Keywords

1 Entrepreneurship Education and the Team Academy Approach

Entrepreneurship Education (EE) is a relatively new scholarly field and, according to Fayolle (2018), is rarely defined and conceptualised. There is a wide variety of approaches related to “how” to teach entrepreneurship and viewpoints of which approaches are superior abound (Hindle, 2007). Still, EE literature gives a lot of attention to student-centred methods, in which knowledge and content are defined by the students’ needs and expectations, using such pedagogical methods as exploration, discussion and experimentation (Béchard & Gregoire, 2005).

Research in entrepreneurship education highlights that there are generally three types of courses: “about”, “for” and “through” (Pittaway & Edwards, 2012). “About” courses typically teach theories about entrepreneurship, “for” courses focus on providing tools for completing specific tasks within entrepreneurship and “through” courses aim to move students through a process of entrepreneurial behaviour (Robinson et al., 2016). Pittaway and Edwards (2012) argue that “through” courses have the most potential to “produce” entrepreneurs, because they require students to mimic and simulate what entrepreneurs do.

An interesting example of EE delivery in an undergraduate context is that of the Team Academy model, pioneered in Finland during the 1990s. Today Team Academy-inspired degree programmes exist within higher education institutions spanning four continents and 16 countries (Akatemia, n.d.). Along with Northumbria University, the University of the West of England was the first in the UK to launch this degree programme in 2013, namely BA (Hons) Business: Team Entrepreneurship (referred to as Team Entrepreneurship hereafter).

The core principle of the Team Academy approach is that learning is team-based, self-managed and experiential. On Team Academy programmes, learners create and operate real enterprises and their learning is centred around their Team Company, a team of up to 20 fellow students that collaborate on projects and ventures and support each other’s learning goals. Each Team Company is assigned a Team Coach, who supports learning through enquiry rather than instruction. Students are referred to as “Team Entrepreneurs” to emphasise the practice-led nature of the programme and to espouse the value of entrepreneurial mindset.

Within the Team Academy pedagogy, learners are required to engage in self-managed learning with support from others, namely peers within their Team Company and their Team Coach. This involves a form of negotiated learning in which Team Entrepreneurs are required to develop learning goals that align to their personal ambitions as well as the mission, vision and values of their Team Company, with regular feedback provided by their Team Coach and their peers.

2 Pedagogies That Support Entrepreneurial Learning

Within EE team-based pedagogies, experiential learning, and self-managed learning are often utilised to supporting entrepreneurial learning. While research highlights that most successful enterprises are founded by teams (Brüderl & Preisendörfer, 1998), undergraduate students often have pre-conceived notions of what it means to be entrepreneurial, often underpinned by stereotypes of entrepreneurs as charismatic individuals portrayed in the media (Warhuus et al., 2017). This viewpoint is supported by Gibb and Hannon (2006) who postulated that the association of entrepreneurship with high levels of innovation, scale and growth reinforce the “heroic” view of entrepreneurship as something difficult to attain and only for a select few. While entrepreneurship educators have started to recognise the value of students engaging in collaboration, and team formation is often included in the curriculum in entrepreneurship education programmes (Warhuus et al., 2017), there is surprisingly little research focused on the impact of team-based pedagogies within entrepreneurship education.

Considering business education more broadly, studies have explored the perceived benefits and challenges of a team-based pedagogy from students’ perspectives (e.g. Schultz et al., 2010). Perceived benefits include the generation of increased ideas and stronger deliverables, owing to a wider range of perspectives and skillsets; improved learning, reduced workload and collective security, resulting in reduced anxiety and stress (Schultz et al., 2010). Students that favoured autonomous work highlighted key challenges in relation to team learning, including grade reciprocity; social loafing; schedule challenges and a disparity between “school teams” and “work teams”, in which fellow students are viewed as “unreliable” and that levels of commitment and participation do not mirror those experienced in a work setting (Schultz et al., 2010).

