Supporting tomorrow's entrepreneurs
30 April 2010
Research in entrepreneurship supports business start-up at LJMU.
Seamus O’Brien joined LJMU’s Liverpool Business School in January 2009, to take up the post of Senior Lecturer in Small Business & Enterprise and was promoted to Principal Lecturer and programme leader for BA (Hons) Business Management. He is also a researcher on entrepreneurship and small business, particularly SMEs (small-to-medium sized enterprises), rural SMEs and innovation within these organisations.
In addition to his academic responsibilities, Seamus is working in partnership with the Business Development Centre’s Student Enterprise team to provide academic input into the Enterprise Fellowship programme, an accredited LJMU programme that helps Merseyside graduates to start their own business. Seamus has worked with the BDC’s business advisers to develop a new business plan template that will create a robust, workable document for the new business owner. The benefits of the relationship with this academic input is clearly evidenced by the final business plan presentations of the 2009 cohort of Fellows, which Seamus describes as “really high quality” with a large number of students receiving distinctions.
This academic/enterprise partnership is also helping Seamus as he looks to build more enterprise and innovation into the Business Management degree. A large number of students on the programme want to start their own business and Seamus can signpost these students to the support of the BDC’s Student Enterprise team.
Seamus commented: "Student Enterprise is the mouthpiece to industry as they are the link to small business and the SME community; this link with industry is a core component of LJMU’s strategy and our employability agenda, and our students who have taken part in enterprise education will be more employable."
Amanda Smith, BDC’s Entrepreneurship Champion, added: "Having Seamus onboard has given us the opportunity to develop the programme to new levels by offering a more robust programme that has been designed to develop the skills of the potential entrepreneur. Seamus’ expertise has been an inspiration for the Enterprise Fellowship Programme."
For more information on Student Enterprise in the Business Development Centre and the 2010 Enterprise Fellowship programme, please visit: http://www.ljmu.ac.uk/startup/
LJMU’s Enterprise Fellowship Programme is a European Social Fund programme, supported by the Learning and Skills Council.
