Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 25 Teaching Business Models Through Student Consulting Projects Philippe Massiera1 Abstract Purpose: This article aims to share practical insights regarding the changes implemented between 2016 and 2018 in a consulting programme implemented in a French business school that involves 200 to 250 bachelor’s students on a yearly basis. For five weeks, students work as consultants assisting up to 40 local entrepreneurs with the objective to strengthen the coherence and value of their business model. Design/Methodology/Approach: Single case study Findings: Experiential approaches to teaching business models remain very demanding in terms of organization and follow-up. Based on our experience, we provide reflections about the pedagogical curriculum, useful tips for the enrolment of entrepreneurs and details about the evaluation process. We also highlight how the introduction of a business model development tool dramatically improved the overall consistency of the consulting project from both the pedagogical and managerial perspectives. Originality/Value: Existing literature on consulting programmes predominantly focuses on consulting projects in- volving small businesses. When implemented with entrepreneurs, such out-of-the-classroom teaching approach is a fruitful but demanding avenue. By sharing our experiences, we expect to document helpful recommendations which could contribute to widen its adoption. Please cite this paper as: Massiera, P. (2021), Teaching Business Models Through Student Consulting Projects, Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 Keywords: Entrepreneurship education, Business model, Student consulting projects, Business Model development tool. Acknowledgement: The author would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers as well as the editorial team for their helpful comments and suggestions. 1 Université du Québec à Montréal DOI: https://doi.org/10.5278/jbm.v9i3.2580 ISSN 2246-2465 https://doi.org/10.5278/jbm.v9i3.2580 Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 26 Introduction In the field of entrepreneurship education, the increas- ing use of experiential assignments highlights the development of a “learning by doing” pedagogy (Kuratko et al., 2015). In contrast to pedagogies dedi- cated to “learning to become an entrepreneur” (e.g., business plan design exercises, simulations or crea- tive projects), which are acknowledged for fostering the acquisition of business-model skills (Gedeon, 2014; Morris, 2014), business model consulting projects are dedicated to raising entrepreneurial attitudes among students (Bechard and Gregoire, 2005; Kenworthy- U’Ren et al., 2006). This out-of-the-classroom teach- ing approach is a fruitful but demanding avenue that requires better documentation. The existing literature predominantly focuses on consulting projects involving small businesses (Pittaway et al., 2007, Winke et al., 2013), which may explain why this innovative pedagogy is still not more widely implemented with entrepre- neurs (Morris, 2014). To contribute to the literature, this article aims to share practical insights regarding the changes implemented between 2016 and 2018 in a con- sulting programme implemented in a French business school that involves 200 to 250 bachelor’s students and up to 40 local entrepreneurs yearly. The paper is organized as follows. We start by presenting the objec- tives and specificities of the reproductive pedagogical approach, followed by the selection process and the organization of the consulting project. Finally, we share some reflections regarding its application and describe the main pitfalls, learning outcomes and avenues for improvement. Pedagogical Approach Context and objectives Regularly ranked among the best French business schools in entrepreneurship, EDC Paris has nurtured a unique entrepreneurial DNA as evidence by 15 to 20% of the students creating their own companies (or taking over a family business) before or immediately after completing their master’s degree. If the school primarily targets potential entrepreneurs and future managers (Kirby, 2004), the pedagogical curriculum is distinguished by the importance given to experiential learning and the emphasis given to the entrepreneur- ial phenomena. The highlight of this entrepreneurial culture is the implementation of a business model consulting project (Bechard and Gregoire, 2005; Ken- worthy-U’Ren et al., 2006). Once a year, for five weeks at the end of their second year of the undergradu- ate programme (BSc/BA), 200 to 250 students work as consultants assisting local entrepreneurs with the objective to strengthen the coherence and value of their business model (Fletcher, 2018). Implemented pro bono, these consulting projects can be defined as a “service-learning” oriented pedagogy (Samwel Mwasal- wiba, 2010) as they aim to respond “to community- identified needs and opportunities” (Kenworthy-U’Ren et al., 2006, p. 121). From a pedagogical perspective, this experiential assignment is primarily dedicated to raising an entrepreneurial attitude among the stu- dents and allowing the students to use their knowl- edge and skills related to the Business Model concept in real cases. Scope of the consulting project During the consulting project, students are placed in a situation in which they compare their ideas, thoughts and analyses with those of local entrepreneurs without the need to be involved in the entrepreneurial process. The knowledge and skills acquired by the undergradu- ate students can be valuable as they provide a more structured and academic approach to business prob- lems than entrepreneurs (Heriot et al., 2008). The consulting projects specifically