The notion of a disparity between team learning within higher education and team working in an organisational context is interesting to consider. This poses questions regarding the authenticity of team-based learning within higher education. Lohmann et al. (2019, p. 458) argue that authentic team-based learning should include “authentic contexts and activities that require interaction and interdependence between team members to produce skills development and knowledge co-creation”. They argue that business simulations can offer a learning environment that incorporates these elements. The approach offered on Team Academy arguably takes this a step further by transcending beyond team-learning via business simulations to a combination of team-based learning with authentic experiential learning within real ventures.

Experiential learning is prominent within EE and several studies have explored its efficacy. Taatila (2010) considers experiential learning to be the most effective method within entrepreneurship education because of the pragmatic and abductive, rather than deductive or inductive approach adopted. Numerous scholars (e.g. Mandel & Noyes, 2016) point towards experiential learning as effective learning where action is the primary source of learning and which requires students to intellectually and physically engage in the learning process and reflect on their experiences (Kolb, 1984). It departs from the traditional lecture-led passive learning, towards action-orientated, problem-solving and project-based learning (Jones & English, 2004). Heinonen and Poikkijoki (2006) found that this approach instils entrepreneurial skills and behaviours, while also broadening students’ perspectives. Through “learning by doing” and reflecting on learning, it is argued that the student becomes more competent in crucial elements of entrepreneurship, such as recognising opportunities (Heinonen & Poikkijoki, 2006).

However, Scott et al. (2016) argue that there is little evidence that experiential learning is more effective than other approaches in entrepreneurship education. The authors postulate that much of the literature within entrepreneurship education highlights “good practice” within experiential approaches and that these are assumed to be more effective than “traditional” approaches, but the underlying philosophies behind such approaches are not built upon how effective they are. Moreover, the authors point to a lack of empirical evidence that such approaches are more effective at enabling students to achieve desired learning outcomes.

Entrepreneurial individuals also need to manage their own learning and understand their individual strengths and weaknesses. As Tseng (2013) argues, entrepreneurs are required to take ownership of their learning, continuously responding to changes in their personal contexts, thus self-managed learning can be seen as a key approach in meeting the complex demands associated with the changing world of work. Self-managed learning can be seen as synonymous with self-directed learning, defined by Brookfield (2009) as a learning process in which individuals take the initiative, with or without the help of others, in identifying their own learning needs, creating appropriate learning goals and devising suitable learning strategies to help them achieve their defined goals.

While the aforementioned studies have explored the impact of these pedagogies on entrepreneurial learning, few have considered the impact of integrating these approaches within one programme of study. The Team Academy pedagogy thus represents somewhat of a unique approach to EE delivery in terms of how these pedagogies are integrated.

3 Professional and Entrepreneurial Identity

Studies have shown that development of one’s professional identity helps to enhance learning. Professional identity is defined by Tan et al. (2017, p. 1505) as “the self that has been developed with the commitment to perform competently and legitimately in the context of the profession, and its development can continue over the course of the individuals’ careers”.

It is argued that an individual that has developed a sense of professional identity can find meaning in their work and identify with their profession’s guiding beliefs and values. For example, Jensen and Jetten (2016) found that students needed to develop their sense of professional identity in order to understand their intended profession and visualise themselves in this domain. This emphasises professional socialisation, the “social construction and internalisation of norms and values by the profession” (Ajjawi & Higgs 2008, p. 135), which occurs over time and requires a commitment to learning (Tomlinson & Jackson, 2019).

Donnellon et al. (2014) suggest that successful entrepreneurship education should consider incorporating the concept of self-identity (i.e. subjective views entrepreneurs hold about themselves as revealed through their narratives) into programme design. With a well-established link between learning and identity development (Wenger, 1998) there has been a growing emphasis on exploring how EE interlinks with identity creation (Heinonen et al., 2013; Matlay & Harmeling, 2011;.

Several studies explore the role of entrepreneurship education in the creation of the student entrepreneurial identity (e.g. Donnellon et al., 2014; Howorth et al., 2012; Matlay & Harmeling, 2011). As entrepreneurial identity has a direct impact on the outcomes of entrepreneurial actions, one of the priorities of EE could be to ensure such identity of entrepreneurs is established during the course of EE interventions (Matlay & Harmeling, 2011).

