Teaching

I am currently leading the entrepreneurship education pillar at the Brett Centre for Entrepreneurship where I am focused on nurturing a multidisciplinary/cross-disciplinary approach to entrepreneurship education across the university. I have designed new cross-disciplinary modules ‘Becoming Entrepreneurial’ which are offered at undergraduate and postgraduate levels for students studying at the University of Liverpool. The modules are designed to equip students, whatever their core subject or discipline, with an entrepreneurial mindset and entrepreneurial skills such as identifying opportunities, value creation and capture, effectuation, business simulation, entrepreneurial planning, and capital resourcing.

In its first year, the undergraduate module 'becoming entrepreneurial' attracted around 100 students from across the University from diverse disciplines, including STEM subjects (e.g., Maths and Chemistry) and Social Sciences (e.g., Business & Law, Business and Languages, Business and Communication; and Business & Sociology). The students' main focus is to reflect on their own entrepreneurial capabilities and tendencies and develop innovative and real-world business solutions.

Additionally, I contribute to the design and delivery of UG and PG entrepreneurship programmes and modules, including Research Methods for MBA programmes (Full-time and Exec). I have also supervised circa 200 MSc and MBA dissertation projects to completion.

In all my teaching, I follow ‘enquiry-based’ and ‘research-led’ teaching to ensure students not only engage with current entrepreneurship theories but also cultivate their enterprising skills/mindsets that provide them with a competitive advantage in the job market. I ensure that all my teaching has relevance to practice. With an experiential learning approach, I encourage students to be immersed with real-life entrepreneurs/start-ups, helping them to develop the necessary attributes and behaviours of what it means to be enterprising, as well as offering insights into being an entrepreneur. This practice-oriented approach is reinforced with practical workshops to stimulate entrepreneurial thinking, creativity and innovation, all of which are relevant to both start-ups and career development.

In the past, I led start-up series featuring entrepreneurs/founders/investors from the UK and internationally to support students’ deep understanding of the myths and realities of entrepreneurship. In addition to my commitment to teaching and learning excellence, I also take an active role in mentoring students’ start ups and support the development of their business opportunities from the ground up.

Entrepreneurship and Innovation

The disruption that digital technologies brought in all industries, has created new challenges and opportunities for businesses of all sizes including Start-ups, SMEs, Corporates as well those in self-employment. The different channels used to satisfy customer needs and wants, have now become even more complex and significant, creating an exciting, dynamic but also challenging environment for both entrepreneurs and businesses. Entrepreneurship and innovation enable students to demonstrate their knowledge of the role of innovation and entrepreneurship in creating integrated innovative solutions using their entrepreneurial thinking to real world business challenges.

Entrepreneurship and Business Modelling

Entrepreneurship with its focus on innovation, has been seen to be the means by which businesses and economies achieve sustained competitive advantage. Entrepreneurship and Business Modelling enable students to explore the concepts and application of business modelling to real life contexts. The use of the Business Model Canvas, pioneered by Osterwalder and Pigneur (2010) provides the tool for students to design real solutions to business contexts, as well as develop an understanding of how organisations and start ups create, deliver and capture value.

Social Entrepreneurship and Social Enterprise

Social entrepreneurship has been seen the panacea by which social entrepreneurial ventures develop solutions to pressing social and environmental problems. Social entrepreneurship and social enterprise enable students to explore the role social entrepreneurs play in creating social impact, through business practices. The use of the social business model canvas and the concept of social innovation, enable students to develop their innovative thinking in solving societal problems through entrepreneurial solutions.

Modules for 2024-25

BUSINESS and ENTERPRISE in PSYCHOLOGY

Module code: PSYC398

Role: Teaching

Dr Zeineb Djebali
BA MALit MBA PhD