target entrepreneurs during the “integration phase” of their creation process (Frankenberger et al., 2013). This period effectively offers a perfect match between the entrepreneurs’ expectations and the pedagogical objective, which is to allow students to use the knowledge, methods and tools they learned in their first two years of school. On the one hand, entrepreneurs must develop a business model that specifies all relevant aspects of their project in a holistic way to communicate and analyse the coher- ence of the strategic choices and economic sustain- ability of their projects. However, many entrepreneurs tend to underestimate the problems associated with the need for completeness and coherence, which fre- quently entails the overall legitimacy of the entrepre- neurial project (Kuratko et al., 2017; Malmström, 2017; Shafer et al., 2005). On the other hand, students assist local entrepreneurs by identifying and addressing pos- sible missing information or flawed assumptions that could undermine the overall credibility of the entrepre- neurial project. However, the consulting project is not Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 27 tailored to addressing the needs of entrepreneurs dur- ing the ideation phase or the later stage of the integra- tion phase (described in the table below). The “learning by practice” approach adopted by the consulting pro- ject has limited value and interest during the ideation phase when entrepreneurs are still in a reflexive state attempting to identify a business opportunity by sort- ing through the multitude of ideas and projects they have contemplated. Consequently, students face origi- nal problems that are not defined a priori, leading to an endless display of options. At the opposite end of the continuum, the project does not target entrepreneurs who are already very advanced in the creation process because their expectations can often lead to a level of expertise that exceeds the knowledge and skills of undergraduate students at the end of their two-year programme. Preliminary knowledge and business model development tool Prior to the consulting project, students must complete a mandatory business model course. After being sensi- tized to the context of venture creation, the students are familiarized with the different stages of the entre- preneurial process and the individual specificities of an entrepreneur (e.g., profile, entrepreneurial orientation, entrepreneurial expertise and effectuation) before learning about the basic strategic and financial skills necessary to be able to properly design and assess a business model (Morris and Liguori, 2016). The curricu- lum was revamped in 2016 to improve the coordination between the strategic and financial contents. Using the business model “integrated framework” (Morrish et al., 2005), the learning goals and curriculum content were framed within two separate overlapping modules taught by two different teachers (see Table 2 below). The business model curriculum is designed to prepare students to assume the role of an expert as they will have to manage the entrepreneur through skills and technique transference (Sadler 1998). However, con- sidering the relative youthfulness and lack of consult- ing expertise of the students, a possible gap may arise between the expectations of the client and the work carried out by the students. Considering that the elab- oration and validation of a business model represent a complex cognitive and rational process by nature, an online business model development software was introduced in 2016 to increase the ability of the stu- dents to reproduce and apply the knowledge and meth- ods acquired during the Business Model course. After performing a comparative study, the choice was made to use the CCI business builder platform (see Annexe B). As illustrated in the figure below, this ready-to-use online tool provides many useful options related to the integration phase of the entrepreneurial process within a unique logical flow as follows: • Several individual self-assessment grids related to the evaluation of an entrepreneur’s attitude and intention, • Two business model visualization tools for the analysis of the Lean Canva (Maurya, 2012) and the Business Model Canva (Osterwalder and Pigneur, Entrepreneurial process IDEATION PHASE INTEGRATION PHASE Consulting project audience Out of scope Scope of consulting project Out of scope Main objectives Generating and selecting creative ideas regarding how to innovate the current business model Developing a complete and consistent business model that holistically speci- fies all relevant aspects Detailed formalization of the business plan Entrepreneurs’ main interests Facilitation of the emergence of the idea Selection of a business opportunity Validation of the overall coherence of the business model Validation of the overall viability of the project Formalization of the industrial, marketing or financing strategy Validation of the tax strategy Table 1: Scope of the consulting project Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 28 2010) (see Szopinski et al., 2019 and Täuscher et al., 2017 for further information regarding the business model development and visualization tools), and • A business plan management tool that includes several writing pads and computation modules that ease the presentation of the strategic and financial core components of a business plan. Organization of the Consulting Process The student consulting project minimally includes the following three key stages: the initiation phase involv- ing the enrolment of entrepreneurs, the execution phase of the consulting mission and, finally, the evalu- ation phase (Heriot et al., 2008, Lycko and Galanakis, 