The work of Nielsen et al. (2017) provides a starting point for understanding the multiple identity processes involved in negotiating between the two identities of “student” and “entrepreneur”. The authors posit a continuum from low (“student” or “entrepreneur”) to high (“student” and “entrepreneur”) identity plurality.

4 Methodology

This study adopted a mixed methodology encompassing four key stages.

4.1 Stage 1—Documentary Analysis of Final year Team Entrepreneurs’ Learning Contract Assignments

The Learning Contract is an example of negotiated learning in which Team Entrepreneurs agree specific goals with their Team Company (including their Team Coach) and reflect on their long-term vision. In order to determine their vision, it is useful for learners to reflect on where they have been and where they are now, including key factors that have shaped their personal journeys and their values, beliefs and mindset. The Learning Contract is thus a rich source of data in relation to final year Team Entrepreneurs’ reflections on their identity and career decision-making.

A total of 10 Learning Contracts were analysed out of 46 final year Team Entrepreneurs. Key themes were highlighted, and the data was used to inform the design and recruitment for the semi-structured interview with both graduates and final year Team Entrepreneurs.

4.2 Stage 2—Analysis of Destinations of Leavers of Higher Education Data for the Programme

This helped set the context for the study and enabled the researchers to understand the extent to which self-employment is taken as a graduate career path on the programme, compared to professional-level employed positions and other career choices.

4.3 Stage 3—Online Questionnaire with Graduates of the Team Entrepreneurship Programme

The questionnaire was distributed to all of the 172 graduates of the programme for which email contact information was available, resulting in completion by 43 graduates in total. The questionnaire explored graduates’ current career situation and whether they identified with certain terms in relation to entrepreneurship (e.g. “entrepreneur”, “intrapreneur”, “entrepreneurial”). This highlighted key themes to explore in greater depth in the interviews.

4.4 Stage 4—Semi-Structured Interviews with Team Entrepreneurship Graduates and Final year Team Entrepreneurs

Interviews were conducted with seven graduates of the programme and two final year Team Entrepreneurs, allowing key themes identified in the questionnaire and Learning Contract analysis to be explored in greater depth.

Table 1, found in the Appendices, provides anonymous contextual information on all research participants, and a reference code is assigned to each individual which will be referenced when directly quoting participants.

5 Findings

This section will summarise the professional and entrepreneurial identity, career decision-making and career trajectories of Team Entrepreneurs/Team Entrepreneurship graduates and the impact that the Team Academy pedagogy has on these aspects.

5.1 Professional and Entrepreneurial Identity

Our research has found that the self-perceived professional identity of Team Entrepreneurs/Team Entrepreneurship graduates varies considerably and it is not associated to one specific profession. Thus, how do Team Entrepreneurs develop their sense of professional identity in a programme where there is no pre-defined professional pathway? If we are to assume that the Team Entrepreneurship programme may support learners to become “entrepreneurial”, for a wide range of career pathways including, but not limited to, self-employment, then it is pertinent to consider how entrepreneurial identities may be formed within entrepreneurship education programmes.

5.1.1 Values-Driven Identities

There is a strong sense of values-driven identity formation from the final-year and graduate Team Entrepreneurs. Several of the participants appear to have a strong sense of the values and beliefs that shape their identity, either as an entrepreneur or within their graduate career destinations/ambitions. This may relate to having a strong sense of who they are as an individual and what they desire from their chosen career, whether as an employee, an entrepreneur or both.

It appears that the strong focus on self-reflection within the programme, particularly prominent within the self-managed and experiential learning pedagogies, enables graduates to develop strong levels of self-awareness and a deep understanding of what drives them. Through directing their own learning according to their needs, Team Entrepreneurs learn how to reflect authentically on their strengths, weaknesses, ambitions and values. Furthermore, through experimenting with different types of projects and ventures, through experiential learning, and subsequently reflecting on the key learning that they have gained through their entrepreneurial actions, Team Entrepreneurs develop their reflective skills further and a strong level of self-awareness.

Engaging in experiential entrepreneurial learning also enables Team Entrepreneurs’ to develop their entrepreneurial identity to a greater or lesser extent, or at least to develop some of the competencies associated with being entrepreneurial. This supports the viewpoint of Heinonen and Poikkijoki (2006) that through “learning by doing” and reflecting on learning, learners becomes more competent in elements of entrepreneurship, such as recognising opportunities.

