Innovative Approaches in Teaching Business Courses: Start-Up Simulation in the Change Management course; students’ experience

Abstract: Simulation is an experiential learning process that speed-ups learning process and make it more interesting and practical. According to Hakeem (2001), when students are involved in different activities of experiential learning, they better understand the subject in comparison with students who just have lectures-only classes. Moreover, experiential learning raises critical thinking abilities and self-directed learning (Kreber, 2001). In business schools simulations have been used to manage trading skills (Truscott et al., 2000) and business ventures development (Goosen et al., 2001). For the Change Management undergraduate course of the Business School there was offered a simulation “Start-Up Wars” that was developed by one of the USA start-ups. This simulation was created especially for colleges and universities students with a goal to introduce students with the real stories of different start-ups and practice making decisions on a daily routine with a goal, according to the scenario, to survive for the first ninety days. Each new day brought a new challenge. By solving everyday entrepreneur’s tasks students have experienced and applied their knowledge into practice in different directions such as strategic thinking, marketing, decisions making, used their managerial and leadership skills, teamwork, planning, and financial modeling. After the simulation students provided the feedback on their experience and met through online session with the developers of the simulation where students shared their experience, ideas and general understanding of the activity. Overall, students provided positive feedback about conducting simulations in the learning process and raised their interest in using business simulations as class activities. Students highlighted the beneficial and practical component of simulations in understanding the business world. Keywords: simulation, start-up, change management, experiential learning, innovative approach, students, business school