Abstract
A side hustle is a small-scale business activity in addition to one’s primary job. Our learning innovation is the student side hustle (SSH), a small-scale business in addition to the student’s academic work. It fits within an existing entrepreneurship course, allowing students to launch small scale ventures on a campus-based peer-to-peer marketplace platform. The SSH contributes to the broader category of side hustles and to the existing category of experiential learning exercises that result in student businesses. We position the concept in the appropriate foundational literature, and offer insights into the details of our “stimulation” and its outcomes, evidence of its effectiveness, lessons learned, and extensions of the exercise.
Keywords
With this article we describe a learning innovation that we developed for an emerging entrepreneurship curriculum, at a medium-sized, land grant state university. Taking an entrepreneurship course as part of an undergraduate program significantly increases the odds of a student founding, or working for, an entrepreneurial organization (SBA Office of Advocacy, 2009). The average age of a person who starts a business is mid-30s (Wilmoth, 2016). Entrepreneurship education should therefore develop skills for both the short and long term (Kuratko, 1996). However, entrepreneurship lessons can be described, but unless and until they are made real, the lesson is not complete (Cowden, 2018). There is not consensus about which types of educational methods, approaches, and support systems best facilitate entrepreneurial learning (Winkler, 2013) and connect teaching with outcomes (Lee et al., 2018) by enabling venture execution in the curriculum (Cowden, 2018).
Learning innovations in entrepreneurship courses that serve to bridge theory and practice are not new, and many colleges have developed exercises to suit their needs. Examples range from a three-week, team-based pop-up ventures for community service (Liang et al., 2016) to an upper level course that requires an application to get into the class (Cowden, 2018). Some active learning courses have prerequisites, or else they are restricted to students who are within a major (Dobson et al., 2020; Kuratko, 1996).
Our learning innovation first fills a need on our campus for a learning activity in an introductory entrepreneurship course to help a student in any major or class year to start a low key, small scale venture. Although we have a small ecosystem of venture mentoring, pitch coaching and workshops on our campus, it serves a targeted few. Half the students who take this introductory course are not business students, and many are upper classmen. They will be taking only this class as a “one and done” in the business school. They will take a job, before they make a job. There were two things we needed to address: 1. very few of our students have ever started or run a business, and yet, 2. they tell us that they either want to start a business, or they want their workplace to be innovative (see Table 1). We owe it to our students to cultivate the second statement, but be mindful of the first.
Insights by Students, SSH Versus Hypothetical Business.
*In Spring 2020, 67 students started the class, and 61 completed it. Of the 20 graduating seniors, 13 intend to start their side hustles or pursue it in an MBA program. 28/41 others intend = 68%. Some students already started versions of their SSH, during the spring of 2020.
We adapted the concept of the side hustle, which other schools have done, but here we offer insights into the way we have executed the concept with our learning innovation, the student side hustle (SSH). A side hustle describes engagement in an activity that earns money in addition to a primary job (Ashford et al., 2018), and often involves a skill, passion or hobby-turned-business (Guillebeau, 2017). By some estimates 43 percent of Americans supplement their income using a side hustle (Clark, 2018), it can therefore be considered a life skill. We define the student side hustle as a peer-to-peer business activity alongside the student’s academic work; the student can earn money and/or experience. We adopted a 27-day plan and integrated it into the course content, then paired it with a campus-based marketplace platform, allowing students to start side hustle businesses.
We are not the first use the side hustle as a class exercise. However, the detailed description this paper offers of the learning innovation and its outcomes, is useful for those who want to adopt this practice. There is a lot to like about a side hustle. It is scalable, fun, inclusive and accessible. The best ideas for side hustles come from skills that one’s friends and acquaintances already seek out (Clark, 2018). We call the SSH a ‘stimulation’ (rather than a simulation). Simulations are serious games that can be used to connect theory with practice (Fox et al., 2018). Simulations include business plans, consulting projects, case studies and games that stress uniformity of content and course outcomes (Cowden, 2018; Tanner et al., 2012), and can be quite effective. We use simulations in our strategy capstone and sales courses, with strong outcomes. However, a business owner will likely admit that a simulation won’t keep them up at night, but running a real business will. Hence the stimulation.
In an ‘execution’ course, the venture outcomes are not known (Cowden, 2018). Coming face to face with a customer creates a fire in the belly of the student. Author Diana Kander (2014) calls this feeling “entrepreneurial butterflies,” noting how difficult it is to simulate the entrepreneurial mindset in a traditional classroom exercise. Though a stimulation can retain the semi-structured educational approach of a simulation, the outcomes are real and risks are confronted. The SSH is a scalable addition to the broad genre of active learning approaches that emphasize dual outcomes of an entrepreneurial mindset and new venture creation (Liguori et al., 2018).