It can be argued that, on Team Entrepreneurship, learning transcends beyond learning to recognise opportunities to learning how to create opportunities. This is, in part, driven by the self-managed pedagogy in which learners set their own goals and engage in their own initiated projects and ventures. Thus, we can see that the integration of self-managed and experiential learning pedagogies enables learners to develop high levels of entrepreneurial competencies and strong skills in self-reflection.

5.1.2 Self-Motivation

A key theme that emerges throughout the research is that of self-motivation being a key aspect of Team Entrepreneurs’/Team Entrepreneurship graduates’ professional identity. Several interviewees describe themselves using phrases such as “driven” and “self-motivated”. Again, this appears to be, in part, driven by the self-managed learning pedagogy. Our research finds that the extent to which Team Entrepreneurs’ exhibit self-motivation varies, but that the self-managed pedagogy appears to be instrumental in developing this quality. This is highlighted in the quote below from a final year Team Entrepreneur:

I know that it was kind of a shock at the beginning…like ‘why do we have to run these training sessions?’…I'd say that that style of learning is a lot more beneficial. I mean, there are times when I feel like, you know, I would quite like to be more knowledgeable in something, but I recognise that I'd probably have to pick up a book on that and do some research into it, which means you have to be quite a motivated and driven individual, which is definitely something that I feel I'm slowly building up to being. (SSI008)

5.1.3 Team/Community Identity

While the research focused on Team Entrepreneurs’/graduates’ individual professional identities, the strong focus on team-learning inevitably plays a significant role in their identity formation. Team dynamics emerge as a prominent theme across the research, including reflections on the skills developed through working as part of a team, such as coaching and leadership, as well as reflections on the challenges of balancing team and individual priorities.

While team dynamics can be a challenge, it appears that such challenges offer rich learning experiences for the Team Entrepreneurs. For example, one Team Entrepreneur reflects on his key learning from a team venture formed with some of the members of his Team Company:

I learnt more from building [Business Name] than I had ever learnt in my entire life. I gained so much experience. But, it was destined to fall apart. In the end, we all had different values, which made it difficult to work together. (SSI0015)

Participants also reflect on the shared learning space, socialisation, community and team-learning element as a distinctive feature of the programme. This encompasses relationships built with team members and Team Coaches and creating a safe space to test their ideas.

There is no community like the TE community. I say that because what you learn, how to work in a team, is so essential to how you should be in everyday life […]. (SSI003)

Being able to… test out those ideas on the course in what is quite a safe environment. That was a really great aspect of the course and real, you know, learning curve […] One key factor that I personally think is great about the course is the integration between all the levels. So, like the fact that I would know Level 2 and Level 3 really well even though I was a first year was so valuable to me and my development. We're all in the same space where, you know, we're encouraged to share and communicate. (SSI004)

Everyone can learn from everyone else and we spent a lot more time with each other so it becomes…like a family. (SSI006)

Such reflections mirror the phenomenon of “collective security” referred to by Schultz et al. (2010) in relation to the perceived benefits (from students’ perspectives) of team-based learning within business education. Interestingly, while this “collective security” is viewed in high regard by the graduates interviewed, some reflected on the sense of being in “a bubble” during their time on the programme. In some cases, this leads to a juxtaposition between their experience on the programme and the realities of running a business and/or developing their career after graduating. The programme is intended to prepare graduates for their futures through a pedagogy focused on learning through real entrepreneurial projects and ventures, rather than case studies or simulations, so this is a surprising finding.

