The use of MOOCs to streamline competence development in Technology Entrepreneurship domain

Purpose – Massive open online courses (MOOCs) are contributing to widespread the access to digital knowledge and the development of competencies and skills based on free and open sharing, use and re-use of digitized material available in purposeful on-line systems. Worldwide, the development of MOOCs has gained popularity also in the management and entrepreneurship domain, where a number of providers have started to offer MOOCs addressed to diffuse entrepreneurial competencies and skills. This paper presents an application of MOOCs to support the development of entrepreneurial competencies. A purposeful roadmap has been set up to identify the set of actors and activities involved in the design, implementation and monitoring of an entrepreneurial project. Each activity of the roadmap is defined in terms of inputs, outputs, tasks and enabling competences to be acquired. Based on the roadmap, a customized open platform for MOOC delivery has been thus developed along with a set of experimental courses and some guidelines to better engage learners and instructors. Design/methodology/approach – The article is grounded on behaviourism, constructivism and connectivism learning theories, and their relationship with ICT, in the aim to frame MOOC as an emergent pedagogical approach capable to experiment networked learning. A preliminary analysis of literature on MOOC methodology and approach, as well as on the study of international cases of MOOC adoption in entrepreneurship education has been made. Then, based on a design science approach, a MOOC platform dedicated to stimulate entrepreneurial culture and competencies has been realized, and preliminary feedbacks have been collected from instructors and learners. The six phases of design science approach have been set up, problem identification, definition of research goal, artefact development, demonstration, evaluation and research communication. Originality/value – The value of the article can be identified in three main elements: i) the personalized approach to access MOOCs based on a structured roadmap of the entrepreneurial process; ii) the role that companies can play in the MOOC platform (e.g. course design, content production, course delivery, feedback analysis); iii) the possibility to experiment a blended approach in the use of MOOCs as a tool for competence development in the entrepreneurship domain. Practical implications – The article provides useful insights for the design of effective MOOC-based learning experiences in the technology entrepreneurship domain. In particular, a set of guidelines concerning the role of each actor of the learning process (including companies) and the implementation of effective blended (physical and on-line) experience are provided. Finally, the study presents a practical discussion about how to capitalize the value generated by MOOCs.