PAPER NO.3 ENTREPRENEURSHIP AND COMMUNICATION
GENERAL OBJECTIVE
This paper is intended to equip the candidate with knowledge, skills and attitudes that will enable him/her to apply entrepreneurship knowledge in business and other environments.
LEARNING OUTCOMES
A candidate who passes this paper should be able to:
- Identify viable business opportunities
- Prepare a business plan
- Demonstrate entrepreneurial orientation skills
- Communicate effectively in a business environment
- Apply entrepreneurship knowledge in response to emerging business
CONTENT
Introduction
- Definition of entrepreneurship, entrepreneurs and sustainable entrepreneurship
- Historical development of entrepreneurship
- Characteristics of entrepreneurs
- Importance of entrepreneurship
- Challenges of entrepreneurship
- Entrepreneur’s contribution to development
Developing individual innovation
- Role of creativity
- The creative process
- Areas in which people are creative
- Approaches to creative problem solving
- The innovation process
- Types of innovation
- Sources of innovation
- Principles of innovation
Assessing entrepreneurial opportunities
- Problems encountered in selecting new ventures
- Factors considered in setting up a new venture
- Factors that determine success of a new venture
- Reasons why new ventures fail
- Importance of business incubators
Entrepreneurs and market research
- Assessing the feasibility of business ideas
- Business plan overview – format
- Research purpose and objectives for entrepreneurs
- Secondary and primary sources of data
- Marketing plan
- Marketing research
- Sales research
- Pricing strategies
Creating a new venture
- Forms of business ownership
- Buying an existing business
- Franchising
- Sources of finance for a new venture
- The venture capital market
Entrepreneurial growth and technology
- Life-cycle of an enterprise
- The success and failure factors at every stage of growth
- Decision making and growth
- Business networking
- Use of internet and E-commerce
- Electronic and mobile money transfers
Business communication basics
- Meaning of communication
- Benefits of effective communication
- Internal and external communication
- Choosing the channel of communication
- Stages in the communication cycle
- Barriers to effective communication
- Steps to effective communication
Written communication
- Rules of effective writing
- Writing business letters
- Application letters
- Memorandum
- Reports
- Electronic mail
Oral and visual presentation
- Meaning of a presentation
- Knowing the audience
- Location and size of audience
- Designing the presentation
- Use of visual aids
- Methods of presentation
Meetings
- Types of meetings
- Attending meetings
- Notice and Agenda
- Role of the chairperson
- Role of the secretary
- Role of participants
- Conduct of meetings
- Minutes of meeting
Ethics and integrity in business communication
- Concept of ethics and integrity
- Significance of ethical communication
- Factors influencing ethical communication
- Ethical dilemmas in communication
- Guidelines to handle communication ethics dilemmas
- Business ethics in communication
Emerging issues and trends