I feel like sometimes when you’re on TE you can have like a student bubble […]. I'd say that in the environment of TE I would have considered myself an entrepreneur 100% but within the environment of like not having the financial backing of like student finance…I don’t want to say in the real world but…when you're outside of that environment and you’re in with all the other players…that's why I would say the money thing…I wouldn't call myself an entrepreneur until I'm fully paying myself. (SSI003)

I think I've been able to know that I'm capable of certain things [since graduating], but also there's a lot of areas where I need to improve on, whereas on TE I think you probably think that you're better in a certain area than you are, either because you haven't really tried that area or just because you're in that bit of a bubble, where you probably think ‘I will be all right’. Whereas when you're in real life business you know you are actually having to do something that you quickly find out on areas where you are not strong enough. (SSI004)

5.1.4 Entrepreneurial Identity

Related to the previous point, regarding the sense of being in “a bubble”, there is a sense from some of the graduates that they considered their entrepreneurial skills and/or their sense of entrepreneurial identity to be stronger during their time on the programme, compared to their perspective now as a graduate, as illustrated by the previous two quotes. This leads on to an interesting theme that emerged from the interviews and questionnaires, that some participants seem to question their legitimacy as an entrepreneur and feel that they have to “earn” that title.

Interestingly, some of the participants expressed that they would not identify as an entrepreneur even though they had started their own venture. They argue that their ventures are at too early a stage to legitimately call themselves an “entrepreneur”, thus suggesting that achieving a certain level of success and maturity within their venture would allow them to identify with that term. Some consider paying themselves a “decent” income from the business to be a measure of success, while others are less clear on what that measure of success looks like.

All of my friends say ‘you’re an entrepreneur because you’re doing this, you've done that’, but I sometimes don't feel like one…I feel like I might be still at the early stages of starting something…I think that until I make it to a certain level of success…I can't earn that badge of entrepreneur, you know?. (SSI006)

This somewhat reinforces the viewpoints of Warhuus et al. (2017) and Gibb and Hannon (2006) regarding the stereotypical/”heroic” notion of an individual entrepreneur that many undergraduates hold. On a related note, an interesting discussion point in the interviews was around the duality of the “student” and “entrepreneur” identity, building on the work of Nielsen et al. (2017). Within the Team Entrepreneurship programme, learners are referred to as “Team Entrepreneurs” rather than students, but do they identify with this term? Do they consider themselves students rather than entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs rather than students or perhaps a combination of both?

The majority of interviewees highlighted that they considered themselves both a student and a Team Entrepreneur, reflecting that the environment outside of the programme, i.e. living a “typical student lifestyle” has an influence on this identity. One of the graduate interviewees expressed that he did not identify as a student, thus finding resonance with the “Team Entrepreneur” identity.

I clearly remember saying ‘I'm not a student, I'm a Team Entrepreneur. I’m here to start a business. I'm working three times as hard as the average student’. (SSI005)

While others highlighted that they identified as a student, while recognising the unique nature of the programme and the opportunities it affords.

…I’ve always felt like a student, but I felt like I've had more privileges than other students, essentially because we are treated like entrepreneurs. We are given those opportunities. So, there is kind of a balance and I think it's a good balance. (SSI008)

This suggests that the combination of self-managed and experiential learning pedagogies plays a key role in the formation of an entrepreneurial identity, in that learners value the independence to direct their own learning and the opportunities provided through a strong focus on experiential learning. The findings suggest that the different levels of integration of the different pedagogies (the “team”, the “self” and the “doing”) is key in the way the team entrepreneurs construct their own learning and entrepreneurial identity.

5.2 Career Decision-Making and Career Trajectories

Analysis of questionnaire data, and of the data captured through the Destinations of Leavers from Higher Education survey between 2015 and 2017, highlights that the Team Entrepreneurship programme has experienced a shift in graduate outcomes, with a larger percentage of graduates attaining graduate-level employment and fewer graduates starting their own business. Data from the cohort graduating in 2016 highlighted that 45% of the graduates completing the survey had started a business or become self-employed within six months of graduating, compared with only 21% within the 2017 graduating cohort. The data collected from the online questionnaire for this chapter highlights that 15% of graduate participants are self-employed as their main source of income.

The types of roles that Team Entrepreneurship graduates attain vary, but include graduate trainee roles, recruitment consultancy and business management roles, including sales and marketing management and office management. These roles appear largely similar to the destinations of graduates of a more traditional business management degree programme, which is surprising given the strong focus on entrepreneurial learning within the programme. While the programme does not espouse to equip learners solely with the skills required for creating their own ventures, one might expect graduates of the programme to attain roles requiring more of an “enterprising” approach, such as those within start-ups.