In the spring 2020 semester, the coronavirus pandemic sidelined face to face learning at our university for the second half of the semester. Putting the course online was a natural experiment that led to modifications to the SSH, which answers a call to action to document innovations regarding online learning (Liguori & Winkler, 2020). As students saw internships and job offers cancelled, their interest in developing their side hustles increased, which we believe enhanced its effectiveness as a learning innovation. Also, side hustles by their nature feature one’s skill set, and therefore the side hustler identifies with the work (Ashford et al., 2018). Side hustles can be empowering due to the autonomy provided, and the benefits spillover to enrich an employee’s full-time work outcomes (Sessions et al., 2020).
We next describe the SSH with requisite detail for replication. We then share and interpret the evidence of its effectiveness first, for course-specific learning objectives. Then we also present evidence of its effectiveness in service to the broader university entrepreneurship initiative, along five primary areas: scale and scope of projects, connection with the university ecosystem of support, achieving student goals, earning student support for the exercise, and achieving campus community engagement. We follow this by a discussion of opportunities for the exercise beyond this course, lessons learned, and limitations.
Introducing the Student Side Hustle
Side hustles are quite prevalent in the United States as a type of ‘gig’ work within an evolving definition of the workplace (Sessions et al., 2020). Gig work is even more prevalent outside the United States (Katz & Krueger, 2016). The breadth and width of gigs mirrors the proliferation of marketplace platforms that act as enablers, such as Airbnb, Uber or Lyft, Etsy and TaskRabbit. Lessons learned in running one’s own gig or side hustle are valuable and long lasting (Clark, 2018).
1. Where the Learning Innovation Fits at Our School
Our learning innovation is at its heart a process innovation, combining classroom theory, ideation, peer and advisor feedback, paired with the structure provided by author Chris Guillebeau in
The course, introduction to innovation and entrepreneurship, is a 100-level course within an emerging program. We offer a major, minor and a certificate in innovation and entrepreneurship. The introductory course fits within a scaffold of topics and courses. For example, through basic activities of problem/solution fit and solution/market fit including early customer discovery, the course prepares the student for a course at the 200-level, the Lean Startup. But in order to fulfill the vision of our Provost for interdisciplinary programming, the 100-level course must also stand alone, be inclusive of all colleges and class years (no prerequisites), and serve as an elective.
In a pre-Covid-19 pandemic world, this 3-credit course met on Tuesdays and Thursdays, for 75-mimute sessions. The number of students enrolled in the course has typically depended on the room assignment, and is larger in the spring semester than the fall semester. In spring semester of 2020, the course grew to an enrollment of 68 students, and 61 students ultimately completed the course. The course was first offered in the spring of 2017, and the student side hustle was introduced in the spring of 2019. There has been a progression in the development of the SSH. In the spring of 2019, students used the logic and flow of the KANU platform and planned but did not start their side hustles. This is because the KANU marketplace platform was still under development, with a target readiness date of early fall 2019.
We once again refer to Table 1 as we discuss the students in the course. Across semesters, a consistent number of students want to start a business before the beginning of the semester. Compared with Fall 2018 (traditional simulation project), Spring 2019 (side hustle project but no launch) and there was a notable gain in Fall 2019 (side hustle project with launch) in students who said they wanted to start a business, and also who said they intended to continue with their side hustles. We also solicited comments from the students about goals that they had set for their side hustles, and we provide those when we discuss effectiveness of the exercise.
We note the following, about project teams: as in many colleges of business, we believe that student work in a team setting is important to success (in both class and real life), and when the SSH began it was naturally designed as a team exercise. In the fall semester of 2019, 18 student teams started (or, as we say “launched”) their side hustles on campus and began soliciting customers. Before the shift to online learning in the spring semester of 2020, 25 student teams had formed, among the 68 students. However, after the shift away from face-to-face learning, the teams were disbanded by the instructor. This was in interesting development that contributed to our estimate of the effectiveness of the exercise. 61 students completed the course and developed side hustles in spring semester 2020. We share the outcomes from re-working this and some of the other original parameters of the SSH stimulation. These results have likely led to some permanent changes to the design of the project. Next, we provide the requisite detail about the exercise. Then with our discussion section we compare the spring 2020 outcomes with previous semesters and take a thoughtful look at the landscape going forward.
