

Now that you understand the fundamentals of entrepreneurship, Social Entrepreneurship will allow you to combine those skills with your philanthropic passions. Once you have completed this course you will be able to identify social needs and respond with an entrepreneurial solution, including problem-solving skills, financial metrics and how to attract capital.

    • SLOs
      • Articulate the basic concepts of Social Entrepreneurship.
      • Recognize and assess free-market opportunities that may be transformed into solving social needs.
      • Develop & apply social and financial metrics to assess the viability of social ventures.
      • Identify social needs and respond with viable, definitive, and sustainable entrepreneurial models.
      • Through problem-solving skills, provide recommendations to overcome the barriers to social enterprise development.
      • Analyze the best practices, successes and failures, opportunities and constraints in the field of social entrepreneurship and sustainable business practices.
      • Use creative design and innovative verbal communications as a competitive advantage to attract capital.
      • Identify new trends in entrepreneurship.
    • Faculty
      • Michael Sloan

Coming out of this course you will be able to identify and assess opportunities in international markets, understand different foreign market entry modes, successfully maneuver cross-cultural issues, and understand global trends affecting new ventures.

    • SLOs
      • Discuss the importance of international entrepreneurship and the global trends affecting the emergence of new international ventures (INVs).
      • Identify and assess opportunities in international markets including those in developing countries.
      • Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of different foreign market entry modes available to international entrepreneurs.
      • Deal with main logistic issues regarding importing and exporting.
      • Describe the challenges of cross-cultural issues in communication, international deal-making and networking.
      • Foresee challenges of developing a business concept in geographically dispersed, international team.
    • Faculty
      • Martina Musteen

Completion of this course will give you a variety of skills to perform critical analysis of franchise offerings, understand its viability as a business expansion strategy, develop a business plan for a new franchise, as well as the ability to navigate the franchisor/franchisee relationship.

    • SLOs
      • Evaluate franchise offerings with a critical analysis.
      • Articulate the indicators and contra-indicators of when franchising should be a viable business expansion strategy.
      • Differentiate between the challenges and rewards faced by franchisors and franchisees, and the legal duties of both.
      • Develop a business plan for the launch of a new franchise opportunity sufficient to sell the concept to a banker or other lender.
      • Provide the key elements of a franchise disclosure document.
      • Identify the primary sources of conflict between franchisors and franchisees.
      • Articulate the feasibility of franchising as a growth strategy in new entrepreneurial ventures.
    • Faculty  
      • George Hadjis
      • Frank Caperino

This course will give you the skills to conduct a feasibility analysis, identify financial requirements, and complete all aspects of the business plan from executive summary to operations and company structure.

    • SLOs
      • Utilize screening and feasibility tools to effectively conduct a feasibility analysis to determine the worthiness of a potential new business idea.
      • Complete a business plan including an executive summary, industry and market analysis, a marketing strategy and plan, operations plan, product/service development plan and company structure.
      • Identify the financial requirements of a new business and develop pro forma financial statements (e.g. income statement, balance sheet, cash flow, etc.)
    • Faculty
      • Bernhard Schroeder
      • Mujtaba Ahsan
      • Kimberly Davis King

This course will prepare you to take on the various challenges presented in leadership. Upon completion of this course you will understand what it takes to motivate, empower and inspire others, and what it takes to communicate and negotiate effectively.

    • SLOs
      • Discuss the role of individual difference characteristics in leadership.
      • Compare and contrast leadership and management.
      • Define power sources in an organization and its key role in leadership.
      • Identify ways to motivate, empower, and inspire others.
      • Describe different models and theories of leadership.
      • Explain the leadership practices necessary to implement change, including overcoming resistance to change and the importance of vision.
      • Describe the role culture, diversity and gender can play in leadership. Demonstrate skills in communication, negotiation, leading a meeting, and solving problems in a group environment.
    • Faculty
      • Blue Robbins

In this course you will complete a comprehensive and original study of a problem connected with management under the direction of a faculty member of the Management Department. It is the student's responsibility to identify and work with a faculty member on a specialized research project related to any aspect of the entrepreneurial process.

    • Faculty
      • Mike Sloan
      • William Sannwald