Our findings thus do not support the notion espoused by Pittaway and Edwards (2012) that “through” type entrepreneurship education courses have the most potential to “produce” entrepreneurs. We argue that focusing on “producing” entrepreneurs ignores the myriad of complexities in relation to the purpose of entrepreneurship education. Our findings thus support the views proposed by Penaluna et al. (2012) that the commonly employed metric of business start-up does not account for the full breadth of entrepreneurship education and of Neck et al. (2014) that the role of entrepreneurship educators is to “unleash the entrepreneurial spirit” of students to support them in navigating increasingly uncertain futures.

So, how does the Team Entrepreneurship pedagogy influence career decision-making? As was found when considering the impact on professional identity, the self-managed learning pedagogy appears to have a strong influence on Team Entrepreneurs’ value formation, which influences their chosen career paths. Through navigating their own learning and reflecting on their interests, values and beliefs, Team Entrepreneurs seem to develop a strong desire to join/create values-driven organisations. For example, several participants have founded, or are in the process of founding social enterprises while others have found graduate employment within charitable organisations. Participants discuss the desire to “do good” in the world and to make a difference.

One of the graduate interviewees discusses his experience of joining an organisation whose values did not align with his own and his dissatisfaction with the organisational culture. He reflects that, upon this realisation, he created an adapted Learning Contract (an assessment utilised on the programme as a self-managed learning tool) to identify his long-term ambitions and drivers and this resulted in him successfully pursuing a career within the third sector.

Arguably, the team-learning pedagogy may indirectly influence graduates in their pursuit of values-driven career paths. The strong sense of community on Team Entrepreneurship appears to create a desire amongst graduates to work with like-minded people and in an organisation where the mission, vision and values align with one’s own. Learning together in a team for three years, co-creating value and developing a shared sense of purpose within their Team Companies seems to instil a strong desire amongst Team Entrepreneurship graduates for belonging and collectivism within their chosen career.

The experiential learning pedagogy seems to play a significant role in influencing the career decision-making of Team Entrepreneurs and graduates. Participants discuss the benefits of experimenting with different types of projects and ventures, in a relatively safe environment, in helping them determine their chosen career path, which may or may not include venture creation. Such experimentation allows Team Entrepreneurs to reflect on their strengths and weaknesses, demonstrating strong levels of self-awareness, which also seems to have a positive impact when interviewing for graduate positions.

Finally, entrepreneurial ambitions are prevalent amongst some of the participants. For some, the Team Entrepreneurship programme seems to have re-affirmed their desire to create their own venture. In some cases this is driven by the negative motivation of not wishing to work for somebody else. The self-managed pedagogy perhaps heightens this independent mindset in some cases. Others seem to be driven by the positive motivation of wanting to create their own path, which again seems to be reinforced by the self-managed pedagogy whereby learners direct their own learning.

6 Conclusion

The Team Academy pedagogy enables learners to develop a values-driven professional identity and a strong sense of self-motivation, constructed through self-managed, experiential learning. The strong sense of community, instilled through team-learning, and of “a safe space to fail”, supported by experiential learning, appear to be key elements of the programme that learners value and that support them in the formation of their professional and/or entrepreneurial identity. A consideration for the programme is how to ensure the “safe space” does not become a “bubble”, which does not align with the reality faced upon graduation, i.e. how to ensure that experiential learning is truly authentic.

The self-managed and experiential learning pedagogies seem to have a noticeable influence on career decision-making through enabling learners to develop strong levels of self-awareness in terms of their strengths and weaknesses and their core values and beliefs. The team learning pedagogy seems to indirectly influence some Team Entrepreneurs in pursuing careers within the social enterprise and charitable sectors, driven by a desire to work towards a shared purpose.

While previous studies have considered the impact of team-learning, experiential learning and self-managed learning within an entrepreneurship education context, few have considered the impact of integrating these pedagogical approaches within one programme design, particularly in relation to the impact on professional identity and career decision-making. The study makes an important contribution to the field of entrepreneurship education by considering the impact of the unique Team Academy model of learning, through seeking to understand how the combination of pedagogical approaches influences learners in forming their sense of professional identity and in their career decision-making.