SPERO Learn: How to start an entrepreneurial venture (for researchers)

Overview

This course will help you enhance transferable skills such as collaborative working, innovative thinking, and presenting. 

You'll also learn about what's involved in setting up a:

• business or not-for-profit venture, such as a company based on academic research that could become a spin-out or a standalone enterprise
• ‘side hustle’ that you run alongside a full-time job, such as a freelance project, consultancy or venture based on a personal passion
• academic venture that will help you advance your career as a researcher, such as a research group or a grant-funded project
• R&D venture within industry, such as a new business unit in a large organisation that wants to explore new market opportunities

UCL doctoral students will receive 7 DocSkills training points via InkPath and the Doctoral School for completing this workshop.

Who it’s for

This course is for UCL researchers from any discipline, including:

• MRes students
• MPhil students
• doctoral students
• post-doctoral researchers
• early career researchers
• research staff members
• research students who graduated from UCL within the past 2 years

You don't need any prior business experience to attend. You don't need to already have an entrepreneurial idea or be an aspiring entrepreneur.

What to expect

If you already have an entrepreneurial idea, you can work on it throughout the course, either individually or with fellow participants.

If you don’t have an entrepreneurial idea, you’ll be put into a team with someone who has an idea, or you can come up with an idea together. You’ll work in that team for the rest of the course.

What you'll learn

You’ll learn the fundamentals of how to establish an impactful startup, side hustle, not-for-profit, or other enterprising project.

These fundamental concepts include:

• ideation; developing and refining an enterprise idea
• intellectual property (IP) management
• customer and competitor research
• prototyping
• brand creation
• designing processes in an early-stage venture
• setting goals
• financial planning
• influencing and negotiating
• pitching for sales or investment

Pitching competition

If you complete SPERO Learn, you'll have the option of taking part in a ‘Researcher pitching competition’ where you could win a share of £2,000.

You don't have to take part, but it’s a great way to practise your presentation skills.

To qualify you’ll need to:

• attend 5 of 7 half-day sessions
• show how you’ve explored and tested your idea

You may not be eligible to pitch for prize money if you have taken part in the competition before or are too advanced for this course (for example, you have an active company with employees). Your eligibility to take part is at the discretion of the entrepreneurship team and course facilitator.

Course format, dates and times

This course runs over 7 weeks, with sessions held in-person at UCL BaseKX (near King's Cross).

Sessions will be on:

• Thursday, 16 April, 4pm to 7pm
• Thursday, 23 April, 4pm to 7pm
• Thursday, 30 April, 4pm to 7pm
• Thursday, 7 May, 4pm to 7pm
• Thursday, 14 May, 4pm to 7pm
• Thursday, 21 May, 4pm to 7pm
• Thursday, 28 May, 4pm to 7pm

Ongoing support

Following the course, you'll have access to fortnightly one-to-one advice sessions with SPERO tutors to support the further development of your idea.

Accessibility

If you have any accessibility requirements or requests, please let us know in the signup form.

Photography

Filming and photography occasionally take place at our workshops and events. We use these photos and recordings to help promote future events through our website and social media channels. You can always choose not to be included in any photos or videos.

Book your place

About the tutors

Warrick Harniess, Managing Director, Scandinavia Stories

Warrick began his career at Pearson Education, where he built two online learning ventures for Pearson UK, managing startup budgets of around £2 million. He pioneered a digital marketing and customer service strategy that created Pearson UK social media accounts with the greatest customer reach, shares and interactions. Warrick also created a customer support programme that helped Pearson-Edexcel achieve Investors in People Silver status and the Institute of Customer Service’s ServiceMark standard.

Mario Moustras, CEO and Founder of Mazamo Coaching

Mario is a leadership and talent development coach who works with researchers and entrepreneurs. Before becoming a coach, Mario worked for the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC). He has a PhD in chemistry, and is a chartered scientist and Fellow of the RSC. Mario has worked with scientists and engineers across government agencies, industry and universities. He's led teams through science-related programmes in higher education, enterprise partnerships (especially with small companies) and technology policy.

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UCL Innovation & Enterprise reserves the right to make changes to the programme, location and/or speakers without prior notice. Such alterations are occasionally necessary due to circumstances beyond our control.

Location

UCL BaseKX, 103c Camley Street, London, N1C 4PF