2. Description of the Student Side Hustle Learning Innovation
First, we briefly summarize relevant learning objectives from the course, and describe the marketplace platform. Then we describe how the learning innovation works, provide a few examples. Included in Online Appendix A are details from the syllabus, including a timeline. In Online Appendix B, we include the checklist for final project deliverables. In Online Appendix C, we offer a short form of the learning exercise, and we offer that as an effective way to engage clubs and other groups on campus. Then, as promised earlier, we discuss the results of a natural experiment that occurred in spring semester 2020, under conditions of the pandemic. Finally, we present and discuss the effectiveness of the SSH in service to the broader university entrepreneurship ecosystem along these themes: for the student, the course and broader curriculum, and the university community. We conclude with reflections of how the exercise could be improved, and also extended. The relevant course-specific learning objectives for the first half of the semester (roughly weeks 1–7, to semester break) are described here. These concepts are covered through curriculum that is administered simultaneously to assist in student learning. Textbooks are SCORE materials and Guillebeau’s Identify opportunities for entrepreneurship and innovation in various contexts such as start-ups, corporate, social, and others. Exposure to theories and practices of innovation and entrepreneurship, including the concept of competitive advantage and the Ansoff matrix. Through case studies, podcasts and other sources, gain exposure to of the startup and growth practices of smaller firms, such as HR, marketing, finance, and accounting. Learn, find and use resources available on our campus, and at state and federal levels that support and promote businesses. Apply the principles of peer review, networking and teamwork. The relevant learning objectives for the second half of the semester (roughly weeks 7-15) are described here. These concepts are covered through the use of the SCORE materials and the Guillebeau’s Identify a college business opportunity by solving a problem or addressing a market gap on campus (moving, tutoring, delivery) Share in peer reviews in class in order to help in customer discovery, evaluation of an idea, assess the market, and turn the idea into a business Develop and start (or “launch”) a campus-based “Side Hustle” business for a product or service using the peer to peer (P2P) marketplace app. Evaluate and present outcomes, and integrate market and peer feedback.
3. A Description of the Marketplace Platform
Students are required to execute their side hustles through KANU, the P2P marketplace platform (https://kanu.us/). KANU is available to the entire campus, but it also provides an organizing tool for the multiple student side hustles within a classroom setting. Experts suggest that when starting a side hustle, one should focus on one channel at a time (Clark, 2018). KANU was designed for a campus setting by two of our students. It is available at no cost via the Apple app store in Android and IOS. The platform is geo-fenced for any campus and requires proper .edu credentials for participation. It provides a secure platform for exchanging goods, services and payments. The platform allows the matching of supply and demand, as well as the exchange of money through a Venmo-like system. The benefits of the platform are that it standardizes yet allows customization within posts, allows faculty and peers to track each other and provide timely feedback, and supports feedback through the ratings that are posted by customers. The platform was fully ready by mid semester in the fall 2019 and was immediately integrated into the SSH for students to post their hustles to the platform. After the two semesters, we have taken time to de-brief and share some lessons learned about the platform.
4. How the SSH Works at Our University
The students work through ideation exercises that include exercises such as SCORE worksheets, using the assignment From student to entrepreneur (Lurie, 2007), and an assignment that requires them to choose and discuss five examples of side hustles from sidehustleschool.com called “48 Side Hustles to get you started.” Students pick two that they relate to because they solve a problem that they have, and two that they relate to because it is a skill set that they also have and they could do as a Side Hustle. Finally, they pick one that had never occurred to them, that could be a business. Students list them and describe in a 2-3 sentences each, why they picked them.
Over the next few weeks students apply course concepts and take two full passes at a worksheet called the Idea to Business exercise. This exercise integrates lessons from SCORE materials and the Side Hustle book weeks 1-3, including building an arsenal of ideas, taking a skills inventory, solving customer problems, competitor analysis, pricing, breakeven and the back of the napkin calculation. These worksheets are available upon request from the authors.
For each of these exercises, students seek peer feedback in class workshops, which serve as early stage customer discovery. There is a final, third copy of the worksheet that is due as part of the final project packet (Online Appendix B). It is a lively classroom, and students must come ready to work. At times, the instructor uses a conventional flipped delivery of content followed by in-class work (Bergmann & Sams, 2012), followed by the ‘inside-out classroom flip’ for the side hustle where students take the lead in execution of the exercise (Bliemel, 2014).
A series of brief in-class workshops help to introduce the students to the KANU platform and help them figure out how they would structure their hustles on the platform. Students download the app and play around with it, and see what is already posted on it. We engaged the founders of the platform to help workshop in the classroom, and we plan to record videos and save them in an archive. Students work in the latter part of the semester to get their side hustles onto the platform and start (or, “launch”) them. The side hustles we have seen so far are described next.