2019). Enrolment of entrepreneurs Similar to all service-learning-oriented pedagogies, the quality of students’ consulting projects depends on the motivation and willingness of all parties to collabo- rate, and a major challenge from the quantitative and qualitative perspectives is the enrolment of entrepre- neurs, i.e., “the clients” (Heriot et al., 2008). To ensure enough time for the identification and recruitment of up to 40 projects, the selection starts five months in advance. This prospecting phase is most often carried out through direct and indirect promotional actions (e.g., through participation in entrepreneur fairs in Paris) and by establishing close relationships with local community partners likely to support entrepre- neurs (e.g., accelerators and incubators). To ensure that their expectations match the scope of the busi- ness model consulting projects, a self-evaluation grid Modules Learning goals Curriculum content Strategic module Ability to assess the time, scope and size ambitions of the project Strategy of the firm Value, vision and mission of the firm Identity and culture of the firm Ability to assess the demand and identify a specific clientele Customer information and interface Customer segmentation and potential Ability to assess the competitive advantage Market structure and competitor analysis Differentiation strategy Value proposition and customer benefits Ability to identify the source of the competi- tive advantage Tangible resources/assets Capabilities/competencies Brands portfolio and firm reputation Customer relationship Ability to define how value is created Process/activity organization Information flows Product/service flows Value network (suppliers) Financial module Ability to demonstrate how the business makes money Sales forecasting Revenue/pricing strategy Design of the revenue stream Break-even analysis and cost forecasting Income statement Start-up capitalization and cash flow projection Initial balance sheet Investment plan Table 2: Business model course: Modules, learning goals and curriculum content Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 29 was specifically developed for the staff in charge of contacting potential clients (see appendix B). First, entrepreneurs are invited to complete an application form in which they describe their projects and expecta- tions regarding the coherence and viability of the pro- ject. Second, these applications are reviewed, and the applicants are personally contacted by the programme coordinator. The main issue is to ensure that the expec- tations of both parties are compatible, particularly regarding the difficult balance between the expec- tations of the entrepreneurs in terms of advice and deliverables and the educational expectations. If an agreement is found, the entrepreneurs receive a con- tract proposal which explains in detail the objectives, Figure 1: Screenshot of the CCI Business Builder development tool Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 30 timeframes and nature of the deliverables, obligations of the school in terms of confidentiality, etc. In return, the entrepreneur commits to sharing necessary infor- mation, including financial information, and dedicat- ing enough time to the students. Two weeks before the start of the mission, all selected entrepreneurs are invited to attend a two-hour presentation delivered by the programme coordinator during which the objec- tives and schedule of the mission are presented and discussed (see Cook et al., 2005 for further guidance regarding this aspect). Implementation of the consulting project As described in Table 3, the consulting project process can be defined as a “micro-one” as it is performed within a relatively narrow timeframe (Heriot et al., 2008, Lycko and Galanakis, 2019). The first week is dedicated to establishing a trusting relationship with the entrepreneur and developing a good understanding of the project. The week starts with a formal meeting between the entrepreneurs and the assigned team. The composition of the teams of 4 to 6 individuals is generally left to the free discretion of the students but cannot be changed once established. Within each team, one student is appointed as a coordinator to serve as the interface between the entrepreneur and the team and between the team and the school. Once this contact has been made, the teams are free to determine the frequency of meetings and their working method at their convenience. To foster their project management abilities, at the end of the week, each team must submit a report presenting the main issues to be addressed and the different milestones and deliverables scheduled for the remaining five weeks (1). During weeks 2 and 4, two follow-up one-hour tutor- ing sessions are organized under the supervision of two faculty instructors paired in complementarity to follow the progress of the project and assist the stu- dents with their strategic and financial assessment. As detailed by Cook et al. (2005), the instructor acts as a facilitator who helps the teams structure their analysis and eventually assists them in recalling the conceptual and methodological fundamentals discussed in class. The first session is dedicated to the identification of flawed assumptions regarding the strategic and mar- keting core dimensions of the business model and the time, scope and size ambitions of the project. The sec- ond session is dedicated to the identification of flawed assumptions related to the financial projections and assessment of the financial viability of the project. At the beginning of each tutoring session, the teams must electronically submit a working document summariz- ing (i) the progress of the work carried out to date, (ii) a work schedule