Haslam College of Business - MGT MAJOR

MGT 331 Leadership Skills

Focuses on developing leadership skills. Provides students with self-assessment, developmental exercises, and case studies to prepare them for leadership roles.

MGT 336 Foundations of Organizational Behavior

Behavioral processes in organizations – perception, motivation, power and influence, leadership. Behavioral consequences – group behavior, teamwork, politics, conflict, culture, change, and development.

MGT 462 Managerial Analytics

Evidence-based, data-driven decisions have become the norm in today’s fast-paced, hypercompetitive business landscape. This course will guide students through the use of analytic techniques and tools, with an emphasis on real-world applications and cases. After completing the course, students will be able to interpret raw data, select the appropriate method of analysis, draw conclusions from the results and communicate results to key organizational stakeholders.

MGT 489 Internship in Management

This course will monitor and assist Management students in fulfilling the internship requirement for graduation.

ENT 375 Introduction to Name, Image, and Likeness

Many issues are involved in making good decisions around how to capitalize on an individual’s NIL, and this course will help you develop a much better understanding and skill set around those issues. More specifically, you will learn several key basics that will get you started in developing and building a business around your own NIL. In this course you will develop a fundamental knowledge of skills and concepts that include building an awareness and knowledge of NIL developments, building and managing a strong and valuable personal brand, developing and executing a strong social media strategy, entrepreneurship and new business formation, and personal and business finance.

ENT 410S Leadership in Nonprofits and Social Entrepreneurship

This course introduces students to obstacles facing nonprofit organizations and start-ups, provides students the tools and concepts essential to address these obstacles, and challenges students to use these tools and their own value systems in making “real dollar” grants to local nonprofits. The pedagogy is a blend of case studies, online learning (a six-module MOOC from Stanford), and service-learning work. In the service-learning portion of the course, students evaluate proposals from area nonprofits and award grants provided by the Learning by Giving Foundation and local philanthropists.

ENT 415 Start-Overs as Start-Ups

Not all entrepreneurial activity takes place within the confines of a brand new organization. For some organizations, entrepreneurial effort is required as an organization “starts over” due to poor performance, changes in leadership, new ownership, generational handoff, and/or other factors. This course centers on those situations where existing organizations need to be entrepreneurially refreshed in order to realize their potential.

ENT 425 Entrepreneurial Marketing

Entrepreneurial ventures face important and sometimes unique challenges marketing new products and/or services from new firms. New ventures must not only let consumers know that their products and/or services exist but also legitimize the venture in the minds of consumers. This course provides an in-depth look at entrepreneurial marketing strategies with an important focus on online presence and social media initiatives.

ENT 451 New Venture Planning

Integration of various functional disciplines and their application to general management of new ventures within established companies and entrepreneurial enterprises. Focuses on the components necessary for the development of a business plan.

ENT 460 Leading Innovation and Change

How managers identify and nurture new business opportunities while maintaining competitive advantage. Topics include examination of change models, the role of middle managers in large organizations, and ways to address resistance to change.

ENT 462 Innovation and Creativity

The goal of this course is to create a working prototype of a marketable product or service within the semester. Starting with a seed of a new product idea, students will conduct a market opportunity analysis, select a target market, and then define the product concept, features, benefits, and unique selling proposition. They will partner with technology experts, hardware and software developers, and others to physically create the product. In-class time will focus on experiential learning with creativity and innovation exercises and weekly executive briefings. Out-of-class time will focus on readings, simulations, field interviews, and work on the product prototype. Throughout the exercise, students will receive guidance and feedback from a professional Product Development Coach.

ENT 464 Corporate Entrepreneurship

Management guru Peter Drucker argues that entrepreneurship is the lifeblood of business; without entrepreneurship, all organizations will eventually find themselves out of business. In today’s world, companies are struggling to lower costs, increase quality, and offer better customer service, while also being faster, more flexible, more aggressive, more innovative, and more connected. These are difficult tasks, but necessary for businesses to maintain their competitive edge. Yet, few people really understand how to make this happen. That is where this course fits in. It is about understanding how and why some firms can maintain their entrepreneurial spirit, competitiveness, and growth, whereas others are not. It is about creating work environments where innovation is the norm, where employees are encouraged to work entrepreneurially, where leadership is supportive (not controlling), and where firms are organized to take advantage of all the good things that its people do. This course will be one of many questions, issues, examples, and controversies. Students will be expected to develop and defend their opinions, to independently search for what the ‘best companies’ do, and to suggest how others can do better. This is an applied course, where students must take the ideas, concepts, tools, and frameworks and apply them to a series of real-world examples and assignments.

ENT 470 Managing an Entrepreneurial Start-Up

Start-up companies have a high failure rate. Acquiring and balancing limited resources, changing direction quickly, building a coherent team, developing an organization’s culture from scratch, managing intellectual property, and creating new markets all test a wide range of managerial skills not usually demanded in one person within a larger organization. Whereas a large company has a strong and well-defined structure and ample resources to deal with unexpected challenges, a start-up usually has insufficient resources and/or management experience, yet it must deal on a daily basis with important and often unpredictable forces.

Students will be exposed to these tensions and experience through problem-based learning methods that illustrate what it is like to start and grow a new company. The course will provide students with the knowledge and experience to increase their likelihood of success whether as a principal in a small company or an investor representative.

Managing a Startup is a problem-based learning (PBL) course, where the learning is student-centered, with faculty acting primarily in the role of facilitators. Active learning happens in this course because students are engaged in the analysis of the complex situations that underlie startup companies. The course leverages the on-line course management system Canvas to define weekly learning objectives, support electronic delivery of assignments, and provide robust video content from entrepreneurs, investors and key employees, who provide additional insights into the management decisions and ethical dilemmas the leader of a startup faces.

ENT 480 Franchising

Franchising is a system for expanding a business and distributing goods and services. It provides an opportunity to operate a business under a recognized brand name. It creates a relationship between the brand owner and the local operator. A franchise occurs when a business licenses its trade name and its operating system to a person or group who agrees to operate according to the terms of a contract. The class will explore franchising from the perspective of both a franchisor (an opportunity to scale a business) and a franchisee (an opportunity to become a business owner). We will discuss both the traditional or product-distribution franchises, and business-format franchises. Students will have an opportunity to interact with both franchise “brokers” and successful franchisors and franchisees. Students will compare and contrast various franchise opportunities and examine Franchise Disclosure Documents.

ENT 485 Funding Strategies for Entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurship funding sources and financial mechanisms necessary for securing and managing startup capital. Development of pro forma financial models, valuation techniques, and similar analyses will be covered in this course.

ENT 492N Entrepreneurship Internship

Integrates classroom knowledge with skill based competencies in entrepreneurship through first-hand experience working with an entrepreneur and with entrepreneurship-focused organizations.

ENT 499 Special Topics in Entrepreneurship

Topics of current interest in entrepreneurship.