BA (Hons) Business and Entrepreneurship Course

Entry Requirements 2025/26

Standard Entry

112 UCAS Tariff points

From a combination of acceptable Level 3 qualifications which may include: A-level, BTEC Diplomas/Extended Diplomas, Scottish and Irish Highers, Access to HE Diplomas, or the International Baccalaureate.

Find out how many points your qualifications are worth by using the UCAS Tariff calculator: www.ucas.com/ucas/tariff-calculator

Northumbria University is committed to supporting all individuals to achieve their ambitions. We have a range of schemes and alternative offers to make sure as many individuals as possible are given an opportunity to study at our University regardless of personal circumstances or background. To find out more, review our Northumbria Entry Requirement Essential Information page for further details www.northumbria.ac.uk/entryrequirementsinfo

Subject Requirements:

There are no specific subject requirements for this course.

GCSE Requirements:

Applicants will need Maths and English Language at minimum grade 4/C, or equivalents.

Additional Requirements:

There are no additional requirements for this course.

International Qualifications:

We welcome applicants with a range of qualifications which may not match those shown above.

If you have qualifications from outside the UK, find out what you need by visiting www.northumbria.ac.uk/yourcountry

English Language Requirements:

International applicants shoud have a minimum overall IELTS (Academic) score of 6.0 with 5.5 in each component (or an approved equivalent*).

*The university accepts a large number of UK and International Qualifications in place of IELTS. You can find details of acceptable tests and the required grades in our English Language section: www.northumbria.ac.uk/englishqualifications

Fees and Funding 2025/26 Entry

UK Fee in Year 1: £9,535

* You should expect to pay tuition fees for every year of study. The University may increase fees in the second and subsequent years of your course at our discretion in line with any inflationary or other uplift, as decided by the UK Government, up to the maximum amount for fees permitted by UK law or regulation for that academic year. To give students an indication of the likely scale of any future increase, the UK government has recently suggested that increases may be linked to RPIX ( Retail Price Index excluding mortgage interest payments)

International Fee in Year 1: £20,950

Please see the main Funding Pages for 25/26 scholarship information.

ADDITIONAL COSTS

There are no Additional Costs

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Modules Overview 2025/26

Modules

Module information is indicative and is reviewed annually therefore may be subject to change. Applicants will be informed if there are any changes.

Year one Year two Year three Year four

Year one

AF4038 -

Financial Decision Making (Core,20 Credits)

You will learn how financial information can be used to assist managers and external user groups in their decision-making processes. You will initially look at the informational needs of outside user groups, the nature of the information they are provided with, and how this information can be analysed and interpreted in order to enhance the effectiveness of their decision making.

Topic areas will include:

• The reporting frameworks and ethical principles that underpin financial reporting
• The nature of international financial reporting standards
• Format and content of the statement of profit or loss and statement of financial position
• The statement of cash flows
• Analysis and interpretation of financial statements using ratio analysis

You will then examine how financial information can facilitate managers in making operational decisions in relation to planning and control.

Topic areas will include:

• Costing (full and variable costing)
• Cost, volume, profit analysis
• Relevant costs for decision making
• Budgeting and variance analysis
• Balance scorecards
• Working capital management

Finally, you will explore the motivations for entrepreneurial activity and techniques that can be used to appraise investment decisions.

Topic areas will include:

• Investment appraisal techniques (payback, accounting rate of return, net present value and internal rate of return)
• Practical aspects of investment appraisal (inflation and capital rationing)
• Risk and uncertainty

More information

GA4001 -

Academic Language Skills for Newcastle Business School (Core – for International and EU students only,0 Credits)

Academic skills when studying away from your home country can differ due to cultural and language differences in teaching and assessment practices. This module is designed to support your transition in the use and practice of technical language and subject specific skills around assessments and teaching provision in your chosen subject. The overall aim of this module is to develop your abilities to read and study effectively for academic purposes; to develop your skills in analysing and using source material in seminars and academic writing and to develop your use and application of language and communications skills to a higher level.

