SUMMARY

The WEFI Fellows program currently consists of 11 Ph.D. students interested in pursuing research in entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial finance, and innovation. The group meets virtually with Mike Ewens bi-weekly for approximately 9 months out of the year (excluding Jan-Feb and a summer month). Meetings include student presentations of new ideas, practice job talks, mock interviews, and idea pitches.

Why?

The primary goals are to help students — particularly those at schools without multiple faculty in entrepreneurship and innovation — refine their dissertation topic, learn more about the research area and build their network of fellow Ph.D. students. The small field and limited advisors are partially consequences of the research area itself: it is often interdisciplinary or pursued by researchers trained in different areas. Though many have successfully written a dissertation in this environment, the lack of seminar speakers, student colleagues working on similar topics and advisors with direct experience in the literature can leave them at a disadvantage or worse, stop them from pursuing certain topics1