By design, a side hustle involves completing requests for discrete goods or services in a matter of minutes or hours (Sessions et al., 2020). The SSH businesses on our campus have broadly fallen into the categories of product or service, with two primary types. One type can be described as in-the-moment hustles, for example, a student is headed to the sandwich shop and posts on the platform that he will pick up and deliver a sandwich for $2 but the offer is only good for 15 minutes, or, a student will post a ride share, but only for this weekend, to a certain location, or, a student lists her longboard for sale. We refer to this type of SSH as episodic. The student side hustle can be a longer term posting on the platform, for example, an ongoing tutoring engagement, a storefront for upcycled clothing, or photography services. We refer to this type of SSH as enduring. For purposes of our SSH class project, the hustles must be enduring. We find wide variations among the hustles, but we see similar broad themes: food, parking, rides, tutoring, student life, and clothing. Once the students activate their side hustles on the platform, we follow author Guillebeau’s guidance for week 4 (“Launch”) and week 5 (“Regroup and refine”), which are to the launch and evaluate outcomes. Here we provide some examples of student side hustles, along with follow up notes:
Example 1, fall 2019. Product: Campus Stickers. This SSH was started by an all-senior team of two animal science majors and one textile design major. They felt they could do a better job than the campus bookstore at designing university stickers that were fun, varied, and colorful. They found a source to print them, adhered to the university trademark rules, and took student orders on the platform. Follow up: One of the animal science majors mentioned the experience on her application to veterinary school; she told me it was brought up in her interview and gave her a nice chance to stand out. The other animal science major was a December graduate, and has also applied to veterinary school. I received an email from her in January, with a note that she had started a side hustle of dog walking in her hometown, while she builds a clientele to extend into a dog training hustle. There were so many exclamation points in her email.
Example 2, fall 2019. Service: Deposit Savers. The two students on this are cousins, and one is a business major and one is in communications. They sought to solve a problem for students who live in off campus housing. They offered a menu of fix-it services for renters that solved the top 1-5 issues that prevented students from getting their full security deposits back upon move-out. They posted their side hustle on the platform and got some jobs right away. Follow up: Based on customer and landlord feedback, this team has grown the idea in spring 2020, to add a service where they perform independent third party inspections of the rental space at the start and end of the lease period.
Example 3, spring 2020. Service: Peer tutoring. Once we transitioned to online learning in March 2020, one of our engineering students started his SSH in order to help peers who needed help. Follow up: this student, a junior, shared with me that he has lined up 3 regular clients for fall semester 2020. He also wrote: This side hustle would help me replace my part time job. I expect to make at least $200 a week; therefore around 2,800 during the first semester. The obstacle would normally be getting the word out that I’m available to help students. However, that shouldn’t be a huge problem with the help of Kanu. This side hustle is also something that I could put in my resume and can help me sharpen up my engineering skills as well.
5. Classroom Visitors, Advisors, Mentors
A final, valuable element to our class work was the engagement of classroom visitors who joined us at key touchpoints in the process of bridging the idea over to a side hustle. Students in general like to have guests in the classroom, and it was not surprise that their comments in end of semester questionnaires about this element were overwhelmingly positive. Alumni acted as our mentors and advisors throughout the SSH exercise. Their roles unfolded as needed, and some ways that they connected with students included classroom visits, in videos of some timely mini-lessons, via Skype-based workshops with students, and by attending the practice for the debrief sessions. In a nod to the popular show ‘Shark Tank’, we branded the final debrief session as the ‘Dolphin Tank’ which signals a kinder, gentler, developmental environment, and we invited the same two guest judges. One is the regional director of the state SBDC, and one is the executive director of our campus innovation launchpad program. In particular these two guest judges have provided valuable insights to the instructor as to the effectiveness of the SSH as it has unfolded across semesters.
6. In the Spring 2020 Semester, a Natural Experiment Unfolded
When the course transitioned to online delivery due to the coronavirus pandemic, the instructor initiated changes. Among the modifications that were made to the content and its delivery, the second exam which is normally given at the end of the semester, was replaced with weekly quizzes. This helped the instructor assess learning and helped to keep students accountable for learning the course content. (Post semester comments by students indicate that they preferred the weekly quizzes to a test.).
Second, class work and the SSH became focused on business strategies under the realities of the low touch economy, as a foundation for the remaining content and activities. Again, post semester feedback indicated that students found this move timely and interesting. The students were told to complete the final project by strategizing what a Fall 2020 side hustle at (our college) on the KANU platform would be, using the assumption that we will be back on campus in Fall 2020, but under the realities of the Low Touch Economy.