The topics you will cover on the module include:

• Understanding assignment briefs and exam questions.
• Developing academic writing skills, including citation, paraphrasing, and summarising.
• Practising ‘critical reading’ and ‘critical writing’
• Planning and structuring academic assignments (e.g. essays, reports and presentations).
• Avoiding academic misconduct and gaining credit by using academic sources and referencing effectively.
• Listening skills for lectures.
• Speaking in seminar presentations.
• Presenting your ideas
• Giving discipline-related academic presentations, experiencing peer observation, and receiving formative feedback.
• Speed reading techniques.
• Developing self-reflection skills.

More information

HR9409 -

Preparing for Professional Practice (Core,20 Credits)

Your programme aims to ensure that you are learners for business, not just of business, upon graduation. This module starts you on this journey by supporting your professional development. It aims to increase your awareness of and sensitivity to personal and employability/entrepreneurship/enterprise skills. It does this by focusing on programme-specific graduate career opportunities that require you to work on projects similar to those that graduates within your field will undertake once in employment. You are taking an experiential, team-focussed, project/problem-based approach. The module will support you in identifying and developing the essential skills, behaviours, and understanding required to sustainably and responsibly manage organisations and their people. These might include generic areas such as leadership, project management, management, resilience, empathy and professional judgment, and discipline-specific capabilities.
You will use this understanding to evaluate, practise, develop and re-evaluate your capabilities in these skills, behaviours and acumen areas, enabling you to build your own graduate identity. This approach underpins your successful future employability, entrepreneurship or enterprise activity. In addition, the activities provide you with authentic insights into the importance and challenges of team-working within organisations as you work to address real organisations’ issues.
Learner/team-led, tutor-guided sessions aim to support you in enhancing your employability and upon building your graduate identity. During the practical development of the key attributes and behaviours central to your future success within your chosen profession within a project-based environment, you will receive support from the programme team. In addition, by documenting and reflecting upon your progress towards achieving your own team defined KPIs, you will enhance your skills, behaviours, capabilities, and understanding.
In short, at the end of this module, you will:
• Have an understanding and increased awareness of, and sensitivity to, those personal skills and attributes which are central to your future employability in your chosen profession or future entrepreneurial or enterprise activity
• Be better prepared to understand the skills and qualities required by graduates in your field to secure future employment or engage in enterprise activity
Have practical experience of working on a real-life business project appropriate to your programme area, improving your project management, research, employability and collaboration skills

More information

HR9412 -

Business, Economy and Society (Core,20 Credits)

Governments and society are increasingly expecting business organisations to step up and assist in building cohesive societies through the application of more sustainable forms of capitalism. This module introduces you to the global economic, societal, technological and environmental challenges of the 21st century, and identifies how, through greater alignment of business interest with that of society and the economy, business can be a “force for good” as well as best prepared to ‘Take on Tomorrow’. You will focus on how contemporary businesses, broadly defined to include public, voluntary, not-for-profit and social enterprise, interact the economy and society though examination of topical news stories and events. In doing so, you will develop a deep understanding of the relationships between business, the economy and society and the global challenges we all face. You will explore a range of cultural, governmental and ethical issues that arise from current and developing global and national contexts through the lens of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Key issues include business ethics, the role of business in society, green issues, stakeholder theory, capitalist variants, the nature of globalisation at firm, economic and societal level and the interrelationship between business and government. By the end of the module you will be able to evidence critical thinking and analysis skills while bringing your own experiences as a citizen into your discussion and inquiry.

More information

MK9414 -

Introduction to Marketing (Core,20 Credits)

This module will introduce you to the business philosophy and practice of marketing. It will examine how organisations can analyse and segment markets to improve performance and profitability by building long-term relationships with their customers. A wide range of marketing decisions is studied together with the influence of the changing marketing environment on these decisions.

