Budding entrepreneurs begin Business Boot Camp

Budding entrepreneurs begin Business Boot Camp

High School students attending Massey University’s first-ever Business Boot Camp have been told they represent the cream of the crop of future business leaders.

The Boot Camp kicked off on Monday with an action-packed schedule planned for the five-day intensive residential camp.

The camp is being run at the Albany campus by the College of Business, with 60 students coming from as far north as Dargaville and as far south as Marton in the Rangitikei. They’re giving up their school holidays to immerse themselves in the world of business.

Director Engagement and Enterprise at the School of Economics and Finance and one of the organisers, Dr Jeffrey Stangl, told the sixteen and seventeen-year-olds they were the next generation of entrepreneurs and business leaders.

“A lot of you in this room will be leading the charge which really could put New Zealand on the map. That’s not hollow rhetoric — we really believe that.”

Throughout the week the students will encounter a wide variety of inspirational speakers, from Massey lecturers to business leaders, and will also go on site visits to companies. They will learn hard skills — the traditional and functional areas of finance, human relations, accounting and marketing — but also will develop their soft skills of leadership, public speaking and networking.

Dr Stangl urged the students to ask many questions throughout the week, saying: “You can teach monkeys to learn an excel spreadsheet: true. Okay, but where you will add value — where you will find your place and successful careers as successful entrepreneurs and business leaders — is by becoming critical thinkers.”

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