By Dr Shai Vyakarnam, Director, AcceleratorIndia.
A group of 18 people from India with diverse academic backgrounds and work experience were exposed to the high spirit of Entrepreneurship in Cambridge.
The group included UG students, PG students, stock market practitioners, artists, chartered accountants, software professionals and second generation family business owners. The blend of a conducive learning environment, programme leadership and the energetic entrepreneurs who came to the class created a rich and meaningful learning experience.
This note by one of the alumni of the two-week programme captures what we might call the ecosystem of learning. Actually a few of the participants were sceptical about their interest in entrepreneurship, their ability to master the varied skills required and the motivation to carry out anything practical that came from it.
The course was a great example of “practitioner-led education for entrepreneurship”. This meant that in addition to faculty from the Judge Business School (Dr Shahzad Ansari – on innovation), the core lectures were conducted by people such as Dr Uday Phadke (has started over 30 companies), Jamie Urquhart (now a venture capitalist, but was co-founder of ARM and listed with multi-billion dollar valuation); Betty Thayer (entrepreneur who sold her business to the Financial Times for a very good return!); Dr Chris Winter (former British Telecom – now a corporate entrepreneur and venture capitalist); Phil O’Donovan (co-founder of CSR – in other words Bluetooth) and Rob Booth (current CEO of an early stage company, having played his part as finance director of a company to stock market listing).
“All of them were exceptionally well prepared and displayed a high degree of academic orientation. Their propensity to learn overtook ours,” said Parag Patel, one of the delegates. They were full of positive energies and reflected clear understanding and depth of their areas. We were able to draw a lot from their vast and varied experiences.
Unlike in India, these people left a clear impression of humility on the group and the passion for “give back” made the programme more enduring. Their passion was not just confined to their businesses but also spilled over to spreading the spirit of entrepreneurship and encouraging higher aspirations among students.
The students were asked to come up with new venture ideas and work on them for the fortnight. Early ideas were limited in scope and scale, but by the end of the two weeks, as a direct result of the inputs from the entrepreneurs, they had raised their ideas into real growth oriented ventures.
There were several leisure and restaurant ideas – that went from single unit ambitions to multiple locations. Bearing in mind many of the students came from business families, they were more than capable of developing the ideas further and the reward as course co-ordinators was that the raised ambitions would be realised.
There was a lot to learn from the Cambridge entrepreneurs, beyond academic models and tools. They are surprisingly approachable, with interaction and sharing their business cards and contacts. It is a rare attribute to be able and approachable at the same time. It enables nascent entrepreneurs get leads and valuable inputs for proposed and existing ventures.
There is a lot to learn from Cambridge: the spirit of entrepreneurship; linkages between academia, techies and their enterprise; productive networking; openness; collaborations; blend of work and leisure; patience; perform while keeping fun as the central idea. It is not just an ancient university that teaches law – it is a vibrant institution well embedded in the entrepreneurial ecosystem and although it is small enough to be thought of as a village (in Indian terms!) – it is quite an awesome village.
Hope this humble beginning of a relationship between the Ahmedabad University and Cambridge blossoms into a large network of knowledge and entrepreneurship.
Co-authored by: Parag Patel, Ahmedabad University, India
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A version of this blog was originally published at India Incorporated, a social media proposition with a difference that aims to encapsulate the India global story through pithy reports, interviews, analyses, profiles and features.
Published on 31 August 2011