The document summarizes discussions from an NCIIA conference call on established entrepreneurship programs. Representatives from several universities discussed the origins and structure of their programs, key successes and challenges. If starting over, representatives said they would focus more on students, assessment, and building an advisory council earlier. They also emphasized the importance of the right people and funding sources.

1. 1994
1995
A Review of Practices of
1996
1997
1998
Established Entrepreneurship
1999
2000 Programs
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
NCIIA – OPEN - 2012
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011 Organizers and Moderators:
2012
Douglas Arion – Carthage College
Michael Lehman – Univ. of Pitts.

2. A Great Idea!
The Wheel!!
Please Don’t Do This!!!

3.  Kathy Allen – University of Southern Cal.
 John Ochs – Lehigh University
 Tim Stearns – California State - Fresno
 Burt Swersey – Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute ( via Skype)
 Douglas Arion – Carthage College
 Michael Lehman – University of Pittsburgh
 All of you! Discussion is Key!

4.  What motivated starting a program?
 When was the program started?
 How many students and faculty are involved
now? Initially?
 Summary: How is the program
structured/operated?
 What have been some major successes?

5.  What have been the greatest challenge(s) or
failure(s) in your program, and how were they
overcome?
 If you were starting over, knowing what you
know now, what would you do?

6. Center for Technology Commercialization
 Entrepreneurship center founded 1972
 Commercialization center founded 1997

7.  Challenge: Everyone is doing entrepreneurship now –
how do you continue to stand out from the crowd?
 Insights:
◦ You can’t control entrepreneurship in one place on
campus
◦ Success is about the right people and tons of patience
◦ Success is about an entrepreneurship ecosystem that
shuns bureaucracy and develops organically from a
grass roots effort
◦ Success is about finding the champions to drive the
vision

8. Positives
 Motivation: Faculty, Alumni, State and Industry interest
 Timeline:
◦ 1994: Undergraduate Integrated Product Development (IPD) pilot
◦ 2001: Graduate IPD, MBA Venture Series, Integrated Business & Engineering
◦ 2005: Entrepreneurship minor
◦ 2010: Baker Institute for Entrepreneurship, Creativity and Innovation
◦ 2012: Graduate Masters in Technical Entrepreneurship
 Initially: 9 students, no staff, 3 faculty (1/3 FTE) as a pilot during summer
session
 Now*: 800+ students, 7 full-time staff, 23 faculty (10 FTE) per year and growing
 Program Structure: University Institute with a director who reports to the
provost – an umbrella organization (*see slide #2, yellow highlight indicates
activities included in ‘Now’ count above)
 Major successes: See slide #3 or go to www.lehigh.edu/ipd
www.lehigh.edu/entrepreneurship, www.lehigh.edu/innovate
8

9. “Garage”
Thalheimer Student Entrepreneurs Student Start-up
Competition Incubator Wilbur
Powerhouse
Lehigh Entrepreneurs Network Innovation & Entrep.
Infrastructure Leadership Residency
L. Pool Memorial Scholarships
for Entrepreneurship & Other Related Office of Student
Levin Advanced Technology
Courses Leadership
Development
Entrepreneurship Competition Integrated
Product Technical ME Labs
Lehigh Silicon Valley Entrepreneurship Development Entrepreneurship
Minor Masters
Bioengineering Capstone Design VENTURE Series Integrated
Executive Certificate Business &
Educational Engineering
Small Business Counseling MBA Corporate Programs
Entrepreneurship IDEAS
Community Consulting Practicum PA School for Global
Entrepreneurship Computer Science
The Business of Life Science & Business
PA Governor’s Institute Ben Franklin
for Personal Finance & Baker Institute for Technology
Leadership Breakfast Series Partners Keystone
Entrepreneurial Entrepreneurship, Creativity &
Education Innovation Innovation
Development & Marketing of New Zone
Products Manufacturers Resource Related
Center
Opportunities for Student Innovation Integrated Real SBDC
Office of Technology Organizations
Estate
Transfer &
Business Information Systems Practicum
Design Minor &
Commercialization
Center for Advanced
LEHIGH’S
Capstone CE & IE Design Projects Design Majors Materials & Nanotech Entrepreneurship
Community
Ecosystem
Production & Marketing of Center for Optical
Sound Recordings Fellows
Technologies
Martindale Center for the Study of Global Village Life Sciences
Private Enterprise Greenhouse
Leadership Enterprise Systems Center
Microfinance Lehigh
ArtsLehigh
Business 1 Business Minor

