Course description

Overview

The course named “Market Investigating and Business Plan Writing” is part of the MBA program at School of Business, Renmin University of China (RBS), and will be conducted in collaboration with Torino Wireless. Also, this course is a part of “Excellence Match Program” (ExMP) launched by Torino Wireless. The course is aimed at preparing a Business Plan (BP) for each international based Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) in the ExMP landing in China. In this course students will work to conduct industry analysis and market research, eventually to write a comprehensive, investment quality business plan. The corresponding lectures and training will be delivered to students to help them in every step. And also the tutors will be assigned to each team to guide students during the whole course.
One thing must be clear that the most important in this practical course is to prepare the good business plan; training and lectures are just a part to help preparing the plan. So the lecture time only is a small proportion to the total time students spend on this course. To be specific, it is estimated that the lecture time is about 30 hours, which occupies just one tenth of the total time (at least 300 hours) every student invests on this course.
The key to this course is that a “business plan is more than a strategic plan.” The key differences are both implementation and possible review by "outsiders." This course deals with the critical decisions and action steps that entrepreneurs must make in both planning and executing a new venture. This course focuses on “doing” rather than on mere “facts about business development and plan writing.” It will concentrate on creative solutions to resource generation and utilization.
The business plan is often a selling document to those who may be interested in the business venture for a variety of reasons. Therefore it must reflect the concept's viability and business model, the environment in which the firm operates, and the expertise of the management team to execute the plan.
The course depends on the active integration of what has previously been covered during students’ study at RBS, especially in the areas of strategy, finance, marketing, and operations. It also builds on what students learned in entrepreneurship and from content from other classes they may have had in the course of their education. It is strongly recommended that students have one of the entrepreneurship courses prior to taking business plan development. This course of Market Investigation and Business Plan Writing can be considered the capstone entrepreneurship course at RBS. It should also help students expand beyond the typical skills of any MBA student whether in business, engineering, the sciences or the arts. While there is great deal of research and practical knowledge about entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship, student will have to be creative as there is no one formula for developing a successful business plan or going about new venture implementation. The class encourages a “can do attitude.” Business plan development and writing is as much an art as it is a science. Class instruction is designed in such a manner so as to provide a cohesive set of skills and instruments to successfully complete the market research and development of a business concept and finish a comprehensive business plan.

Course Objectives

1. To familiarize with the essential requirements for the development of a successful business plan. To expose students to various business plans written for innovative concepts in a variety of fields and industries.


2. To know the communication skill under the intercultural background, and understand how to beg, borrow, and “acquire” the necessary resources to design a growth- oriented business and write a plan to implement it.


3. To develop competencies associated with innovative management in business environments where uncertainty and lack of adequate resources are typical.


4. To create a “can do” and “make it happen” attitude towards entrepreneurship and to challenge their current thinking and assumptions about what works and why.


5. To improve students written and oral presentation skills by better organizing their thoughts and expressing them clearly, concisely, and persuasively through a business plan.


6. To involve the Italian companies in the whole course process and let them know Chinese culture and industrial reality.


7. To apply a variety of tools and concepts including management structure, economic trends analysis, opportunity recognition, and financial analysis for reaching and making effective decisions in the holistic context of a written and do-able, business plan.


8. Finally, to create a business plan for an actual venture. This is not an academic exercise, nor is it a feasibility study. All plans used in this class are confidential documents and should be treated as such.