describing the main steps to be taken, and (iii) a list of the questions to be addressed during the tutoring sessions (2, 3). During the entire con- sulting project, the teams are invited to use the busi- ness model development tool. As previously described, the platform provides many tools that are particularly relevant for project analysis, especially during the incu- bation phase. Through the platform, the teams and clients share a common repository to save informa- tion online. Like a checklist, the step-by-step analytical framework follows a logical sequence that eases the generation, dissemination and analysis of the informa- tion and co-production process of the final deliverables. For each core section of the business model/business plan analysis, the teams and clients can also access various videos and online tutorials. Week 1 Initiation and reading Week 2 Tutoring session 1 Week 3 Project analysis Week 4 Tutoring session 2 Week 5 Conclusion Initial meeting with entrepreneurs Gathering and analys- ing information Defining the problem  1  2 Strategic assessment: Competition Market acceptance Sales scenarios Key success factors Operating cost Key partnership and resources  3 Financial assessment: Breakeven analysis Funding requirements  4 Oral presentation Table 3: Timeline of the students’ consulting projects Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 31 Project completion At the end of the five-week mission, each team must submit a final written report of approximately sixty pages in length (4) and present a final one-hour oral presentation. The students present their conclusions and recommendations for 20 minutes. Subsequently, 20 minutes are allocated for a Q&A session, 10 minutes are allocated for a jury deliberation (held behind closed doors) and 10 minutes are allocated for a final discus- sion during which the jury deliberations are presented. The jury comprises academic and non-academic rep- resentatives as follows: two teachers, including the instructor in charge of monitoring the strategic aspects, and at least one representative from the private sector. These representatives must have an entrepreneurial background and are most often enrolled among the alumni community. This bond of trust facilitates both the recruitment and confidentiality of the discussions. However, to avoid any conflicts of interest, the repre- sentatives must be recruited from a different industrial sector. Our experience demonstrates that their pres- ence contributes to emphasizing managerial expecta- tions in terms of content and presentation. Evaluation The final grading of the assignment, which represents the equivalent of approximately one hundred hours of personal work, is computed by summing four scores weighted as follows: 20% for the strategic and financial tutoring sessions (10% each), 10% for the final written report, 50% for the final oral presentation and 20% for the client’s final evaluation. Formal rating grids were developed to standardize the evaluation process to the greatest extent possible. After each tutoring session, the faculty instructor assesses the progress and quality of the consulting project and the attitude and behaviour of the students based on the following criteria: • Quality of the summary sheet • Listening skills • Consistency of the analysis • Project progress • Relevance of the questions asked • Compliance with the methodology • Mastery of knowledge • Team cohesion If the evaluation of the final oral presentation is com- pleted straightaway by the jury, the final written report is evaluated by the programme coordinator within two weeks. In both cases, particular attention is paid to the quality of the writing in terms of spelling and clar- ity, and the formal evaluation considers the following criteria: • Robustness of the academic knowledge • Ability to collect, synthesize and exploit information • Project understanding and presentation (market and company) • Consistency of the analyses • Relevance of the recommendations Considering the specificities and importance of the oral presentation, a specific grid was developed to evaluate the quality of the communication skills based on the following criteria: • Timing compliance • Listening and communication skills • Team cohesion • Verbal expression, conviction and argumentation While the students are evaluated collectively, we agree with the recommendations by Teckchandani and Kha- nin (2014), who suggest using individual assessments. In our case, this individual evaluation occurs at the end of the final presentation. The students have the oppor- tunity to suggest to the jury that additional points should be awarded to a specific member of the team in recognition of specific contributions. Regarding the evaluation provided by the client, we strive to maintain a clear demarcation with respect to the academic evaluation. Prior to the presentation, the clients must provide their own specific rating form, which includes details regarding the following criteria: Attitude and behaviour: • Communication abilities • Involvement and motivation • Compliance with instructions • Team spirit • Organizational skills Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 32 Attitude: • Analytical skills • Synthesis capabilities • Initiative - Curiosity • Responsiveness and adaptability • Project understanding The entrepreneurs who attend the presentation are required to not interfere and remain neutral until this very last moment during which they are invited to con- clude by giving an opinion and viewpoint of the work carried out by the students. This delimitation and the relative weight given to the client’s assessment are the result of two intentions. First, the weight of the academic