Supporting SME Innovation, Growth and New Business Development by Regional Entrepreneurship Model

Abstract

To enhance small and medium sized enterprises’ (SMEs) business development Laurea University of Applied Sciences will build a training programme and engage the student and staff in the development work. The students, who choose a company to follow, may also attend the training programme together with their tutor. Both the company participants and the students’ experiences will affect the final model. SMEs are often unable to give enough thought for the future business innovation. On the other side, the students and teachers from the universities of applied sciences are so engaged in theirs disciplinary content that more advanced skills for entrepreneurship may suffer. Our aim is to bring these together in a holistic pedagogical framework. We will create a permanent platform for matching the development of SMEs and university students’ studies. The regional model is built together with Regional Business Development Organizations who work with companies on daily basis. Methodological framework consists of Learning by Developing (LbD) action model. It is a pedagogical approach in which learning is linked to applied research, development projects and regional developing. For SMEs, it gives new perspective for customer and business surface evaluation.