Main lectures will introduce the basic theories of marketing:
• The Marketing Environment
• Consumer & Organisational Behaviour
• Target Marketing & Segmentation.
• Marketing Information Systems & Research.
• Dimensions of a Product, Branding and Product Life Cycle.
• Pricing Theory; strategies and tactics.
• The Promotional Mix: Advertising, PR, Direct & e-Marketing.
• Marketing channels

Whilst seminars and topical lectures will apply marketing theory to different case scenarios:
• Service Marketing
• Not for profit Marketing
• Food marketing
• Digital Marketing
• Environmental Marketing
• Sustainable Marketing

More information

SM9413 -

Introduction to Entrepreneurship (Core,20 Credits)

This module introduces you to entrepreneurial thinking and action and provides opportunities to create, develop and test new entrepreneurial ideas. The module reviews the importance of entrepreneurship for society and provides opportunities to learn from others. The module introduces you to a range of thinking and supports you in developing and testing out new ideas – and importantly, communicating the value of these ideas. Specifically, you will learn about value creation, entrepreneurial identity and entrepreneurial thinking and action. You will learn about the basics of developing and testing the viability of your ideas.

More information

SM9414 -

Student Enterprise: Building a Venture Team (Core,20 Credits)

This module is the key to your entrepreneurial learning in your first year. The module supports you to develop your ideas and entrepreneurial mindset through team learning. You will work in coaching teams and with support from your Team Coach you and your peers will work on integrating learning from your other Level 4 modules to support you to test and develop ideas which will build your entrepreneurial skills. Combined with this is the all programme activities which support your entrepreneurial and team learning, through a residential and Bootcamp as well as student led enterprise events.

You will use developing your own trading business or by working on enterprising type activities such as through entrepreneurial societies to tests out your learning in a practical setting.

This module is self-directed so you and your peers will direct your own learning in coaching sessions by drawing in learning and topics form your other level 4 modules. With support from your team Coach however some of the topics you may cover are;

Team formation topics (from all programme activities)

How to develop effective communication
How to develop effective venture teams
What is coaching and how to get the most from a coaching environment

Venture development Topics (From Introduction to Entrepreneurship, Financial Decision making and Introduction to Marketing)
How to come up with business ideas
Ideation
Business model canvas
Lean start up
Market research
Developing a cashflow
Writing a marketing plan

Team development Topics (From Business, Economy and Society and Preparing for Professional Practice)
Developing a social enterprise
Team building and communication
Reflective learning

More information

Year two

SM9536 -

Creativity and Innovation (Core,20 Credits)

In this module you will gain a comprehensive understanding of the nature and practice of creativity and innovation and how it can be applied, whether within the context of a new venture or an existing organisation. The module will cover theories relating to innovation and its management within a strategic management context. This will be combined with an introduction to processes of stimulating creativity in a variety of business contexts. The module will seek to facilitate the development of practical skills to promote creative thinking through practice-based elements in which real world problems are introduced for the testing of creative teamworking techniques.
Specific topics will include:

Innovation in a strategic context:
What is innovation, innovation and industrial dynamics, innovation strategy, disruptive innovation

The process of innovation and creativity:
Models of innovation process, sources of innovation, open innovation, innovation management, creativity, design thinking.

The creative environment:
The creative organisation, creative industries, creative class, creative places

Innovation and creativity policy:
Innovation systems and clusters, promoting creative places

More information

SM9537 -

Born Global Enterprise (Optional,20 Credits)

Some enterprises are ‘born global’ – they operate internationally from the start. Such companies stand out because of the way, speed and scale they gain presence, revenues and market share in several countries simultaneously. They differ not only in their strategic and operational ambition, but also in the way their founders learn, make decisions and use networks creating powerful alliances.

This module will help you gain knowledge and understanding of ‘born global’ firms, their key characteristics, how they are launched and developed. Using case studies, you will also learn about internationalization strategies and learning processes of born globals. You will use your learning to develop a launch plan for a born global startup in your chosen industry.