10. Major Successes
Tech Startups Services
 Viddler.com  Lehigh Valley Grand
 Orion Security LSP Prix
 MPlug  Vital Conversions
 Gigmax.com Fashion
 hField Technologies  Simply-Anti Apparel
 EcoTech Marine
 George Guest Ltd.
 Lifeserve Innovations
 Hillary Caroline
Jewelry
NGOs
 Soccer without
Borders
 Jamii Water
1
0

11. Negatives
 Challenges:
◦ Finding like-minded faculty who are willing to learn by doing
◦ Convincing a reluctant University administration to invest
◦ Bottom-up implementation needs top-down champion
◦ Great Strategic Planning with poor follow-on tactical implementation
◦ Understanding University budgets and prioritization processes
◦ Capital $’s for buildings are easy; $’s for operations and maintenance
not so
 Solutions:
◦ Build your programs and courses into the curriculum on a boot strap
budget
◦ Seek funding from wherever: alumni donors, foundation grants, ear
marks, and industry sponsors
 Do overs? Fight harder, be even more belligerent when dealing
with university administrators! Publish more.
1
1

12.  What motivated starting a program?
Need for entrepreneurship curricula in the region. The Central Valley struggles with
high unemployment, lower education levels, and lack of corporate opportunities. Both
Innovation and Entrepreneurship are believed to be engines for economic transformation.
Developing entrepreneurial skills among students is a long path to success, but fundamentally
the most sustainable.
 When was the program started?
The first class in the major was offered in 1999. The Lyles Center for Innovation and
Entrepreneurship launched in 2004. However, it was the result of an earlier Institute that
launched in 1996.
 How many students and faculty are involved now? Initially?
We graduate 70-75 majors each year. Approximately 150 students with
entrepreneurship declared as their major. I was the first entrepreneurship faculty. We now have
3 faculty (2 full, one assistant) and a host of adjuncts 5-6.
 Summary: How is the program structured/operated?
The entrepreneurship major is housed in the Business school of which I am a faculty
member. However, the Lyles Center is a university facility of which I am the executive director. I
oversee both.

13.  What have been some major successes?
◦ A two semester mentor program requiring students to attend each Friday for 3 hours.
◦ 8500 sq. ft. facility housing 8 student hatchery rooms, a classroom, 2 venture capital
offices, 30 work stations, board room, student lounge, and creativity lab.
◦ Built the first ever Entrepreneur Pathway linking 20 high schools with 12 community
colleges to Fresno State. Train faculty at all levels to teach entrepreneurship using our
philosophy and method. Articulation between schools achieved enabling students to
continue through a consistent educational experience.
◦ 2nd largest major in business school
◦ A technology commercialization unit that works both with campus and community to
launch products.
◦ “New California LLC” created to capture commercialization agreements with potential
benefits from exits. A partnership between the private sector and the university.
◦ Creation of an Advisory Council that contributes $5000 a year each and are highly
engaged in programs.
◦ Originated the Coleman Fellows program which now has 15 faculty teaching aspects of
entrepreneurship in their disciplines (e.g. anthropology, engineering, agriculture,
culinology, public relations, music, architecture, etc.)

14.  What have been the greatest challenge(s) or failure(s) in your program, and
how were they overcome?
◦ Business plan competitions. So many methods, so many mediocre
outcomes.
◦ Preserving the independence of the Lyles Center
◦ Money! 3 staff funded but 4 project managers live off soft money. Have to
wake up every day and hope a new stream is found.
◦ Gaining greater penetration on campus through student engagement
◦ The exchange between investing in marketing or program is a tough one.
We have never had marketing dollars and without have not received wide
attention outside of Central Valley. On the other hand, we do not recruit
students nationally. However, more national acknowledgements would (I
think) lead to more dollars flowing into the Center.

