How to set up a Junior Enterprise

Step 2.2

Brainstorm on the services you might provide and on its market viability

5W2H

What?

You need to brainstorm to determine the services you might provide with your JE.

When?

You need to conduct this brainstorming in the earlier stages. Indeed if you cannot provide services, there is no rationale for the existence of a Junior Enterprise.

Where?

There’s no need of a special place to do the brainstorming. You can have face to face meetings but you can also communicate via e-mail, forum, skype, etc.

Why?

As it is written above without services there is no rationale for the existence of a Junior-Enterprise. Indeed the goal of a Junior Enterprise is to bridge the gap between universities and business. The Junior Enterprise has to give students the opportunity to put into practice their theoretical knowledge. Areas of expertise are the essence of the Junior-Enterprise.

Who?

The whole team needs to be involved in this brainstorming. You can ask your teachers and your faculty to help you.

How?

First of all you need to find out the areas of expertise of your team members. The goal of a JE is to add value to your education and you will recruit people who are studying at your school/University. You have to be aware that you cannot offer and sell services that you are unable to provide.

How to define the skills of the school?

• Look for some advice concerning your school, i.e. at the career center of the university
• You might perhaps already know what is taught at your school/university, but you can also take a look at the program (the different material that are provided to interested people)
• Ask your teacher about what you are supposed to be able to do at your stage of development / education

You can simply schedule an appointment with your faculty. Indeed they will tell you what a student can do in each scientific field that is taught in your school/university. Do not neglect the areas you do not study but in which your colleagues might have experience and be well-prepared/experts.

You can also have make a research and find out what are people doing who graduated at your school/university.

Establish a synthetic note

• Establish a synthetic note of the different services that you can provide for the future customers.
• It will help you to identify your product service, what you could sell, and who will be your customers.

Do not hesitate to ask your teacher. The fact that you can provide concrete services is also a good sign for the quality of their teaching.

How much?

This in an internal process and there are no costs involved.

Examples

Some examples of areas of expertise in France:

• Market surveys
• Feasibility studies
• Creating websites
• Bibliographic studies
• Technical studies

It is not an exhaustive list. Your services will be specialized according your school: Food engineering, business, financial services…

How to set up a Junior Enterprise

Step 2.3

Do a list of possible supporters of your future Junior Enterprise and get in contact with them.

5W2H

What?

Prepare a list of possible supporters for your JE.

When?

The list should be prepared in the earlier stages of setting up the JE, even before having elected a board.

Where?

There’s no need of a special place where you can prepare the list. It can be during face to face meetings, it can be via e-mail exchange or in your forum.

Why?

Don’t forget that you are still students and references and support from different parts it’s important to your potential customers. You still need to learn a lot and having people and organizations at your side is also important for you. A Junior Enterprise is an enterprise and you need to be aware that you will have to face difficulties of whose existence you didn't suspect before.

These difficulties can be very specific and your problems might require advice from an expert. There are many areas in Junior Enterprises where you might not yet have the expertise to manage them: financial part, team management, communication, strategy, in the services that you provide…

Some examples of situations where support from outside might be necessary, are:

• You will need an office where to establish your J.E. HQ (ask your school for example)
• You will need information to help realizing what kind of services you can offer/sell
• You will need an internet access, a phone, a fax…
• You will need some equipment to run your Junior Enterprise or to achieve the service that you have sold
• You will need a lawyer
• An accountant
• People that can help you to communicate

Who?

Everybody needs to be involved in this task. You need to build your network with contacts of your entire student team.

How?

To have the more supporters possible you need to convince them that what you are doing is important and good. It is important that you create a document to present your project.

The different topics to be presented in your document can be:

1.Your Team:

• Describe your team, the key staff, their positions and responsibilities
• Explain how new staff will be trained
• The résumé of your career until now
• A nice and professional photo of your team
• 
  
• 2.The presentation of your project:

• Present what is a Junior Enterprise
• Explain what do you want to do and where you want go
• 
  
• 3.The advantages for your school:

• A good communication tool from your school and professional
• Help of worldwide and recognized network
• Dynamism and professional team
• A good approach of the professional world for the students of the school
• 
  
• 4.Your needs, this part needs to be adapted with regard to the contact person / organization

• Help, support, office
• Financial support…

Overall your document needs to be adapted with regard to your contact person and also specialized in relation to what it can bring you.

