Keeley Galley
Assistant Direct for Enrollment Management
Baker Online
Why It’s Time for More MBA Programs for Entrepreneurs
About
The business landscape is rapidly evolving as consumer demands develop, competition grows, and economic conditions change. Professionals who can apply originality to how they think and work are needed to generate success and growth. As a result, there’s an increasing demand for workers who are driven by entrepreneurship and innovation.
Whether you’re expanding an existing business, managing a start-up, leading innovation efforts in a corporate environment, or creating a business plan for a future venture, finding the right MBA for entrepreneurship is the key to turning these ideas into reality.
An MBA in innovation, like Baker University’s MBA in Venture and Innovation Development (VID) helps agents of change like you develop new ventures and business concepts while balancing and managing risk.
This MBA concentration area is the first of its kind in the Kansas City region, designed to empower students to become entrepreneurial leaders who seize opportunity, take action, solve problems, navigate uncertainty, overcome mental blocks, and embrace challenges. You can adopt an entrepreneurial mindset to apply creative thinking and solve complex problems.
What an MBA in Innovation Can Teach You
- How to integrate entrepreneurship into venture development opportunities for start-ups and corporations
- How to identify sources of potential funding and financing for business start-ups and expansions
- How to apply the business opportunity evaluation process to develop and foster innovation
- How to design creative strategies to pursue, deploy, and further develop new opportunities
- How to drive innovation that unlocks new opportunities
- How to take note of cues and signals that represent opportunity
What You Can Do With an MBA for Entrepreneurship
What does it take to get a new idea, business, or opportunity off the ground—and continuously grow it?
There are countless ways to go about launching and expanding business ventures. Earning an entrepreneur MBA online equips you with applicable tools and concepts that help you conceive, build, and manage innovative organizations from start to finish.
Earning an entrepreneur MBA online will teach you how to explore sources of capital for early-stage companies and make sure you’re aware of the implications surrounding certain business decisions. You’ll understand how to fund and manage operations while being able to benchmark and adjust performance along the way.
You’ll also have the theoretical and practical knowledge to create viable business models, analyze valuation, and develop strategic plans to grow innovative ventures.
Earning your MBA in innovation doesn’t mean you need to launch your own business. You’ll also be prepared to take your unique skills to organizations that need someone to step up, pilot new ideas, and give their big plans a solid foundation to build on.
You can help companies avoid common pitfalls, pitch ideas more effectively, validate the need for new products and services, and develop solid business concepts. There are many career paths to choose from when you pursue an MBA for entrepreneurship.
How Is an MBA in Innovation Different from an MBA?
As entrepreneurism makes its way into higher education, business leaders have a growing number of choices when it comes to MBA programs for entrepreneurs.
While an MBA can provide a solid foundation of business, management, and leadership principles, an MBA in innovation helps you develop the right mindset and mentality for building and growing something new.
In addition to solidifying your business education and expanding your knowledge of concepts like finance, marketing, accounting, operations, and human resources, earning an entrepreneur MBA online helps you study these subjects through a new lens. Learn to think like an entrepreneur who needs to drive innovation, develop advanced-thinking skills, and bring valuable knowledge to the workforce.
In addition, an MBA in innovation gives you the skills to transition concepts from paper to practice. You’ll be able to not only identify and generate good ideas but also build them so they grow steadily and successfully—all while avoiding risks.
With an MBA in innovation, you’ll build skills in ideation, innovative business model creation, strategy development, product development, and entrepreneurial marketing.
The Benefits of MBA Programs for Entrepreneurs
Pursuing an MBA in innovation can help you build not only the foundational skills to start and run a business but also the soft skills to build teams, attract clients, and form impactful relationships.
In programs for entrepreneurs, you can also grow your network. As you work with other innovation-forward students, faculty, and alumni, you’ll often make connections that can be helpful for your career for years to come. You may meet prospective partners, investors, suppliers, stakeholders, employees, or clients.
As you pursue a career in venture and innovation development, challenges are bound to arise. Entrepreneurs need to be flexible and adaptable to respond and adjust to changes. Earning an MBA for entrepreneurship will prepare you to take unstructured and uninhibited approaches to problem-solving so you can navigate ambiguity and create value in any environment or industry.
No matter what comes your way, you’ll be ready to respond to keep business on track. You’ll know how to recruit the right people, work with members of the media, take care of customer service problems, and lead teams toward achieving aggressive goals.
When your ventures don’t go as planned, the knowledge you gain from an entrepreneur MBA online will help you recover and learn from setbacks.
As you pursue programs for entrepreneurs, consider Baker’s MBA in Venture and Innovation Development to help you confidently turn ideas into reality.