Third, the student side hustle became a solo exercise. The outputs were modified slightly, and are detailed in Online Appendix B, including a requirement that each student produce a 2–3 minute video as a de-brief of their SSH. Using the SSH as a solo effort was a move that was being contemplated for a future semester, based on evaluation of outcomes of previous semesters and debriefs with the two guest judges. Also a solo hustle invokes the true spirit of a side hustle, which by definition uses one’s skills and passions (Sessions et al., 2020). Based on the outcomes, this will likely become a permanent change to the exercise for purposes of this course.
The natural experiment during the spring 2020 semester revealed to us that the SSH is versatile, and lends itself to both team ventures and solo ventures. This is an important contribution to our assessment of the effectiveness of this learning innovation. We next discuss additional evidence of effectiveness.
Evidence of Effectiveness
We present early evidence of effectiveness using pre- and post- course questions. As described in this paper, the goals for the SSH were straightforward and modest. We sought to fill a gap in active learning and help our students close the circuit between entrepreneurial thinking and acting (Neck & Greene, 2011). Student feedback has been solicited through end of semester questions about specific elements of the course. Combined with pre and post questions (some of them the same) we asked the students for feedback and other comments (again, Table 1), and we gathered instructor observations. Although this was not part of a pre-planned comprehensive test of effectiveness, we feel the information is valuable in the interpretation of the effectiveness and achievement of outcomes.
We acknowledge that future assessment remains an area for future testing and research. Here we offer a discussion of the effectiveness of the 2019-2020 iterations of the SSH compared with previous semesters’ exercises, where students worked on hypothetical businesses. In addition to achieving course learning outcomes, ‘success’ or ‘effectiveness’ to us means meeting these five outcomes: a realistic student and semester-scaled size of venture, connecting students to the innovation ecosystem on campus and in the state, helping our students achieve their goals for the project, gaining broad support by the students for the SSH, and campus engagement. We discuss our interpretation of the outcomes below.
Outcome 1: Achieving a realistic scale of business. We feel that the SSH is scaled properly to support teaching with practice for a semester, for a student, and within our curriculum. In addition, the scale and scope of the businesses that have emerged are appropriate and the differences from previous semesters are notable. We observed that in past semesters when the assignment is hypothetical, the business ideas that students develop are complicated, and in general could not be executed in a semester’s time. In some cases they are great ideas, but they follow author Tom Clancy’s axiom of, “an overnight success is ten years in the making.”
The professor, classroom mentors and the guest judges agreed that student ideas became more realistic when we took away the hypothetical nature of the assignment. This observation, though not formally measured, serves to provide an informal validation by people who are qualified to judge the notable difference from previous semesters. In an unsolicited email following the fall 2019 semester presentations, the director of innovation for the campus wrote to the professor: Thanks for showing your students how courage in the face of uncertainty can feel. That is at the heart of entrepreneurial thinking and resilience building … … it’s also fun partnering with you as we work to grow the Innovation ecosystem at (school name withheld)!
One interesting thing we observed is that whether it was a side hustle or a hypothetical business, the campus problems that students attempted to solve did not change much. The popular problem categories are parking, food, tutoring, ride sharing and access to upcycled clothing. But the scope and scale of the projects changed with the SSH, as we describe next using a popular project idea that comes up each semester: “solving parking on campus”. We provide two contrasting examples, one from the hypothetical project, and one from the side hustle.
Both these examples won the audience vote as the favorite project in their semester. In the fall semester of 2018, under hypothetical business planning, students devised a solution that involved an app and a series of sensors, timers and gates, along with peak and off peak pricing. It was a great idea, but the scale of the solution was beyond their ability to execute it. We call this the ‘world domination project.’ In fall 2019, using the SSH, one student team tackled and solved just one piece of the parking issue, reducing the number of people that need to park. They devised a ride share board for car-pooling from the town where most students live in off campus housing.
Outcome 2: Connecting students to the university ecosystem of mentoring and support. This outcome serves a student who wants to start a business as well as one who wants to add value as an employee of an innovative business. Our natural experiment in spring semester 2020 showed students that although in a perfect world they would could rely on the KANU platform, could have a side hustle without it. During the summer of 2020, several students started their side hustles from home, in anticipation of being back on campus in the fall. Some did this to replace employment, to reach out to community members, or to get a head start on the fall semester.
As a result of the project becoming a solo pursuit, we untethered the graduating seniors from the campus-based platform in order for them to try their side hustles in place. Three have already launched. This cohort of new alumni was invited to join a series of virtual entrepreneurship lessons and coaching by other alumni through our launch lab. This natural experiment helped us achieve one of our goals of getting students to the starting line of being able to avail themselves of the innovation ecosystem on campus. Another cohort is being formed for the SSH spring 2020 cohort, targeted for the fall of 2020, because over 80 percent of the students intend to launch their side hustles on campus.
