- \n
- On the one hand, companies like\u00a0Google<\/strong>\u00a0are tightly intertwined with the\u00a0support from their partner universities. <\/strong>They are a\u00a0place to nurture ideas, spearhead research, establish patents and are sometimes first drivers for growth.<\/li>\n
- On the other hand, many universities are like\u00a0ivory towers<\/strong>, cut off from the business world, and their teachings have been challenged both by\u00a0Internet startups<\/strong>\u00a0in the field of\u00a0MOOCs<\/a>, such as Coursera, and by innovators who deem they’re an obstacle to business creation (Paypal co-founder\u00a0Peter Thiel<\/strong>\u00a0has a special fund for genius kids that will support them\u00a0provided they drop out<\/a>\u00a0from their college or university).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
![\"Martin](\"http:\/\/innovao.cluster030.hosting.ovh.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Global-Entrepeneurship-Summit-2013-Kuala-Lumpur-Agence-Tesla-martin-pasquier-Knowtex-nicola-loubet-Innovation-factory-anne-lalou-entrepreneurial-university-education-768x1024-3.jpg\")
<\/a>The UK, Malaysia (x2), Egypt and the USA to talk about the way they kickstart entrepreneurship in their universities<\/p><\/div>\n
Universities have a key role to play in today’s shift from a service economy to high-growth companies, <\/strong>those\u00a0that start small and scale rapidly with a supportive environment. The panel at GES was composed of professors all promoting\u00a0entrepreneurship in their alma mater:<\/p>\n
- \n
- Joana Mills<\/a>,\u00a0deputy director of the Center for Entrepreneurial Learning at the University of\u00a0Cambridge<\/strong>,<\/li>\n
- Datuk Zabid<\/a>,\u00a0President of Universiti Tun Abdul Razak in\u00a0Malaysia<\/strong><\/li>\n
- Rafik Guindi<\/a>, helping\u00a0Egypt<\/strong>\u00a0to setup a new age for its education<\/li>\n
- Peter Ng<\/a>,\u00a0founder of the\u00a0UCSI<\/strong>\u00a0group which delivers education, based in particular on the Blue ocean strategy (see Chan Kim’s briefing of this business strategy)<\/li>\n
- Larry Farrel<\/a>, an\u00a0American<\/strong>\u00a0who trained more than 5 million leaders in entrepreneurship\u00a0with an affiliation network<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
4 steps to turn a university into an entrepreneurial hub<\/h2>\n
A first step is to\u00a0think of the university as an institution in a region where specific businesses, culture and history exist<\/strong>. The University of Cambridge, in the UK, is surrounded by about\u00a01 500 high tech companies employing over 54 000 people<\/strong>. It’s both an opportunity to expose students to successful entrepreneurs, and to provide the latter with new research and technology designed by the university.<\/p>\n
![\"Martin](\"http:\/\/innovao.cluster030.hosting.ovh.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Global-Entrepeneurship-Summit-2013-Kuala-Lumpur-Agence-Tesla-martin-pasquier-Knowtex-nicola-loubet-Innovation-factory-anne-lalou-cambridge-university-uk-innovation-ecosystem-3.jpg\")
<\/a>The University of Cambridge and its ecosystem of companies<\/p><\/div>\n
The\u00a0faculty<\/strong>, too, should be aware of the growth of entrepreneurship as a factor of growth, and have an entrepreneurial mindset themselves.\u00a0<\/strong>They\u00a0can create new\u00a0formats<\/strong>\u00a0of knowledge sharing, use high-tech and\/or connected\u00a0tools<\/strong>\u00a0that will empower their students, or\u00a0teach the\u00a0soft skills<\/strong>\u00a0key to any business owner (networking, negotiation\u2026).<\/p>\n
Thirdly, the university should be\u00a0open to private companies<\/strong>. It’s common to see companies hiring graduates and starting them off with intensive training. This suggests that the university did not provide the right skills. For instance, The Universiti Tun Abdul Razak in Malaysia has\u00a0a degree in accountancy that has been designed jointly with the\u00a0Australian CPA<\/a>,<\/strong>\u00a0a professional association of accountants and the 2nd largest body of this type in the world. As a result, graduates receive both a degree and the certification required for one to work as an accountant. Universities can also take\u00a0shares<\/strong>\u00a0in their students projects.\u00a0Stanford<\/a>\u00a0has netted\u00a0$336m\u00a0in shares from Google<\/strong>\u00a0as a patent license fee, and the\u00a0University of Florida<\/a>\u00a0has been getting\u00a020% royalties from Gatorade\u00a0since 1973<\/strong>, which accounted for $150m as of 2009. Another research group from\u00a0MIT<\/a>, led by Tom Leighton, had been working on speed internet algorithms before creating Akamai, a company through which 20-30% of the global internet traffic now transits.<\/p>\n