evaluations recalls that the consulting mis- sion has a pedagogical purpose, and the quality of the consulting activities represent a secondary objective. Considering the various challenges involved in student consultancy projects, the intent was also to protect the students from the risk of an arbitrary assessment (Cook et al., 2005, Lycko and Galanakis, 2019). Discussion Pitfalls This pedagogical approach to teaching business mod- els offers students the opportunity to better under- stand what it means to start a business through a real case but remains very demanding in terms of organiza- tion and follow-up. Despite all efforts, from the peda- gogical and organizational perspectives, it remains difficult to ensure that each entrepreneur experiences a certain level of satisfaction given the number of pro- jects to be supervised, their heterogeneity in terms of maturity and industry specificities and non-rational and affective dimensions, which are intrinsic to the entrepreneurial orientation. As previously described, the volume of projects is important, and the standard deviation within the same cohort of projects can be significant regarding the maturation of the entrepre- neurial process or the willingness of the entrepreneur to invest enough time and effort to work in coopera- tion with the students. Sometimes, the gap between the students’ skills and industrial knowledge required and the heterogeneity within student teams in terms of understanding, abilities and behaviour make it dif- ficult for students at this level of study to fully address the entrepreneur’s expectations. Second, an important commitment in terms of time and effort is required from all constituencies, including the school, faculty instructors, students and especially the entrepreneurs (Cook et al., 2005). In this context, the competences and implications of the faculty instructors who are in charge of the tutoring sessions remain among the most important key success factors. Ensuring access to this very specific resource is even more difficult since in addition to the relative scarcity of entrepreneurship professors, the individual in charge of the tutoring ses- sion must be able to reconcile theory and practice and provide advice and recommendations without directly interfering with the relationships between the stu- dents and the entrepreneurs (Cook et al., 2005). Lessons learned Despite all these challenges, our experience demon- strates that the changes applied in 2016 contributed to achieving a better alignment between theory and practice and increased the overall consistency of the consulting project. First, the evolution of the business model curriculum has demonstrated that the selec- tion and structuring of the subjects to be taught were important success factors (Samwel Mwasalwiba, 2010). Our experience particularly demonstrates that the use of the business model “integrative framework” proposed by Morrish et al., (2005) helped clarify the articulation between the strategic and financial mod- ules. The structuring of the learning goals based on the six core components described in Table 2 greatly facilitated the learning process of the knowledge nec- essary for being able to assess the coherence of the project, particularly during the integration stage of the entrepreneurial process (Malmström, 2017; Shafer et al., 2005). Second, we found that the introduction of a business model development tool dramatically improved the overall consistency of the consulting project from both the pedagogical and managerial perspectives. From the academic perspective, our experience demonstrates that the use of a digital rep- resentation of the Lean Canva and the Business Model Canva fostered the adoption of a systemic thinking perspective (Olofsson and Farr, 2006) and helped the students approach the issues holistically (Heriot et al., 2008). We also noticed that the structuring of the analytic flow into a logical order and the possi- bility of deepening the details of each sub-section of Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 33 the core components of the business model (Malm- ström, 2017) allowed a faster and better alignment between the pedagogical objectives and the manage- rial expectations and a greater homogeneity among the deliveries. The implementation of the platform greatly eased intelligence generation and the collabo- ration and sharing of knowledge related to the core elements of a business model. Considering the chal- lenges related to the generation of knowledge that is hetero-finalized jointly by the students and the entre- preneur (Bayad et al., 2010), the normative dimension of the platform facilitated the overall co-construction process between the teams and their clients and between the teams and the faculty instructor. The check-list approach helped the students uncover missing information or flawed assumptions prior to the tutoring sessions (Ebel et al., 2016; Szopinski et al., 2019) and facilitated the identification and expla- nation of the strategic inconsistencies prior to the two tutoring sessions. By homogenizing the reports and dissemination of information, the use of a com- mon platform considerably helped the professors con- ducting the tutoring sessions follow up progress and take corrective action and the programme coordinator in the assessment of the final report. From the mana- gerial perspective, the step-by-step analytical frame- work dramatically contributed to limiting the space for inventive and entrepreneurial approaches and limiting the tensions between the pedagogical objectives and managerial expectations. We discovered that the use of a business model development tool contributed to allowing a faster and better alignment between the