Outcome 3: Achieving student goals for the SSH project. In Table 2, we present students’ self-reported goals and follow with brief discussion.
Self-Reported Goals for Side Hustles, According to Primary Themes.
*Large income goal (8), modest income goal (15).
We elaborate briefly: 23 students stated that income is a primary driver of their project. Of those, 8 stated the intention to replace substantial amounts of summer or semester-based income (more than $500). For example, one student wrote, I would like to make extra money on the side on top of working at my job now. I love my job but I don’t make a lot and it would help pay off some of my student debt.
Another student wanted to earn her dues payment for her sorority, about $900. Another said, For one semester I have the goal of making $1,200. I would be doing this to replace the revenue I get from my other job. Commercial fishing is slow in the spring, so I need a way to make more money. However, I believe that everything is a learning experience, and when you can make money while doing it, it makes it even more worth it.
Fifteen students stated a modest income goal for the semester, between $200-500, described as grocery money, pocket money, or spending money.
One benefit of a side hustle is that it can provide training that one can use within full time work (Betts, 2006). 26 students said that their primary goal is the experience of running a business and putting it on their resume (examples include grocery delivery, textbook exchange, photos for linked in profiles, sneaker cleaning), add to their portfolio and their resume (examples include film services for classes, virtual dance classes, becoming the Marie Kondo of dorm organization). Seven others wanted to have fun and use their passion (thrifting, crochet lessons, making custom shot glasses), and additional four had social entrepreneurial aspirations (examples include mask making, and providing care packages for sick students). These answers suggested broad student support for the project, and below we share additional feedback.
Outcome 4: Broad support for the exercise from the students. The students were asked to complete a questionnaire at the end of the semester. One of the questions was: “please provide any comments – good/bad/ugly – about the class, the Side Hustle, whatever else is on your mind.” Below we summarize and provide counts. We then provide examples that are representative of the nature and tone of the comments. In the spring 2020 semester, (after the SSH went from team to a solo project, and the delivery of the course went online as of mid-March) there were 60 responses, and the themes that emerged were: I liked/loved the SSH (24), I liked the SSH, but…(5), I am not a fan of the SSH (1), and miscellaneous compliments or constructive comments about the online course delivery (20), miscellaneous complaints, wistfulness or expressions of frustration about how the spring 2020 semester ended (5), “N/A” (2). In the fall 2019 semester, (when they launched the SH) the same question was asked in the same manner. In the 41 responses, the themes that emerged were: I liked/loved the SSH (25), I liked the SSH, but… (8), I am not a fan of the SSH(0), “N/A” (2).
Example comments from spring 2020 and fall 2019, for ‘I liked/loved the SSH’ are: I really liked the whole side hustle approach when learning business concepts. It is a very relatable way of learning and thinking about what business ideas you could utilize. I enjoyed this class and it allowed me to expand my side hustle. I was so excited to take this class and since the first class you have kept me excited and intrigued about each lesson. I wish I could take this class again. Okay you get the point, stay healthy and enjoy the summer! Great class that I think everyone should take. Apart from the online quizzes I loved the Side Hustle book. This course did help and was VERY informative and I know will be useful for the upcoming years. Thank you. This class was awesome. It really made me believe that I could start my own business. I want to continue to develop my side hustle next semester. It was a super fun project and a great learning curve! I now am constantly thinking of ideas. Awesome class! Made me understand how side hustles work! Very excited to start my own. Beneficial project, especially if you are a freshman. I really enjoyed this class! It opened up my eyes to a lot of aspects about owning a business I have previously never thought about. There are certainly many components to starting and running a successful business, although a lot of it is trial and error. I really enjoyed this and it was really cool being able to plan and start a new business.
Examples from students in spring 2020 and fall 2019 indicating ‘I liked the SSH, but…’: I like the side hustle project I just wished we could’ve continued to collaborate and bounce ideas off someone. (this comment in particular powerfully addressed the changes due to online delivery in spring 2020) I like learning about the business side hustle, I find it interesting and essential to life outside ___, but I am more interested in product design. It was a good experience however, I wasn’t a fan of how reliant on (the platform) it had to be. I do not plan to actually run a laundry business so that may have been misleading in the beginning and should have been addressed from day 1 that you would actually be starting these businesses. I thought the Side Hustle course and project was well thought out and gave the opportunity for us students to take a look into the entrepreneurship part of the business world. I do think that there should be more time spaced out at the end of the semester for the Side Hustle project. More time would give students the chance to be able to dive deeper into the project and get a full experience of what it is like to run the Side Hustle.
c. There was one other observation of note, in the fall of 2019, about teams: Students were required to complete a self-evaluation as well as peer reviews of team members, and these revealed an unexpected positive outcome in Fall 2019. The instructor noted that the SSH exercise seemed to engage team members more than a hypothetical launch ever did. Unlike previous semesters, there were no complaints about team members, and far fewer team issues were reported to the instructor (who checks in regularly with teams) during the fall 2019 semester, nor at the mid and end point peer evaluations.
d. In spring semester of 2019, when it was a hypothetical side hustle, student comments were positive, but overall lacked the energy of the subsequent semesters, and suggested that the project was just that – a project. These six were the only comments out of 26 completed questionnaires.