![\"Martin](\"http:\/\/innovao.cluster030.hosting.ovh.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Global-entrepreneurship-summit-kuala-lumpur-university-and-entrepreneurs-1-3.jpg\")
<\/a>Different types of education institutions can address different segments of entrepreneurs<\/p><\/div>\n
Of course, the question of how to turn an education institution into an entrepreneurial hub is very much contextual. Zabid Abdul Rashid, President of Universiti Tun Abdul Razak, is trying to make\u00a0a typology of universities<\/strong>\u00a0and crafting steps that they can take to support entrepreneurs<\/strong>.<\/strong>\u00a0According to him, an education institution must take into account its own market to know how to drive different segments of entrepreneurs, from SME owners to risk-takers. (Stanford or Berkeley are known to take risks, while Yale nurtures more\u00a0corporate leaders, for instance)<\/p>\n
4 Roles of an Entrepreneurial University<\/h2>\n
In the end, added Rafik Guindi from Egypt, a university should think about what it prepares its students for. After having brilliantly described how education has gone from learning the trade of your parents to learning new skills, then focusing on degrees and more recently on research, he\u00a0described the entrepreneurial university as encompassed in spheres of human interaction and how it must prepare the youth for effectiveness and impact:<\/strong><\/p>\n
- \n
- At an individual level, a university must provide personal knowledge (skills, taste for risk, leadership, innovation)<\/li>\n
- At a country level, the university must develop thinking and action on national issues (such a new regime building in Egypt)<\/li>\n
- At a regional level, the university should address topics such as security and water resources<\/li>\n
- At a global level, eventually, the university must prepare and help students tackle the world’s problems such as climate change.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
![\"Martin](\"http:\/\/innovao.cluster030.hosting.ovh.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/GES2013-University-and-innovation-sugata-mitra-trending-3.jpg\")
<\/a>Universities was designed to provide exchangeable civil servants. How can it adapt to an entrepreneur-driven growth?<\/p><\/div>\n
Let us not forget how education and\u00a0universities had been designed in the first place; as a breeder of similar and\u00a0exchangeable\u00a0civil servants<\/strong>, from lawyers and philosophers in kings’ courts to the British Empire’s literal colony of efficient mechanisms to spread a world-wide empire and administration, as Sugata Mitra reminds us in\u00a0a brilliant TED Talk<\/a>.<\/p>\n
All in all, the entrepreneurial university must both open itself to its environment, especially with companies, and tackle a range of subjects on which students can act directly upon within the university to change our world. But it’s a long road.\u00a0The Kauffman foundation<\/a>, a leading think and do tank on entrepreneurship and education, has assessed that\u00a0only 12 educational institutions in the world were entrepreneurial<\/strong>\u00a0in 2012.<\/p>\n
- Datuk Zabid<\/a>,\u00a0President of Universiti Tun Abdul Razak in\u00a0Malaysia<\/strong><\/li>\n
- On the other hand, many universities are like\u00a0ivory towers<\/strong>, cut off from the business world, and their teachings have been challenged both by\u00a0Internet startups<\/strong>\u00a0in the field of\u00a0MOOCs<\/a>, such as Coursera, and by innovators who deem they’re an obstacle to business creation (Paypal co-founder\u00a0Peter Thiel<\/strong>\u00a0has a special fund for genius kids that will support them\u00a0provided they drop out<\/a>\u00a0from their college or university).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n