Alumni Association

Peers Influence Decision to Become an Entrepreneur
Why do some geographic areas, such as California's Silicon Valley, produce so many entrepreneurial companies? The answer may be workplace peers. Working with former entrepreneurs makes individuals more likely to start their own businesses, says GSB Professor Jesper Sørensen. Peers Influence Decision to Become an Entrepreneur Details

Extreme Affordability Journal
The elective Design for Extreme Affordability takes students from their funky classroom/design studio to far flung corners of the world. Follow progress through the Extreme Affordability Journal. (Video Available) Extreme Affordability Journal Details

Strategies: Entrepreneurs Hope to Save the World 1 Baby at a Time
Embrace, a device that looks like a very small sleeping bag, helps save premature babies. It is the result of an innovative entrepreneurship class at Stanford, called Design for Extreme Affordability, featuring a team of Stanford students including GSB alumna Jane Chen MBA '08. USA Today, September 19, 2008 Strategies Details

Coffeehouse Serves the Latino Community
Tierra Mia Coffee's owner, Ulysses Romero, MBA '04, hopes to open more shops by surpassing Starbucks on quality and offering Latin-inspired drinks. Los Angeles Times, September 15, 2008 Coffeehouse Serves the Latino Community Details

When (Organizational) Change Hurts: Startups Need
to "Think Employees" from the Get-Go
A decade-long study of Silicon Valley (California) technology startups by GSB Professor Michael Hannan finds that companies were three times more likely to fail if at some point they altered the founder's blueprint for employee relations than if they maintained their original employee model. When Organizational Change HurtsDetails

Keep Main Street Safe for Local Opinions
Can grassroots movements be noticed in this era of corporate control and background noise? GSB Professor Hayagreeva Rao studied the emergence of low-power FM radio stations as an example and says when local organizations offer a rich variety of opinions, they can indeed make a dent in the control of larger corporate organizations. Keeping Main Street SafeDetails

Founders of Startups May Develop Itchy Feet
Founders of entrepreneurial firms are more likely to leave and start a new business as their companies mature and their own roles become more routine, according to GSB Professor William Barnett. Unlike their bosses, employees are more likely to leave early on and start a company. Founders of Startups Developing Itchy FeetDetails

Be Creative, Talk to Strangers - Stanford Business Magazine
One of the best ways to heighten your creativity is to step out of your normal daily pattern and start talking to strangers. The most creative entrepreneurs, spend less time than average networking with business colleagues who are friends and more time with a diverse group that may see the world a little differently. Being Creative and Talking to StrangersDetails

Entrepreneur Describes the Path to Profitability
They went 18 months without a salary, made 700 presentations seeking venture backing, and admit to having moments of great doubt, but today classmates Kathy Sherbrooke, MBA '94, and Janet Kraus, MBA '94, can look proudly at Circles, the profitable six-year-old company they have created. Path to ProfitabilityDetails

The Real Value of Search Funds
Search funds are formed by individuals who invest in a profitable established firm with a fairly simple business model, such as no big product development cycle and no big technology component. Research, sponsored by the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies, analyzed 28 such funds and found returns to investors were more than 30 percent. More details about VC Funding Signals Growth Strategy Details

VC Funding Signals Growth Strategy
Prior research indicates that venture capital funding is the most significant resource for entrepreneurial success—it allows for faster product-to-market turnover and enables a company to "professionalize" management teams quickly. New research by Antonio Davila and George Foster suggests that initially the amount is less important than the fact that venture funds were invested at all. Non-Financial Data Can Predict Future ProfitabilityDetails