The topics you will study will draw from the following themes:
• Born global firms: definitions, examples, characteristics, types
• Born global firms: case studies
• International Entrepreneurship: speed, scale and patterns
• Strategies for international success
• Thinking differently: learning processes of born global and their founders
• Use of networks and alliances
• Dilemmas: rapid growth vs control trade-off
• Planning to launch a ‘born global’ startup

More information

SM9538 -

Business Research and Analysis (Core,20 Credits)

This module focuses on ways to conduct independent research, together with the key academic skills of analysis, synthesis and criticality. You will be able to learn about processes and practices of conducting research from the initial idea to reporting results as well as understand the purpose of the research projects. The module examines the principles of research design before progressing to a more detailed treatment of data collection and analysis. You will be challenged to develop research ideas and critique existing literature primarily from academic sources. You will gain an understanding of various means of undertaking a research enquiry specifically to provide insights to solving a relevant problem, including activities as defining hypothesis/research questions, designing research objectives and research design that involves also budgetary limitations, primary and secondary data collection, research methods, and structuring of the final results.

More information

SM9540 -

Entrepreneurial Management (Core,20 Credits)

Successful entrepreneurship requires a broad understanding of management processes and techniques ranging from finance to strategy, HR and organisational behaviour. This module provides you with an overview of key management techniques and ideas which will be useful in your future entrepreneurial career. You will learn some basic concepts from a range of management disciplines with a focus on essential skills and their application in the entrepreneurial business.

Topics will include the following:

Foundations of strategic management
Entrepreneurial finance
HRM for new businesses
Organisational culture in the entrepreneurial business

More information

SM9542 -

International Digital Economy (Optional,20 Credits)

This module aims to provide you with the knowledge and skills to understand how the emergence of the digital economy has created opportunities and challenges for international business. The module is delivered through lectures and seminars.

The module will cover the following issues:

• The scale and scope of electronic commerce
• Digital infrastructures
• Digitalisation and international business
• International institutions and the digital economy
• Transnational businesses and national governance structures
• International digital platforms

Through this module you will gain skills enabling you to analyse the growth and developing of the international digital economy. On completing the module, you will appreciate the scale, scope and dynamism of the international digital economy.

More information

SM9543 -

Recognising Entrepreneurial Opportunities (Optional,20 Credits)

This module will help you to better understand how entrepreneurs identify opportunities

The module explores two phases of the opportunity recognition process: generation and assessment. Within a spirit of research, we will be led by what interests us at the time, however this will include an exploration of: key philosophical debates (and why these matter to your process); necessary individual and firm level attributes (using intention and orientation models); sources of entrepreneurial opportunities; socialising the opportunity; subjective value and types of value; shadow opportunities; and timing of opportunity.

More information

SM9552 -

Entrepreneurship Theory (Core,20 Credits)

The module focuses on The Entrepreneur and the Role of Entrepreneurship Theory.

It will develop your learning from Introduction to Entrepreneurship [insert module code] in year one. It is also the module which will help you to decide, through a process of self-analysis, whether you want to take the venture start-up pathway (2) or follow the more theoretical pathway (1). You will learn how each phase and stage of venture creation and start-up is underpinned by rigorous applied entrepreneurship theory.

It will increase your capacity to think on your feet and be innovative; it will develop your life-long learning skills and your self-awareness and teach strategies to develop your psychological resources, such as hope and resilience. By the end of the module students will have developed a start-up venture which they can deliver at the Entrepreneurship EXPO.

Additionally, you will learn you how to create and participate in action learning sets which form the bedrock of the start-up pathway, and decide whether this more experiential approach to learning is right for you.

Through this module you will learn about:
• Different conceptualisations of success in entrepreneurship
• The difference between being an entrepreneur and being enterprising
• phases/stage of in new venture creation
• The psychology of entrepreneurship
• o Ideation
o Feasibility
o Market research
o Competitor analysis
o Forms of venture finance
o Brand development
o Financial planning and costing
• Tolerance of uncertainty, ambiguity, risk and failure
• Learning theory and learning styles
• How to create, lead and manage action learning sets

More information

SM9553 -

Student Enterprise: Developing a Venture Team (Core,20 Credits)

This module is the key to your entrepreneurial learning in your second year. The module supports you to develop and grow your venture and enterprising activities through continuing your self-directed approach to learning in a team setting.

