Today we’d like to introduce you to Alex DeNoble.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Alex. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
The Lavin Entrepreneurship Center was founded in approximately 1988 with an original gift from a number of prominent community leaders and entrepreneurs headed by Mr. Ron Fowler, L. Robert Payne and Kit Sickels… We were originally known as the Entrepreneurial Management Center (EMC). We are a part of the Fowler College of Business and we operate under the auspices of the San Diego State University Research Foundation.
We primarily exist to serve the needs of SDSU students, faculty and staff who may be seeking to embark on an entrepreneurial journey. Our motto is that we are in the business of preparing the next generation of entrepreneurs. We do this by developing and implementing a portfolio of experiential programs designed to help our stakeholders build their entrepreneurial competencies, confidence in utilizing these newly acquired competencies, professional networks and confidence in leveraging those professional networks to advance entrepreneurial agendas.
We also work with the Management Department in the Fowler College of Business to create and promote a variety of academic entrepreneurship programs including, but not limited to an undergraduate Entrepreneurship specialization, a cross-campus Entrepreneurship minor, a Music Entrepreneurship Program (within the College of Professional Studies and Fine Arts), a graduate concentration in Entrepreneurship within the MBA program and the Lavin Entrepreneur Program.
In the early 2000’s, the Entrepreneurial Management Center received a significant gift from QUALCOMM to help fund the QUALCOMM Executive Director position. Then between 2008 and 2012, we received additional significant gifts from Dr. Leonard H. Lavin (founder of the Alberto Culver Company). As a result of these gifts, we renamed the Center in 2012 to the Lavin Entrepreneurship Center.
Within the last 10 years, SDSU received additional gifts from the Moxie Foundation that enabled us to establish the Zahn Innovation Platform (ZIP) Launchpad, a university-based incubator and the ZIP Idea Lab, a design thinking center. Also as a result of another gift, we were able to create the H.G. Fenton Idea Lab, a facility for prototype development and testing.
Originally the Lavin Entrepreneurship Center (previously the EMC) operated out of administrative offices in the Gateway Center on campus. The ZIP Launchpad, ZIP Idea Lab, and Fenton Idea Lab also operated in separate facilities on campus. Then in January 2018, SDSU opened up the new Engineering and Interdisciplinary Sciences Building (a $90 million project). Within this new facility, as a result of another gift, all of our entrepreneurship center operations moved under one roof within the new William E. Leonhard Entrepreneurship Center facility.
While each Center maintains its own identity, our new proximity to one another provides us with a great opportunity to collaborate and offer even more powerful opportunities for our stakeholders both on campus and within the community…
Has it been a smooth road?
No road of this magnitude has ever been smooth. Finding and working with potential donors is always a challenge. We had to learn how to articulate our vision in such a way that donors could embrace what we are trying to accomplish. Each donor has his or her own expectations and finding the alignment that meets both donor and university expectations is no easy task. Yet, when the stars align, magic tends to happen.
From a financial standpoint, it is always a challenge to run and manage our operations. These wonderful major gifts that we have received over the years are funneled into endowments, meaning that we operate off of quarterly payouts that are dependent upon market performance. These payouts provide us with a level of funding to support basic operations. Thus, to implement programs above and beyond basic operations, we are dependent upon finding short-term program sponsors, grant opportunities and donors willing to provide non-endowment support. As you can probably imagine, things get especially challenging when the markets perform poorly and donors become skittish.
As educators, we are always generating new ideas and programs that are consistent with our mission. However, given resource constraints, we must always evaluate which programs to keep and which programs to drop from our portfolio.
Within our new facility, as mentioned earlier, we have the opportunity to offer powerful new programs for our stakeholders. Yet, under one roof, we have 3 Executive Directors (one for the Lavin Entrepreneurship Center, one for the Zahn Innovation Platform Launchpad and one for the ZIP Idea Lab). Each of us has our own operating style and ways that we promote our organizations. Each of us has to learn how to adapt to the new working environment that we operate in. So far, after one month together in our new facility, we all seem to be getting along.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the SDSU Lavin Entrepreneurship Center story. Tell us more about the business.
As mentioned earlier, at the Lavin Entrepreneurship Center, we specialize in developing and offering experiential co-curricular activities and programs that complement the curricula side of the house (our academic programs, also mentioned earlier). Within the Lavin Entrepreneurship Center, we focus on creating programs to get our students hands-on experience with entrepreneurs in the community.
We do this through an array of specialized competitions, internship and mentorship programs. When we find students who are interested in starting their own companies, we move them into the ZIP Launchpad, our university-based incubator facility where they can get additional mentorship, legal help, office space to work from and prototyping assistance (from our H.G. Fenton Idea Lab). We also utilize the ZIP Idea Lab to help our stakeholders to work through product and business design issues and other creative problem-solving challenges.
We are noted for our comprehensive set of curricula and co-curricular offerings that can serve any student, faculty or staff within our campus community.
In 2017, we were recognized by the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) as the national model undergraduate program of the year. We were also recognized by the Global Consortium of Entrepreneurship Centers (GCEC) for excellence in cross-disciplinary entrepreneurship education. Our programs have also be recognized in various publications such as BusinessWeek, Forbes and the Princeton Review.
We also serve as a thought leader in Entrepreneurship within the academic community. Currently, we are in the planning stages for our fifth annual California Entrepreneurship Educators Conference (April 12 – 14, 2018). This conference attracts entrepreneurship educators and researchers from around the world to discuss cutting-edge new trends within the field.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
In education, in general, we see a movement towards more online course and program offerings. Yet, despite these trends, we believe that there will always be room for the hands-on and interactive nature of face to face programs as well. Thus, as educators, we have to be ambidextrous, so that we can operate effectively in either or both platforms.
There is a growing emphasis within our field to ensure that our academic curricula and co-curricular programs emphasize student engagement and experiential learning.
We also must be cognizant of how new technologies are impacting how companies will be doing business in the future. Our job is to ensure that our curricula and co-curricular programs remain contemporary so as to prepare students to work in these new environments. Technologies such as big data, artificial intelligence, virtual and augmented reality, drones, 3-D printing, blockchain and cryptocurrency and robotics etc. will greatly impact new business models and create major threats to the status quo and major opportunities for those with foresight.
Pricing:
- Interested readers can attend our California Entrepreneurship Educators Conference for $349 (April 12 – 14). http://lavincenter.sdsu.edu/programs/Entrepreneurship-Conference/
- Int Interested readers can get involved by joining our advisory board. This is a philanthropic board: Dues are $5K per year http://lavincenter.sdsu.edu/about/Board-of-Advisors/
Contact Info:
- Website: http://lavincenter.sdsu.edu/
- Phone: 1-619-594-2781
- Email: adenoble@mail.sdsu.edu
- Facebook: lavin entrepreneurship center
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/SDSULavinCenter
- Other: LInkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/entrepreneurial-management-center/
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