What can you do with an MBA and a concentration in entrepreneurship? The sky’s the limit.
At Booth, you’ll join an unparalleled entrepreneurial community of students, alumni, and faculty who are passionate about turning ideas into impact. You’ll network with venture capitalists and explore the risks and rewards of building a startup, including through a number of business accelerator programs offered through the University of Chicago Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. You’ll also have access to the Polsky Exchange, a 34,000 square foot startup incubator.
And you’ll gain real-world experience in creating new ventures, competing for funding—and maybe even changing the world.
Emma Lawler: Booth has so many resources for entrepreneurship. If you come here as a really serious entrepreneur, you have a very good chance of being able to succeed in that role.
Nisha Saboo: I took this entrepreneurial discovery my first quarter which really helped and focused on what's my problem that I'm trying to solve, not just the solution, but who am I solving it for?
Johnathan Zhang: That definitely was helpful in terms of putting a lot of the experiences I had from developing the idea to actually building a product into frameworks that were more structured.
Emma Lawler: The Venture Capital Lab, so there's one PE section and one VC section and you find an internship through that program and then you get mentorship through the class.
Nisha Saboo: EVC, the Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital Group has been fantastic. They have a lot of founder focused series.
Johnathan Zhang: Your peers as well as your friends are gonna be extremely valuable. We try to meet twice a quarter at minimum just to share our progress and then our feedback on each other's idea.
Emma Lawler: Polsky was another big reason that I came to Booth because it's a devoted center that's very fully staffed and well funded and so I can actually just schedule mentorship meetings with them to talk through my business idea or do a practice pitch or talk through different business models.
Maya Shaposhnik Cadena: Polsky was really my home, I would say. They were extremely supportive of the process and were always also connecting me with other individuals that could help me have more growth.
Nisha Saboo: I was a part of the EIP, Entrepreneurship Internship Program where we are supported financially for the summer to help grow and scale your business.
Maya Shaposhnik Cadena: We also had sessions with a mentor from EIP and we would just talk through some of our challenges.
Johnathan Zhang: What Booth afforded me is to take a little bit more risk because I always know that there's a safety net that I can kind of fall back on.
Maya Shaposhnik Cadena: Booth is the right place for anyone who wants to do an MBA and wants to do the entrepreneurship route. The reason number one is flexibility by far. It just allows entrepreneurs to flourish.
At Booth, You Own Your MBA Experience
A Booth MBA is rooted in The Chicago Approach, the educational philosophy that sets Booth apart from every other business school in the world.
What's more, our MBA curriculum for Full-Time and Part-Time MBA students is the most flexible among top programs globally. The level and sequence in which you take your foundational courses at Booth is not set in stone. You can customize your education to support your professional interests and goals, because we know there is no singular roadmap to career success.
Customize your MBA experience with courses that immerse you in a startup culture and teach you the tools you need to take your venture from idea to impact. Here are just a few of the many entrepreneurship-focused courses available at Booth.
| Course | Short Description |
| Lab to Launch | Lab-based innovations have contributed the most important advances to humanity, from energy that power our lives to medicine that cures disease. But limited effort is placed on commercializing these discoveries. In this class, you’ll work in teams to build a new business, using a lab technology that is sourced from a leading research lab. |
| Women As CEOs, Entrepreneurs, Investors, Executives & Directors |
The goal of the course is to provide candid insight and purview into the personal and professional lives of leading women entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and private equity executives, what has helped catapult or has hampered their ability to lead organizations worldwide. |
| Building the New Venture |
Through class lectures, “game” assignments, and real-world cases, you will learn how to raise initial seed funding, establish initial brand values and positioning, leverage a strong niche position, determine appropriate sourcing and sales channels, and develop execution plans in sales, marketing, product development, and operations. |
| New Social Ventures |
In this course, groups of students will develop an idea for an innovative, startup social organization. They will conduct research to create a detailed plan for its creation and growth and pitch the plan to faculty, social entrepreneurs, domain experts, foundation officers, and philanthropists |
To see more Booth MBA courses, visit our course catalog.
MBA Concentrations at Booth You Can Consider
Our flexible curriculum gives you the freedom to focus your MBA experience on a specific area of interest. Earning an MBA concentration gives you deep knowledge in a given field and sets you up for success in your career. Concentrations are available to Full-Time, Evening, and Weekend MBA students.
Entrepreneurship is the most popular concentration at Booth. Several of our concentrations are of particular interest to students planning to pursue entrepreneurship careers with an MBA.