pedagogical approach, which is “data rich, rational and linear”, and the pragmatism of the entrepreneurial orientation, which is more “iterative, creative, action- focused data poor and even emotional” (Morris, 2014, p. 8). Consistent with several authors who recalled the challenges related to the implementation of student team consulting projects (Cook et al., 2008, Heriot et al., 2008, Lycko and Galanakis, 2019), our experience suggests that the attention paid to the initial setup and the supervision through the use of a business model online tool are both crucial best practices. Limitations Our experience shows that at the end of the consult- ing project, the students have generally strengthened their skills in many areas. However, the assessment approach suffers from two main limitations. First, the assessment is performed collectively and does not assess the development of specific individual knowl- edge and competencies (Tardif, 2006). A proper evalua- tion of individual skills and competencies would involve a much more structured approach, including the ability to address the measurement process at an individual level before and after the consulting mission (Walia in Manimala et coll. 2017). Second, a deeper examination of the formal evaluation grids reveals a stronger focus on soft skills at the expense of hard skills. Indeed, most criteria aim to reflect the overall implication of the team and the following individual soft skills considered important in the entrepreneurial context: leadership and social skills, time management skills, critical think- ing skills, assessment skills, problem-solving skills and communication skills, especially persuasion. In con- trast, regarding hard skills, it appears that the evalu- ation process adopts a much broader perspective in an attempt to assess how students succeeded in adopting a rational perspective to properly assess the strategic and economic validity of the entrepreneurial project. The criteria used for the evaluation of the tutoring ses- sions and the formal grid used by the jury to assess the final presentation express judgements regarding the coherence and credibility of the deliveries and, to a lesser extent, the quality of the consultancy. Conclusion Teaching business models using a consulting-based pedagogical approach is a fruitful and demanding ave- nue in entrepreneurship education. The reflections of the pitfalls and limitations highlight the difficulties associated with such an approach and perhaps explain why it is still not widely used (Morris, 2014). However, such experiential pedagogy provides a very appropriate perspective for the diffusion of “business model think- ing” (Hogan and Warrenfeltz, 2003) and contributes globally to decreasing the “knowing–doing gap” (Pfef- fer and Sutton, 2000; Williams Middleton and Donnel- lon, 2014), and we humbly hope that this feedback of experience could help to widen its adoption. Journal of Business Models (2021), Vol. 9, No. 3, pp. 25-38 34 Appendix A: Choice criteria and comparison of popular business model visualization tools Name Reference BM viz. tools Financial assess. tools Languages Web based Free Reference CCI Business Builder Chambre de Commerce et d’Industrie de Paris.   French   https://business-builder.cci.fr Montpellier business plan Montpellier Médi- terranée Metropole (France).  French  http://www.montpellier- business-plan.com Strategizer A. Osterwalder (2010).  English   https://strategyzer.com GRP Story teller T. Verstraete (2010).  French   https://storyteller.grp-lab.com Detoolbox B. Aulet (2013). English  https://www.detoolbox.com Appendix B: Selection grid I would like to have an external perspective to be able to decide between several ideas A I would like to have a recommendation of the type of tax package to be implemented E I wish to detail and validate the assumptions and figures used to demonstrate the economic viability of my project D I would like to start a business, but I do not have a clear and precise idea A I would like to identify suppliers and write a cache of charges E I want to ensure that my business model is solid C I would like to ensure that I anticipated the resources needed to carry out my project C I would like to better understand the needs and expectations of the market C I would like to obtain a list of potential customers and take advantage of the mission to start prospecting E I would like to be helped in defining what I do, my job, and my market C I want students to suggest ideas and enjoy their creativity A I would like the students to help me write the entire business model D I would like to carry out and price my communication plan E I would like to validate my financing plan and prepare my file D I would like to validate that my selling price is accepted by my target customers E I want to check that my project is solid, have a fresh perspective, and check if the students derive the same conclusions as me B I would like to have a questionnaire made to validate the interest of customers for my product and/or the acceptance of the proposed selling price E I would like to better understand my competitors and their strengths/weaknesses C I have a project but many questions as follows: which product? for whom? through which means? for which profitability? 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In 2015 and was appointed head of the entrepreneurship department at EDC- Paris, in charge of redesigning the Master’s degree in Entrepreneurship and Innovation within the Grande École program. In 2018, he moved in Canada. Associate professor at the École Supérieure de la Gestion of the Univer- sité du Québec à Montréal he teaches strate- gic marketing and entrepreneurial marketing. About the Authors