Posted on: 15 December 2005
IRISH ENTERPRISE TEAMS DON’T HAVE BUSINESS SKILLS FOR HIGH GROWTH WARNS LEADING US EXPERT
The Provost of one of the world’s leading colleges for enterprise education has said that an investigation carried out by his global entrepreneurship monitor had found that Irish entrepreneurial teams typically do not have the business skills to support high-growth potential new ventures.
Speaking in Dublin on 15 December 2005 when Trinity College Dublin (TCD) and the Irish Management Institute (IMI) Graduate School of Management signed a strategic partnership with Babson College in the U.S, Prof Mike Fetters, Provost of Babson, said the educational sector in Ireland is not perceived to reinforce a strong enterprise culture.
Babson College co-produces the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, a global study of entrepreneurial activity. The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) Report on Ireland, published earlier this year, investigated new venture activity in Ireland. The work was sponsored by Enterprise Ireland and Intertrade Ireland.
Prof Fetters said one major finding was that entrepreneurial teams are typically not balanced managerially and do not have the business skills to support high-growth potential new ventures. He said he believed the new venture involving Trinity, the IMI and Babson would help to address these issues. “We hope this new partnership will have far-reaching impacts in new venture creation, innovation, and corporate entrepreneurship. We also hope that the exchange between Ireland and the US will produce students better prepared to lead as entrepreneurs across all borders,” said Prof Fetters.
The Trinity-IMI Graduate School of Management and Babson collaboration will develop educational programmes that promote and support entrepreneurship and stimulate entrepreneurial activity in all organisations. The joint programmes will focus on education to support creativity in opportunity recognition and execution, global thinking when launching new ventures or transforming existing companies and promotion of rapid growth and export-oriented companies, as well as focussing on more efficient processes to better link discovery and successful commercialisation.
The partnership will include student exchange programmes for PhD, MBA, MSc(Mgt) and undergraduate degree students, to allow for a regular flow of students between the schools; Academic programme collaboration to deliver joint programmes, with a special emphasis on MBA degree courses; Executive education collaborations allowing access to each school’s executive education facilities; and faculty collaborations to allow for sabbatical or temporary assignments of academic staff. Another key element of the partnership will be joint research programmes.
Trinity-IMI and Babson will consider joint student projects involving teams of students working on educational consulting projects with either Irish or US companies. The William F. Glavin Center for Global Management at Babson and its European Institute will work directly with Trinity to coordinate student exchanges and business consulting projects.
Dr John Hegarty, Provost, Trinity College Dublin said: “We are delighted to announce the formal strategic partnership between Babson and Trinity-IMI today. Our agreement with Babson integrates us with a network of leading US professors and practitioners. Combining the deep commitment to research excellence of university business schools such as Trinity and Babson with the professional and management development excellence of IMI and Babson’s executive education and its research centers will produce a new kind of business school for this new century”.
Dr Tom McCarthy, Chief Executive, IMI noted: “Babson College is one of the top twenty global providers of executive education programmes and has been ranked among the top executive education schools worldwide by both the Financial Times and Business Week, with the Babson Entrepreneurship MBA ranked number one in the world. We are very proud to be forging a close collaboration with such an esteemed institution. Our aim is to provide Ireland with a world class executive education, entrepreneurship and research institution and collaborating with expert international institutions like Babson will be a key factor in achieving that aim.”
The Trinity-IMI Graduate School of Management was launched in October 2005 and brings together the IMI and TCD’s School of Business. Currently no Irish Executive Education programme ranks in the global listings. The School will build on the foundations of the Trinity MBA and the suite of M.Sc. (Mgmt) degree programmes currently delivered across the two institutions. It will also focus on providing world ranking management development through executive education for senior executives and an ambitious programme of research on management and competitiveness issues.
Babson College is recognised internationally as a leader in entrepreneurial management education. Babson grants BS degrees through its innovative undergraduate program, and grants MBA and custom MS and MBA degrees through the F.W. Olin Graduate School of Business at Babson College. Babson Executive Education offers executive development programs to experienced managers worldwide.