Personally I didn't feel as invested in my group's idea as I would have liked therefore I would not make a business out of my project. However, the project gave me some tools and foresight into planning and executing an idea I may have in the future.
No but I thought that it was a great experience learning to make a business model based off of a random idea made with 2 other classmates.
Not [starting a side hustle] from my idea, but [from] something else.
My initial business Idea is not to the scale I would like to expand the business at.
I will try to think of something along the lines of my college flower idea, but one that is more different and could therefore be more successful.
Maybe in the future. [I will start the side hustle]
Outcome 5: Campus community engagement. The SSH by design works by identifying and addressing campus-based problems. Students have demonstrated that they can define a problem on campus and solve it, successfully navigating the idea to business divide and using entrepreneurship to transform our campus community (Morris & Liguori, 2016). We note the following in support of campus engagement. The SSH reaches students in the ‘iGen’. iGen is a label applied to the generation who grew up with the internet and the i-phone, as well as individualism (Twenge, 2017). According to Twenge (2017), independent decision-making is a latent skill set for iGens, diminished by over nurturing, protective parenting and fewer siblings to among whom to share parental attention. They are believed to be more risk-averse than previous generations (Twenge, 2017). By nature then, they are not drawn to the uncertainty that is inherent in entrepreneurship (Dobson et al., 2020). A large percent of our undergraduate students are iGens, and the faculty at our university were trained to integrate “iGen thinking” into our course designs and classrooms.
We believe the controlled risk of our stimulation appeals to iGens. The side hustle by its nature is student-scaled, engaging a skillset that is informal, and often hobby-based. The student may have taken the skill for granted, but they can receive market validation in the form of earning income, serving repeat customers and gaining positive ratings on the marketplace app. We did not know how the SSH project would be accepted by students, but they seem to trust the journey. Although they express a range of emotions from fear to excitement throughout the semester (the entrepreneurial butterflies), in the end, they report feeling real accomplishment. The SSH seems to have imparted some life skills through a scalable, do-able venture. b. Inclusion of the campus and state innovation communities to our Dolphin Tank. At the end of the semester, students are required to give a two minute debrief to an audience of peers and invited guests (pre-spring 2020). Having an invited audience raises the stakes for the students and gives them another instance of fire in their belly.
In the fall of 2019, we were joined by deans from all colleges that had a student in the class, as well as our provost, and others in our campus and state innovation ecosystems. The audience votes for their favorite side hustle, using the software program PollEverywhere. Excitement built as the votes came in and we watched on the big screen. The top two teams won bragging rights and t-shirts.
Also, in fall 2019, our university’s president attended and took notes as each team described 18 solutions to campus problems they had defined and had attempted to solve through their side hustle. After the debriefs, our university president reached out to two student teams and shared that their side hustles solved problems in a more elegant way than was under development in the administration. He invited them to discuss ways that their side hustles could become legitimate offerings by the university.
We had invited the same audience for the spring 2020 Dolphin tank, and we had received a fair number of RSVPs by early March, but we had to subsequently notify them about the cancelation of the session. The instructor received a personal note from the university president, expressing his support. Students submitted 2-3 minute individual videos as part of the final packet.