If you will ask for knowledge (teacher…) you will underline what the Junior Enterprise brings to your education, in what it is complementary, what you are learning…

If you need a financial support you will need to argue why you need this support and why it is useful

Important:

Once you will be in contact with somebody who is agreeing to support you, you must maintain and care this relationship. Here a few tips how to achieve this:

• Take regular news from the person who is supporting you / the organization that is supporting you
• Show to your support what he is bringing to you and show the outcome of your partnership
• Greeting card
• Make regular reviews

How much?

It won’t cost you money; the only thing that it is going to cost you is time.

How to set up a Junior Enterprise

Step 2.4

You need to list the financial and material resources needed for founding you J.E. and establish your first budget

5W2H

What?

You need to list the financial and material resources needed for founding you J.E. and establish your first budget.

When?

At the beginning of your efforts to establish the Junior Enterprise.

Where?

At your J.E. HQ or somewhere else if you don’t have yet an office. You can also work online and share information via e-mail or in your forum.

Why?

Because it is easier to get what you want when you know what you want and you have an anticipation of what that might cost you.

Who?

Somebody in the team, if you have somebody specialized in financial management then he/she might be the right person to do this. To build the budget, you can entrust this task to someone who feels comfortable with calculating.

How?

To list the material resources needed, build a table with four columns:

1. The material resource needed
2. Why you need it
3. How you can get it (contact)
4. How much it will cost you

For your budget, here a small help with a simple excel sheet:

*For the 1^st year don’t plan to easily to get project from customers, think better to establish your structure. You might also plan to have projects, but they will be mostly not paid projects. Your aim in this kind of projects should be to establish trust to your business partner who will perhaps become a customer of yours in a longer term.

** Administration expense: printing paper, phoning, registration of the association…

*** Expenses according to the payment of the students for the project and charge for the project (travels…)

How much?

It won’t cost you money; the only thing that it is going to cost you is time.

How to set up a Junior Enterprise

Step 2.5

Design the organisational structure of the Junior Enterprise in order to fit the JE’s objectives.

5W2H

What?

We meant that the students have defined the divisions, departments and positions that will exist in the JE. In this step, you have to design the organizational chart, the description of the positions and the career plan inside the J.E.

When?

As soon as possible

Where?

At your JADE HQ but you can have discussions also elsewhere if you don’t have an office yet. Discussions can be conducted and documents can be exchanged also via e-mail exchange and can be shared online also in your forum.

Why?

This step is important because it is useful to have an organisation structure in which departments and tasks of the people to be involved in each department are well defined.

Who?

The team.

How?

You must make a grid to define the skills of each person in the team and the position they want have

The three positions that you will need to begin are:

• The President: He/she has the ultimate responsibility for the association, has to keep an eye on the team and make important decisions that will guide the association to the summit. He generally has strong relationships with external people (Head Director of the school…)
• The General Secretary: He/she has to oversee the development of the Junior enterprise, do reports of the meetings, set up meetings, place orders (depends on the need of the JE) and  decisions in the JE with the President
• The Accountant: He/she has to establish and send the invoices of the JE, control the accounting of the JE, and administer budget.

You might also plan other positions such as: marketing manager, communication manager, quality manager, international manager… Project manager will be everyone in charge for completing a project. You might also plan to have a special position in the JE of the project manager. Apart from the managing positions you will also have the consultants positions.

Sometimes, your legal status as an association or other legal form might require you to plan some specific positions. You have to check this before.

How much?

It will cost you nothing just time.

How to set up a Junior Enterprise

Step 2.6

Define the legal form of the Junior Enterprise and build and write the statutes

5W2H

What?

Define the legal form of the Junior-Enterprise and build and write the statutes.

The choice of the legal status of your J.E. is an important step in the Junior-Enterprise creation. The legal form will vary from a country to another depending on the country legislature. Some J.E.s find it easier to start as an association, a foundation or a Limited Company.

