Group Size
?
1.) Small group (teams of 4-6)
2.) Individual Task
3.) Large Group
4.) Any
Small group (teams of 4-6)
Learning Environment
?
1.) Lecture Theatre
2.) Presentation Space
3.) Carousel Tables (small working group)
4.) Any
5.) Outside
6.) Special
Presentation Space, Carousel Tables (small working group)
QAA Enterprise Theme(s)
?
1.) Creativity and Innovation
2.) Opportunity recognition, creation and evaluation
3.) Decision making supported by critical analysis and judgement
4.) Implementation of ideas through leadership and management
5.) Reflection and Action
6.) Interpersonal Skills
7.) Communication and Strategy
1Creativity and Innovation
2Opportunity recognition‚ creation and evaluation
3Decision making supported by critical analysis and judgement
4Implementation of ideas through leadership and management
5Reflection and Action
6Interpersonal Skills
7Communication and Strategy
Introduction:
The module is based around students working in groups to form ‘company teams’ which collaboratively generated a (fictional, use of pseudo-science allowed) biotechnology product (e.g. medical device, new therapeutic etc). The product should answer a real-world biotechnology problem and/or market need, they then tested its business feasibility. Students receive 3 hours contact time per week, over 12 weeks; learning was further supported by directed and self-directed research and tasks. In order to form the companies students undertook a Belbin role audit and were ranked for their suitability for each role; from this, module leaders chose ‘company leaders’ (Highest Co-ordinator scores). Each company leader received their Belbin role audit back and selected their team members based on the ‘skills’/roles they felt were most needed in their company.
The module contains numerous small tasks throughout (formative/summative, written/presentation and individual/group work) and culminates in a group Dragons’ Den style pitch for investment and a group Feasibility Report for their product.
The creation of the companies is done within the first week and when each student is selected for a company they have to give an elevator pitch on who they are, what are their strengths and what can they bring to the company. We also do some icebreaker games with the class to break down any barriers between the students both within a company and within the class. Once the companies are formed it is up to them to decide what real-world and/or market-need they will meet with their product. The three main fields of biotech are medical devices, pharmaceuticals and agribiotech, we guide the students (if required) to ensure that each of these fields are represented (as long as we have 3 companies).
The weekly sessions are designed to guide the students through the process of creating the feasibility report and are broken down into a 1-hour session early in the week and a 2-hour session later in the week. The 1hr sessions generally involve some content delivery (short lecture) by a lecturer and the rest of the time is a company development workshop based on the lecture content (for example, market analysis, IP, finance). The 2-hour sessions will contain a talk by an external speaker (someone who works either for a biotech company or in a related industry e.g. patent lawyer) and student presentations or company development workshops. Throughout the module students will come across barriers to their product (e.g. a saturated market or key patents held by other companies) and they have to problem solve and navigate these in order to keep their product viable.
Students will give a total of 6 presentations throughout the module (not counting the Dragons’ Den Pitch), half will be formative and the rest summative, they are also broken down so that the students start with a group presentation then do a pair presentation, then an individual presentation before returning to a group presentation – allowing them to get sufficient practice at presenting and build up to an individual presentation. The student presentations are all based around a common theme (e.g. Biotech Ethical Issues) but the companies are asked to make their presentations relevant to their company. This way a student who is involved with a pharmaceutical based company can still learn about the subtle differences that would apply to the other biotechnology companies’ fields (i.e. Peer-learning). All elements of group work are subject to self- and peer-assessment. Apart from the individual presentation (summative) individuals also have a chance to display their own proficiency through weekly reflective logs (7 formative and 3 summative) and a final reflective log (summative).
The Dragons’ Den panel is made up from some of the expert external speakers as well as two members of the module team (including the module leader). The students pitch is 20minutes long and they are asked questions at the end by the panel. The presence of the external speakers provide a critical real-world eye on the actual business feasibility side of the product both in terms of questions to the company and feedback on the pitch to the staff when considering the marks. We actually make an event of this part of the assessment asking students to dress smart for the occasion and have a small reception (with the Dragons) afterwards. The feasibility report is quite a substantial piece of work that they have been slowly creating throughout the module and is usually in the region of 40-60 pages in length.
Students gain a great deal from this 100% coursework based module. The module is very student-centred with minimal content given by the lecturer/s and the external speakers, developing great independence in the students. Having to work in a group for a whole module (12 weeks) poses a lot of challenges for the students, but also enables them to learn how to work effectively in a group (as opposed to being in a group for a couple of weeks to undertake one assignment) and how to communicate well. Giving the students repeated opportunities to give presentations in class is an excellent way to enable them to develop good presentation and communication skills. In fact after the first presentation I also inform them that from this point on they are no longer allowed to use notes during their presentations – this is met with horror initially but this simple act has an enormous impact on increasing the quality of the presentations. Students also appreciate the opportunity to ‘work up to’ an individual presentation, which otherwise they may not get the opportunity to do until their placement year or even their final year dissertation presentation. Throughout the module the students get the opportunity to be creative and innovative, as well as spot opportunities, critically analyse, problem solve and make decisions as they develop their product and their company (including name, logo and product design).
Here are some comments from past students about the module:
“During this module self-assessment has been import and I have learnt about myself through reflection in order to improve my skills & learning processes more efficiently.”
“I feel like this course has taught me valuable lessons in how to not only work well in a team, but how to best resolve a conflict situation”
“The skill of presenting & speaking has helped me throughout the term whilst taking part in assessment days for companies, where the final activity for both involved having to present to the interviewers. I believe this [module] provided me with a strong advantage over the other candidates and this purely was due to this course.”
“Constant practice of public speaking & presenting also allowed me to work on my skills and see the improvements I was making first hand.”
“Working in a team is clearly an important skill for nearly any future job and in normal life, as it is the skills needed for effective interaction with others and for being productive and not disruptive when working with others.”
“The teaching process whereby we moved from doing whole group presentations to individual presentations, helped me build up my confidence at presenting and my general presentations skills.”
“This [module] was far more effective for long-term understanding and information storage than hour lectures and cramming for exams as for nearly all my other modules.”
“This module is more useful for preparing me for an actual career.”
“I especially enjoyed applying some of the developed skills during the course.”
“Having applied the entrepreneurial skills throughout this module, I now feel that I can easily identify opportunities within the field of biosciences and making informed decisions regarding the applicability of such opportunities.”
“I feel I have learned to approach problems by immediately developing a strategy to tackle them.”
“I found the whole process of developing these [enterprise] skills, attributes and behaviours extremely rewarding as I was actively improving myself in terms of professional and personal development.”
“The reflective writing we had to do proved to be extremely useful and has helped me develop both professionally and personally.”
“It is ok not to always be perfect or the best, even as a group leader. On occasion, it can be useful as a leader to show your team that everyone can make mistakes and then use them to learn from and act sensibly to this failure”.
External Speakers
References:
Adams & Sparrow (2008). Enterprise for Life Scientists: Developing Innovation and Entrepreneurship in the Biosciences. Scion Publishing Ltd. Bloxham, UK.