Entrepreneurship
Build the practical tools and experiences you need to start your own business or embark on a career in private equity or venture capital.
Entrepreneurship
Marketing Management
Go beyond the bounds of traditional marketing practice. This concentration prepares you to act decisively and solve problems with confidence.
Marketing Management
Strategic Management
Build the skills you need to create and implement key strategies—and shape the structure and functioning of your firm.
Strategic ManagementMBA Student Groups in Entrepreneurship
Participating in student-led groups is a great way to meet fellow entrepreneurs, explore new ventures, and make connections across our vibrant startup community.
EVC is one of Booth’s largest student groups, providing access to a wide network of people in the entrepreneurship and venture capital community. Resources include frequent lunch-and-learn speakers, venture capital and startup treks in San Francisco and New York City, and the annual SeedCon conference.
Through this group, Full-Time MBA students engage in discussions with industry experts, gain experience in sourcing and evaluating live investment targets, and join a robust community of entrepreneurial peers.
Designed for Evening and Weekend MBA students, this group connects members to the growing investor and entrepreneur community and provides education, resources, and networking opportunities.
Join a Full-Time MBA Group
Get involved, develop new skills, and meet new people in a wide array of student-led groups.
Join a Full-Time MBA Group
Explore Part-Time MBA Student Groups
Pursue your interests and expand your network by joining a student-led group for Part-Time MBA students.
Explore Part-Time MBA Student GroupsDiscover Student Stories
A New Way to Teach Math
The winner of this year’s Edwardson SNVC, together.science, uses a free web-based tool to help students learn math.
A New Way to Teach Math
A Transformative Medical Treatment
A Weekend MBA student’s health-care startup aims to improve IVF and other medical procedures by removing the need for needles.
A Transformative Medical Treatment
Choose Your Path to Success
Tell us about yourself, and we will show you the value of a Booth education.
Discover Alumni Outcomes
Our alumni are launching new ventures all over the world in fields ranging from cryptocurrency to research to winemaking.
An Organic Vineyard in Belgium
Three Booth alumni blended their expertise to successfully launch a challenging venture with a social purpose.
An Organic Vineyard in Belgium
Empowering Entrepreneurship with Crypto
Through the more stable cryptocurrency Akoin, Lynn Liss, ’01, hopes to bring new opportunities to entrepreneurs throughout Africa.
Empowering Entrepreneurship with CryptoBooth Research Centers in This Area
Our interdisciplinary research centers give you access to workshops, conferences, leading scholars, and research opportunities.
Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation
The Polsky Center bridges the gap between knowledge and practice, idea and action, and research and impact through education, partnerships, and new venture creation.
Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation
James M. Kilts Center for Marketing
The Kilts Center for Marketing advances marketing at Booth by facilitating faculty research, supporting innovation in Booth’s marketing curriculum, funding scholarships, and creating engaging programs.
James M. Kilts Center for MarketingFaculty Research in Entrepreneurship
Our faculty are award-winning scholars whose work is regularly covered in Chicago Booth Review, our influential magazine focusing on business, policy, and markets.
Good Start-Ups Have Great Networks
Research into Chinese entrepreneurs is revealing some global truths about business success.
Good Start-Ups Have Great Networks
Let Your Customers Tell You When to Pivot
Small-business owners can get guidance by surveying their own customers.
Let Your Customers Tell You When to Pivot
Who Starts Companies When Opportunity Suddenly Strikes?
Research explores the characteristics of “responsive entrepreneurs.”
Who Starts Companies When Opportunity Suddenly Strikes?Leverage Resources Across the University
Booth MBA students who are interested in a career in entrepreneurship have access to the New Venture Challenge. Launched in 1996, the New Venture Challenge is recognized as one of the top-ranked accelerator programs in the nation. Companies that have been successfully launched through the NVC include Grubhub, Braintree/Venmo, and Simple Mills, among many others.
Engage Further with Us
MBA Life at Chicago Booth
See how the student experience comes to life for MBA students at Chicago Booth, and read about how our alumni are creating impact across the globe.
MBA Life at Chicago Booth
Admissions
We take a holistic approach to admissions at Chicago Booth. Explore the admissions process for MBA, PhD, and other Booth programs.
Admissions
Full-Time MBA Program
The Full-Time MBA Program provides you with freedom: academic freedom, freedom to take risks, and freedom to define your impact in the world.
Full-Time MBA Program
Part-Time MBA Programs
Our top-ranked Evening MBA and Weekend MBA Programs accommodate the schedules and lifestyles of working, goal-oriented professionals.
Part-Time MBA Programs