Chicago Business

Issue date: 2/22/07 Section: Admit Weekend

The University of Chicago Graduate School of Business may not at first glance seem to be a hotbed of entrepreneurial flare and energy. But look closer and you will see that, behind our persona as finance powerhouse and bastion of intellectualism, we do indeed have a number of current and future entrepreneurs in our midst.

There are many shades of entrepreneurship and it is important to distinguish between them. On one end of the spectrum we have those who are "interested" in starting a company or running a small firm "at some point in their lives." We also have those who tag along to entrepreneurial events, but their true passion lies in venture capital or private equity. On the other end, we have those with past start-up experience, those who attend every entrepreneurial event possible, participate in business plan competitions, bug our entrepreneurship faculty to no end by sending them weekly e-mails and showing up at their offices, and are actively looking to go run an exciting start-up.

Regardless of where one falls in this spectrum, there are a number of wonderful opportunities to take advantage of. First, there is the Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship founded with a generous donation from alumnus Michael Polsky who is very active with the entrepreneurship program along with a number of other alumni.

The Polsky Center is a resource for all entrepreneurs at the GSB and organizes a number of speaker events that bring in authors, current and past entrepreneurs (once an entrepreneur, always an entrepreneur, right?), lawyers, and professors. They talk about a wide array of topics ranging from the history of innovation, how to manage sales within a start-up, how to take a company public and protect intellectual property. The Polsky Center also sponsors the Kauffman Entrepreneurial Internship Program that gives 1st year students the opportunity to intern with a start-up in a semi-risk free manner (the GSB provides some funding for the summer). Furthermore, this class gives you a great opportunity to network with some of the most entrepreneurial students at the GSB.

Next, we have a number of faculty members who teach an interesting set of entrepreneurship classes. These classes range from those that focus on the initial stages of a start-up to those that discuss sales, operations, and other key aspects such as raising funding and building a business plan.

The capstone of the GSB's Entrepreneurship Curriculum is the Chicago New Venture Challenge (NVC) - one of the country's most prestigious business plan competition. This is one of the best learning opportunities as it is completely experiential. It is quite an experience when you present a strong presentation and a VC looks you in the eye and says "I don't fund companies run by people under the age of 30." You cringe, knowing the mean age of your team is 24, only to be saved by a fellow GSBer in the class who started a $100 million+ company at the age of 25 who refutes the VC. Whatever way you look at it, presenting to VCs is a great experience and will only hone your approach to what it takes to start a successful venture.

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