Syllabus

Course Meeting Times

Lectures: 2 sessions / week, 1.5 hours / session

Course Goals

Entrepreneurship in the 21st century is evolving. Because of global changes in technology, communications, and capital markets, today's innovative startups are building successful companies in countries around the globe, in environments often dismissed as impossibly hostile to entrepreneurs. The challenges these leading-edge companies face, particularly in emerging markets, are some of the most sophisticated issues for businesses and governments alike.

These challenges are the focus of G-Lab.

G-Lab has four specific goals:

1. To familiarize students with the issues and challenges facing entrepreneurs in emerging markets.
2. To provide students with an intensive internship experience working in a global startup.
3. To familiarize students with the power of informal networks and the importance of leveraging MIT-related and other networks while working globally.
4. To offer high-quality advice to global entrepreneurs. We would like MIT Sloan to become the first place that global startups look to for advice and help. This is an important goal for you, for MIT, and for all future generations of MIT students.

Course Design and Expectations

G-Lab is both a course and a collaboration: A partnership between MIT Sloan and entrepreneurial companies facing real challenges throughout the world. The faculty and other advisors to the course have devoted considerable time and resources to finding appropriate projects, and entrepreneurs have worked hard to apply competitively for a G-Lab slot. Therefore MIT's and Sloan's reputations are very much at stake. Future students will only get this kind of opportunity if G-Lab continues to provide value to everyone involved.

Please regard everything we ask you to do as a work assignment (i.e., as if from an employer) and not simply a course requirement. Everything in this course is designed to help you work effectively with your projects. There is no make-work or irrelevant material; all of the requirements have been designed solely to help you and your team be effective. If you need more content or clarification on any issue, talk with us and we will make sure you get what you need, as quickly and easily as possible.

Grading

Grades will be assigned based on the following individual and team activities.