Individual assignment - 65% The assignment consists of 2 parts
Part 1: The Founder’s Dilemmas - 1,500 words essay
- Select a founder case study from Jessica Livingston (2007) Founders at Work: Stories of Startups` Early Days.
- Analyse the interview with reference to Noam Wasserman’s The Founder’s Dilemmas. Which dilemmas did the founder experience in the early stages of their company? What was the impact, wow could they have navigated the dilemma in a different way?
- Identify at least one effectuation principle in the Founder’s startup story
Formatting
- Submit as Word Document or in .pdf format
- Font size 12pt
- We use anonymous marking on this module. Please only add your Student ID to the document and don’t include your name.
Word count
• The recommended word count is: • Essay: 1,500
• Reflection: 750 words
• You are allowed to go below or above the word count by 10% for each part of the assignment.
Required reading
Noam Wasserman (2012) The Founder’s Dilemmas https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/reading/detail.action?docID=867851
Jessica Livingston (2007) Founders at Work: Stories of Startups` Early Days. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/reading/detail.action?docID=418002
Pick one of the following case studies
From Jessica Livingston’s Founders at Work: Stories of Startups` Early Days.
Max Levchin, Paypal
Evan Williams Blogger
Steve Perlman, WebTV
Joshua Schachter, del.icio.us
David Heinemeier Hansson, 37 signals Stephen Kaufer, TripAdvisor
Blake Ross, Firefox
Analyse the interview with reference to The Founder’s Dilemmas
- Which dilemmas did the founder experience in the early stage of their company? Identify at least 3 dilemmas. Provide a short description of the dilemma in the context of the case.
- How did the Founders respond to the dilemma? How did their decisions impact the company and their own position in the company in the long-term?
- How could they have circumvented the dilemma? Based on current research literature, what could have been alternative courses of action or strategy they could have employed to achieve optimal outcomes?
Analysing The Founder’s dilemmas
• How many dilemma’s should I cover? We suggest you cover 3-5 dilemmas. Analyse dilemmas in detail. Show us why they occurred, what their impact was on the business and what could have been an alternative course of action
• “There are no dilemmas in the case study I picked...” We’ve provided a list of recommended case studies you can chose from. You may want to read a few or all of them to decided which one is best suited for analysis.
- When you read through the case study, look for issues around co-founders, investors, hiring, etc ...
- Focus on Founder Dilemmas, NOT on the business challenges. The assignment is to analyse entrepreneurial decision-making, NOT to evaluate business or product strategy. You don’t need to elaborate on business challenges experienced around marketing, software development, etc.
- When you have identified a dilemma, analyse why this dilemma occurred and what options where available to the founder. What could have been an alternative course of action? Could they have circumvented the dilemma? If, based on your analysis, “they did everything right”, then show us how with reference to current research literature.
- Is the case contradicting theory? Show us your ability to critically analyse the case to achieve the highest marks.
- When analysing founder decisions, you don’t need to just look at what went wrong, but equally you should examine what the founders did right - with reference to the literature. Explain how decision align or don’t align with theory.
- Do additional research, go beyond Wasserman and Livingston. For a high mark, we would like to see that you have done additional research around your chosen case company, but even more importantly, that you have consulted wider academic literature on entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial decision-making
