ECONOMICS MADE SIMPLE: Developing entrepreneurs through the teaching process

Entrepreneurship development is among the key issues of discussion in Tanzania and beyond. In the Tanzanian context, this is particularly important given the country’s socialist. After the major and far-reaching reforms in the management of the economy in the mid 1980s, Tanzania embraced step by step private sector and market – led economy. Among other things this calls for adequate quantity and quality of entrepreneurs. Whereas some entrepreneurs are born, others are made.

Both categories need and can be developed. There are many ways to develop entrepreneurs. These include formal and informal training, internships, apprenticeship, mentoring and coaching. On 17th May 2018, Mzumbe University organised its second entrepreneurship camp as part of developing entrepreneurship in the country and beyond. The author of this article made a presentation on the way entrepreneurs can be developed through the teaching process, based on his own practical experience. In what follows, some of his views are shared:

The context
Masters of Business Administration and Masters of Science in Marketing students studying Theories of Entrepreneurship and Small Business Development at Mzumbe University Dar Es Salaam Campus College are getting their entrepreneurship skills developed through practical training. They develop their own entrepreneurship and business skills through individual term papers in which they develop their own business plans each.

How can it work
Entrepreneurs are invited to express interest of having their business problems and challenges solved by students at no direct monetary cost. The business problems are submitted to the university by entrepreneurs.
They are then distributed to students for solving. The solving process is consultative and participatory. It starts with a kick-off and inception meetings between students and entrepreneurs. This is done physical and/or virtually depending on the context. Students work with entrepreneurs to solve the submitted business problems using both theoretical and practical knowledge. They are given activity plan and strict deadlines and have to submit weekly progress report through group leaders.
Marks awarded to students depend on a number of factors including customer satisfaction from the entrepreneurs. Students are encouraged to study problems submitted by all entrepreneurs and reports submitted by fellow students thereby broadening their entrepreneurship knowledge from practical cases on top of theories.

Some statistics for 2018
For 2018, a total of 74 entrepreneurs expressed interests of having their problems solved by students
Out of these majority (68.9 percent) are male and the rest 31.1 per cent are female. This poses discussion issues on women participation in entrepreneurial activities inter alia.
In terms of nature of business involved, there about 18 different types of businesses broadly categorised. They include agriculture; trade and commerce; manufacturing, livestock keeping, training and consultancy; renewable energy; health; finance; construction; education; media; security; social entrepreneurship and cleaning services among others.
 
Types of business problems
There are about eight different broad categories of business problems that are being solved by students. They include developing business plan; conducting market research; general business consultancy; creating systems, structures and process flow; developing strategic plan; developing company profile; advice on business turn around and advice on financial management , including cost and profits calculations. This shows the typical types of problems and challenges that businesses are faced with. These can be inputs for policy and decision makers, development partners and practitioners on felt-needs areas of interventions.

Benefits to students
Practical entrepreneurship development through the teaching process has various benefits to students. They learn various kinds of business ideas and models in practice that they can practice in future, they face challenges and learn how to solve them, they learn advisory, consulting and research processes and practices that they can use as current and future entrepreneurs. They also learn and practice soft skills such as team work, communication, innovation, time management and endurance among others. They also get exposed to the real world of business as they get their hands dirty instead of just being bookish and theoretical.

Benefits to entrepreneurs
The involved entrepreneurs benefit as well. Inter alia, they get their business problems reduced or even solved at no direct monetary cost. In this way, their businesses get developed and grow. At the country level this is an increase in the supply side of entrepreneurship both in quantity and quality which s very essential for economic growth and development.