EnterpriseTECH STAR

EnterpriseTECH STAR: 180 hours – 10 weeks – 20 people

EnterpriseTECH STAR is for entrepreneurial individuals who want to become founders of new ventures. The extra-curricular programme runs for 10-weeks with 100-hours of lectures, workshops, and activities underpinned with an anticipated 80-hours of mentoring sessions and personal research. Throughout the programme, students develop themselves personally as entrepreneurs and work on their early-stage business ideas. 

We accept up to 20 people a year and only consider applicants who have completed (or who are currently on) our EnterpriseTECH programme. 

To find out more get in touch with the programme team. You will be expected to outline an appropriate business idea you would like to work on in your application.

By the end of the programme you will produce:

• one-page business plan summary
• business plan
• pitch deck
• video interview
• jobs to-do list.

Watch the students’ perspective of the programme: EnterpriseTECH STAR

Programme dates for 2023

Monday 6 March 2023	Application deadline
Monday 27-Tuesday 28 March 2023	Interviews
Wednesday 19 April 2023	Launch evening
Thursday 20-Saturday 22 April 2023	Module 1: People and Products
Friday 28 -Saturday 29 April 2023	Module 2: The Market Place
Friday 12 -Saturday 13 May 2023	Module 3: CEO 101
Friday 2 -Saturday 3 June 2023	Module 4: Personal Expeditions
Thursday 8-Saturday 10 June 2023	Module 5: First Class Delivery
Tuesday 20 June 2023	Investor Pitches
Wednesday 21 June 2023	Showtime!
Monday 26 June 2023	Assessment deadline

Programme details

Weeks 1-4: Discover, explore and absorb

Module 1. People & Products: self-awareness, team building, harnessing systems, IP, product market fit, product development, behavioural design, case studies and fireside chats.

It is often said that successful businesses are made from the right combination of people and products (or services), and so the first part of the STAR programme focuses specifically on that combination of assets and understanding how the individuals and the business must work together to create value. On the people side, the programme shines a light on your personal traits and competences and how they can be moulded to create business leadership. On the product side, the focus is more on understanding where value is created and for whom and providing a framework for the development of a well-balanced business.

Module 2. The Marketplace: business and product marketing strategies, branding, applications, customer and market research.

“Everyone has a plan until you get punched in the face” was how Mike Tyson viewed his world and the essence is similar when developing a new business. It is impossible to be prepared for every outcome but understanding that having an idea and implementing it are very different skills is an important insight to acquire. 

The Marketplace sessions are focused on how you bring an idea to market including how do you understand the way the customer thinks and behaves, how do you communicate with customers through branding and marketing, and how do you convince others with money to go with you on the journey into the market understanding all the uncertainties involved.

Weeks 5-7: Refine and commit

Module 3. CEO 101: selling, working with investors, governance, finance, legal details for founding CEOs, fund-raising, adaptability and operations.

Running any organisation can be a difficult and lonely journey and one that requires a wide and complex range of skills. This part of the STAR programme starts to develop an understanding of what these skills are, how they can be developed and when they need to be deployed. The CEO sessions focus on how to handle the range of choices and decisions that CEOs may need to make around the type and level of finance, how to build the right team, how to build trust and motivate staff, how to select the right technologies and how to communicate and work with key stakeholders.

Weeks 8-10: Articulate and deliver

Module 4. Personal Expeditions: personal leadership styles, communication, negotiation styles and strategies, storytelling architectures and techniques, and business personas.

It is impossible not to change if you are involved in starting and running a business. Some of those changes may be minor, incrementing your knowledge, building your network or honing a particular skill, but some may have a significant impact on the way you see the world and your place within it. This part of the STAR programme looks at how the process of becoming an entrepreneur often demands you adopt a new mindset and outlook, commonly driven by a sequence of unpredictable events, while simultaneously preserving the core parts of the original you.

Module 5. First Class Delivery: voice coaching, practical performance skills, pitching clinics, visual communications.

Businesses can succeed or fail on how effectively the entrepreneur brings together all of the essential elements that go into delivering a first-class product or service from the quality of marketing, through the delivery of consistent product or service, right up to development of customer loyalty and advocacy.  The last theme in the programme draws all these threads together to illustrate how different values, contexts, resources and capabilities drive the development of highly customised approaches to the delivery of business impact and success.