MGMT3004 Entrepreneurship

Assessment Guide

The following information is designed to guide you with Assessment Task 1 for MGMT3004
Entrepreneurship. It is meant to complement the details in the unit outline so don’t forget to read the
outline as well. This includes the marking guides for your assessments. The information provided in
this guide is broken down according to what is required for the Literature Review assignment. Please
read through it carefully and ask your instructors if you have any further questions.

Assessment Task 1 - Literature Review Component

The first assessment is one of the components of the entrepreneur interview project and helps you
develop some of the skills you require for Assessment Task 2. Assessment Task 1 is an individual
assessment. Early in the semester, a guest entrepreneur will be making a presentation to
entrepreneurship students. The focus of this presentation is on the entrepreneur’s opportunity
recognition. For Assessment Task 1, you will need to review the content of the entrepreneur’s
presentation and determine where the entrepreneur confirmed the theories, principles and models
relating to opportunity recognition. To help you access the theories, principles and models relating to
opportunity recognition, the titles of key, seminal papers have been posted on the Assessment link on
the MGMT3004 Blackboard site. Since you will be reviewing these papers, this assessment is
referred to as a literature review. Please review these articles to help you identify key themes and
principles that confirmed or differed from the guest entrepreneur. The articles are a starting point and
you are expected to cite at least five (5) of these articles in your assignment. Feel free to use more
articles in your assignment to explore key theories and principles further. Assessment Task 1 does
not need an executive summary since it is relatively short – around 1250 words (+/- 10%). What you
do need is to provide an introduction, a body and a conclusion. It will be a challenge to keep to the
1250 (+/- 10%) word limit for this assignment so be sure to use models, diagrams and tables to
synthesize some of the theoretical concepts. The models, diagrams and tables you provide are not
included in the word count. When you use models, diagrams and tables please refer to them in your
assignment so your instructor understands their significance to your assignment. The following
provides more details of what you will include in your assignment.

1. Introduction (around 10% of word count)

Include in this section an explanation of what the purpose of the assignment is about and provide brief
details of the entrepreneur who made the presentation. Provide a brief discussion on the task you
undertook to examine how the entrepreneur confirmed or disproved the theories, principles and
concepts relevant to opportunity recognition.

2. Body (around 70% to 80% of word count)

The body of the assignment requires you to detail how the guest entrepreneur confirmed or disproved
the theories, principles and concepts relevant to opportunity recognition. To do this you will need to
make clear linkages between the research literature you reviewed and the guest entrepreneur. When
you apply the theories, concepts and principles to the entrepreneur, please provide the evidence from
the presentation that linked with the relevant elements of the research literature. You can use some
direct quotes from the presentation. One pitfall to avoid is not providing the specific evidence from the
presentation that confirmed or disproved the theories, principles and concepts. Another pitfall is
providing too much information from the presentation with very few connections made to the research.
Aim for an even balance. Do not leave it to your instructor/grader to draw the conclusions from your
writing. In other words, explain why you thought specific elements of the entrepreneur’s presentation
connected to certain theories, principles and concepts relevant to opportunity recognition.

When you review the literature you will see that there are different theoretical views on the subject of
opportunity recognition. You will need to demonstrate your analytical skills to compare and contrast
the different theories when applying them to the entrepreneur. For instance, you might find one
element of the entrepreneur’s presentation related to a specific theoretical concept discussed in one
particular article. However, you might find the exact same element in the entrepreneur’s presentation

MGMT3004 Entrepreneurship Literature Review Advice 1

links equally as well to a different theoretical concept in another article. Clearly explaining how the
different concepts applied to the entrepreneur and why shows your ability to think critically and your
capacity to compare and contrast key concepts.

3. Conclusion (around 10 - 20% of word count)

In your conclusion, you need to demonstrate your ability to synthesize the different concepts you have
identified that relate to opportunity recognition and the guest entrepreneur. Your synthesis will include
a definition of an entrepreneur relevant to the topic of opportunity recognition. An appropriate
definition would look like something like this:

“An entrepreneur is an individual who is able to recognise opportunity as a result of….”

It’s up to you to finish the rest!

Remember, the advice provided to you in this assessment guide aims to help you with your first
assessment task but please be sure to review the information in the unit outline regarding this
assessment to give you a more complete overview.

Good luck everyone, Louis Geneste, Unit Coordinator.

MGMT3004 Entrepreneurship Literature Review Advice 2