15.  If you were starting over, knowing what you know now, what would you do?
◦ I would have focused more on the students and their performance in the
program. Your first cohort defines your second cohort defines your
third….. We had many students that should not have been allowed to
declare entrepreneurship as their major.
◦ Built more assessment into the academic program.
◦ Built an Advisory Council sooner.
◦ Would start with the creation of a School of Entrepreneurship.
◦ People! Get the right people on the staff. Make sure they have drunk
plenty of KoolAid before you bring them on board.
◦ I recommend finding a billionaire to name your program rather than
bootstrap!

16.  Start with Individuals. Teams can kill innovation in early Concept
Phase.
 Insist that Students do more than they think they can.
◦ Based on Values, Purpose, People and Planet ahead of Profits
 Zero waste, 1/10 the cost, available for all. Scalable to 1,000,000 users
◦ Understanding based on facts and research not “guesses”
◦ Teach basic “Creativity”, Critical Thinking, Problem Solving
◦ Visual Thinking, Fact-based Decision Making
 Teach a Process for innovation
◦ “Learning to See/ Understand”-Problem Finding, Needs, User, criticize
what exists, identify and challenge assumptions and compromises
 Tell a Story of specific user, “needs not wants”
 List the questions in structured format
◦ “What”- Create a Vision- Suspend Judgment, State the “Ideal”
 “We have a design/ method that will make it possible for... to… Benefits will
be… Now all we need do is figure out how to achieve it.”
◦ “How”- Make it Reality- O.K now for Teams with Shared Goals, Attitude

17.  Successes:  Failures:
 Ecovativedesign.com  Students who do not
 BullexSafety.com achieve their
 Successful Graduates potential
who are  Teaching “Problem
intrapreneurs at Finding” and Solving,
leading companies. Creativity, and
 Gaining at least some Thinking Skills to all-
attention and making it a priority.
support at RPI.
 Support from NCIIA!!

18.  nytimes.com- Corner Office, dotearth.blogs
 NPR.org- Weekend Edition,
MarketplaceMoney
 WSJ.com
 Delicious.com/swersb
 “Whack on the Side of the Head”, Roger von
Oech
 “Drawing on Right Side of Brain” Exercise
Book Betty Edwards.

19.  Independent, private, four-year college
 Huntingdon, PA
 1,400 undergraduate students
 Juniata Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership launched in 2003
◦ includes Sill Business Incubator and Student Seed Capital Fund
 Motivation:
◦ experience-based learning
◦ regional economic development
 Impact: 500+ students

20.  State-related research university
 Pittsburgh, PA
 Fifteen schools
◦ 25,000 undergraduate students (2,000 in business)
◦ 10,000 grad students (900 in business)
 New wave of entrepreneurial offerings in 2008
 Motivation
◦ Experience-based learning opportunities
 Impact: 1,000+ students

21. Challenges
 “We don’t want to give up equity in the company!”
 “Why should we pay for space in the incubator?”
 “Effort follows funding, and our funding is for regional economic
development.”
 “Student ventures we help create should stay in our region.”
 “This technology has already been licensed.”
 “Where is all of that interest (from the Student Seed Capital Fund) going?”
Insights
 Leverage the ‘Student Supply Chain’
enrollment, academic advising, career services, alumni, development
 Adopt a three tiered approach to curriculum development
develop new, integrate and embed
 Create a ‘revenue-generating’ Board
(plus students and faculty)
provides matching funds (plus) for grants

22.  Proposed by alum/donor – 1994
 Staffed by 1 faculty member + Pieces of
others
 Junior classes of 20-30 students; 5-15
seniors
 ScienceWorks is a minor
◦ Coursework + Innovation/Business Plan Project

23.  Very, very successful graduates
 Tough curriculum, high expectations
 External Advisory Board/Defense Panel very
helpful
 Current industrial/company/economic
development activities/experience critical
 Built many partnerships
 Part of NCIIA since founding
 PUI Group
 Center for Advanced Technology and Innovation
 Regional economic development organizations
 Cross-campus projects

24.  One man show
 No operating budget
 Small college
◦ Little visibility/Smaller scale
 Difficult to interest partners
 Difficult to get grants/funds
◦ Small number of students – must recruit heavily
 Had to invent it all!
◦ No precedent for undergraduate tech.
entrepreneurship In 1994!

25. What will you do?
What questions do you have?
What new ideas are out there?

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