Reflection on Opportunities for Extension, Limitations and Lessons Learned
In positioning our student side hustle stimulation, we offer insights into positioning the concept in hopes that more programs will adopt this learning experience. We have also been delighted by the feedback of peers and other interested parties, who speculate that the SSH and the marketplace can be used beyond our exercise in the introductory course. Overall, we have been encouraged and we have learned valuable lessons through several iterations of the exercise. Because the goals of the SSH exercise within a course and more broadly in the university are modest, we feel that the limitations we have encountered act as challenges and opportunities, rather than fatal flaws. These lessons relate to course design and as well as the KANU marketplace. We discuss each briefly here. Future course design will integrate worked examples. Although we used examples from the companion website for We learned that we need to launch the side hustles earlier in the semester, and in spring 2020, we built a much earlier launch in to the semester (pre-pandemic). An earlier launch will provide valuable time for assessment, evaluation of market strategies, and an increased opportunity to earn peer reviews. We learned how to accommodate graduating seniors, who may not have access to the platform once they graduate. We were pleasantly surprised that the summer of 2020 provided the opportunity for us, to engage our graduating seniors in to our innovation launch lab programming. We would like to formalize that next-step connection in future semesters. Finally, the natural experiment of spring 2020 will be thoughtfully evaluated. Going forward, the SSHs will be likely be solo pursuits. The abrupt switch in spring 2020 to solo work gave us pause as to how to keep students feeling supported while not on a team. Going forward, we will put careful emphasis on the peer workshops that we had already been running in class. One strategy for this would be to assign rotations among students for peer feedback throughout the semester. For example, students with similar themed hustles could be paired up, and then the pairings could be randomized. Limitations and lessons learned about the KANU Platform. The KANU team has been holding regular de-briefs with the instructor to evaluate the pros and cons of the platform. A big positive is the lift that the platform gives to the SSH, stripping away most fixed costs, providing a means for money exchange and peer rating and it allows the student to focus on the task – but it does this in the safety of the community. Also, the structure of the assignment combined with the platform encourages continuation of the side hustle after the semester ends.
Some students resisted using the platform, having come to the class hoping to work on an existing business idea. This issue gave the founders of KANU the opportunity to work with these students in integrating with the platform. For example, some students already had a business and a strong presence on social media sites such as Instagram. Through the KANU platform, they can now create a post that drives traffic to that site and allows them to transact business through KANU. 6. We remain open to learning about unknowns. For example, a peer recently asked what happens in year x + 1 when all many of the ideas are taken? First, market forces will play out. Second, students and hustles will turnover, and maybe we will see that students could actually sell their side hustles or take on junior partners.
Applying, adapting or extending the student side hustle to other contexts.
A comprehensive program that exposes students to the breadth and scope of the application of modern theories of entrepreneurship is more effective than a single course (Kuratko, 1996). Based on feedback from our presentation at a recent academic conference, and subsequent inquiries by a dozen universities and some local high schools, there is interest in adopting the SSH and KANU platform, with or without the curriculum that we are using. Peer feedback also suggests that the applications of the SSH could be broader and deeper than what we have been able to achieve in a short period of time. Other possible applications include use by founders in an accelerator, in a new venture growth class or a micro finance course. Also, in a course such as the Lean Startup, the feedback from the KANU marketplace integrates well into lessons on customer discovery and value propositions. This feedback by peers provides us with yet another measure of the effectiveness of our innovation.
At our own university, we are considering extensions of the side hustle. We have had student interest in continued engagement, as measured for example by two Fall 2019 teams engaging in their projects as independent studies in Spring 2020. We are considering offering a version of other school’s closed courses for venture acceleration (where students apply to get in) (Cowden, 2018), in order to support students who want to grow their ventures. Students from the introduction to innovation and entrepreneurship class are devising additional ways to use side hustles elsewhere on campus, for example, in club or greek life fundraising. The faculty member who developed the SSH learning innovation started a social enterprise side hustle too, in order to give away extra meals that they had prepared, using the platform to address student food insecurity. Another area of interest is hackathon projects, which often end in ideas but not businesses, so connecting the SSH idea with these events on campus might be fruitful. In Online Appendix C, we offer a short form version of the exercise, as an ice breaker or as a means of brainstorming for ideas.
Conclusion
New venture creation can include intrapreneurship as well as entrepreneurship (Kuratko et al., 1990). A strong case has been made for competency-based education and portfolio-building for business students (White, Hertz & Moore, 2016). Approaches that support this include active learning, project-based learning, entrepreneurship as practice, and student self-directed learning (Neck & Corbett, 2018), as well as community building (Morris & Liguori, 2016; Noyes & Linder, 2015). As a state-based land grant university, our mission is to prepare our students to add value to our state and region. “By fostering entrepreneurism, regional universities provide the catalyst for new businesses and a flexible, creative, motivated, and well-educated workforce that will enhance the economic development of the regions they serve” (Harrington & Maysami, 2015, p. 37).
Only a small percent of students starts their own business immediately after graduation (Pathak, 2019), and we need to prepare them for new realities of business life (Lindh & Thorgren, 2016). Our school encourages students to add value through innovation in existing businesses as well as new-to-the world companies whether they take a job, or make a job. For some students that venture is their family’s business. Students who develop a portfolio of outcomes are able to demonstrate competencies (Schindehutte & Morris, 2016). With our execution of the student side hustle exercise, we hope to contribute in a small but meaningful way to the student’s outcomes.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Supplemental Material
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