Check which legal form is most appropriate for a Junior Enterprise in your country.

If you choose a certain status make sure you know all the pros and cons and what it will mean for your organisation.

Statutes should include JADE’s requirements such as non-profit, non-political etc.

When?

At the earlier stage of the association.

Where?

At J.E. HQ

Why?

Your J.E. will need binding rules so that it can keep afloat and ensure the continuation of its existence.

Furthermore the statutes and legal form should be outlined in the report produced for the application as a J.E (JADE membership process).

Who?

Your J.E. ExBo should be involved in this task.

How?

You could start by including JADE’s requirements and then brainstorm of what you think would be best for J.E.s.

It might be useful to contact other J.E. to have an example of their statutes and ask for advice from the ExBo of JADE. This advice will provide you with the most up-to date information concerning the statutes of JEs.

Here you find a framework for the statutes of an association:

Denomination

The name of your J.E.

Registered office

Contact, address of your J.E. (put the same as your university, it’s why it’s important to get the support of your university/school)

Object

Aims of the association, here you should describe which are the mains aims of your association, services that you can provide to students and companies

Composition of the members/Admissions

Explain the differences between physical and moral members

What kind of members can join your association (active members, consultative, passive members, honorary members)

Right of the members

Describe what can do each member. For example describe the function of the secretary or that only the president’s signature right.

Obligation of the members

Define what are the main obligations of a Junior-Enterprise’s members. You need to write here if they need to pay a participation fee and if yes, how much is the participation.

Limits and responsibilities of the members

Restrict the responsibilities of the members; how they can work of the association, what are their limits?

In which cases a member can be expulsed of the J.E..

Organization of the association

How you define your General Ordinary Assembly

How you define your General Extraordinary Assembly

Definition of the meeting between the members: where? When? Which frequency?

Definition of the ExBo.

Generally within an association there is the executive Board which has important responsibilities within the association and the Council administration Board which still have important responsibilities. In this article you should define how you select the people inside of the board…

Definition of the Executive Board

How many people in the board? Who are they?

Financial year

Define when start and finish the exercise of the association

Dissolution of the association

Define how the association could be dissolved

How much?

The registration process might take a long time and be also costly. This will directly depend on the procedures that apply in your country. Unfortunately, we cannot give you an exact figure or even estimation for this point.

How to set up a Junior Enterprise

Step 2.7

Define the Junior Enterprise’s Internal Rules, including the Selection and Election Processes

5W2H

What?

The association will not work without values…before the rules; you must define which your values are. The strategy, the rules, the objectives come afterwards.

Once, the Status are written down, you should send us a copy (don’t need to translate all the articles), and proofread it by a teacher from your school or a specialist.

Moreover, you can complete it by writing the internal rules, more flexible rules that explain, and deepen the statutes with more regulations of processes and of responsibilities.

Don’t forget that your values are the base for your work. So don’t be too much abstract and choose true values that all members and partners can understand.

When?

As soon as possible

Where?

At your J.E. HQ

Why?

It is essential to have internal rules to work.

Who?

All members need to agree with the internal rules and with selection and election processes.

How?

The values of our Junior-Enterprise come from 4 words:

• Personal development to enable people to fulfill their potential
• Synergy to have a united development
• Innovation to develop and grow
• Advice to help and support

These words gather the values of your Junior Enterprise. As soon as you do this ethical charter, your customers, partners, and you will have a reference of your vision.

An ethical charter helps you communicate and gives a reference for your Junior Enterprise; it makes you not only a group of students who wants to do business but also people who have values.

After this, you can make the rules on how your Junior Enterprise will function.

The internal rules are just very detailed explanations of the statutes and perhaps some extensions. These rules are not written in a legal language.

You need to define your selection process

You need to define your election process

The best method for an election is with a ballot box!

Someone who is not part of the team will count the vote and announce the results.

Don’t forget that the election of officers is something important for your J.E.

Each of you has to prepare a speech to show to the others what you can do and bring for the organization, what will be your strategy.

How much?

It will cost you time but not money.