You will do this by continuing to work in your coaching team and apply a self-directed approach to your learning. You and your peers will work on growing your ideas by continuing to integrate learning from your other modules. By doing this you will be working on developing your entrepreneurial mindset as well as your ventures or activities. We will also support you to get your venture ready in order to take the Student Enterprise Placement year if you wish.

You will continue to contribute to the all programme activities using this to develop your leadership capabilities.

This module is self-directed so you and your peers will direct your own learning in coaching sessions with support from your team Coach however some of the topics you may cover are;

Venture Development Topics (from Entrepreneurial Management, Entrepreneurial Theory and Creativity and Innovation)
Sale processes
Marketing campaigns
Growth strategies, models and theories
Growing sales through customer relationship management
Operations and logistics

Venture growth topics (From Business Research and Analysis)
Managing customer data for business growth
Marketing and sales for growth

There are several activities which you will take part in across the year, some will be other cohorts on the programme
Bootcamp
Student led enterprise events

More information

Year three

ML5029 -

Placement Abroad (assistantship) (Optional,120 Credits)

You will focus on experiential learning to enable you to develop your linguistic and employability skills whilst immersed in the culture of the host country as an integral part of this module. The placement abroad provides you with the opportunity to develop your oral and written communicative competence in French or Spanish. Living and studying or working abroad will enable you to further develop your understanding of the business, economic, political, social and cultural environment of a French or Spanish-speaking country.

The module aims to enable you to apply your linguistic competences (speaking, listening, reading, and writing) in a working environment. You will extend your knowledge of more complex lexical and syntactical structures of the French or Spanish language appropriate to the business and social environment of a wide variety of sectors and disciplines. You will have the opportunity to apply this knowledge and skills to increasingly complex situations as well as develop as an autonomous learner.

More information

NX9525 -

Newcastle Business School Work Placement Year (Optional,120 Credits)

The Work Placement Year module is a full year 120 credit module available on degree courses which include a work placement year which is taken as an additional year of study between levels 5 and 6. The placement consists of 48 weeks of full time work experience in a host organisation which is relevant to your studies.

The placement is an important element of your course structure and it will provide you with the opportunity to:

• Experience the environment of a real workplace which will help you decide the type of career you would like to follow after graduation
• Develop your organisational and interpersonal skills required to enable you to work efficiently as a member of a team
• Acquire and develop relevant technical skills associated with the nature of your work
• Identify, analyse and discuss with experienced practitioners how theoretical concepts are adapted and applied to suit practical requirements
• Apply knowledge that will help you to plan and evaluate future study and career development.

This is a Pass/Fail module and so does not contribute to your degree classification. When taken and passed, however, the Placement Year is recognised in your transcript as a 120 credit Work Placement Module and on your degree certificate in the format “Degree title (with Work Placement Year)”. The learning and teaching on your placement will be recorded in the training agreement signed by you, the placement provider, and the University.

More information

NX9526 -

Newcastle Business School Study Abroad Year (Optional,120 Credits)

The Study Abroad Year module is a full year 120 credit module which is available on degree courses which include a study abroad year which is taken as an additional year of study between levels 5 and 6. You will undertake a year abroad at a partner university equivalent to 120 UK credits.

The study abroad placement is an important element of your course structure and gives you access to modules from your discipline taught in a different learning culture and so broadens your overall experience of learning. At the end of the module you will have adapted to and appreciated a different cultural and learning environment and developed ability. You will have developed your interpersonal and intercultural communication skills as a result of your learning in an international environment.

This is a Pass/Fail module and so does not contribute to your degree classification. When taken and passed, however, the Study Abroad Year is recognised in your transcript as a 120 credit Study Abroad Module and on your degree certificate in the format “Degree title (with Study Abroad Year)”. The learning and teaching on your study abroad placement will be dependent on the partner and will be recorded in the learning agreement signed by you, the host University, and the University.

More information

NX9528 -

Newcastle Business School Blended Placement Year: Work Placement Semester (Optional,60 Credits)

The Work Placement Semester module is a semester long 60 credit module which is available on degree courses which include the option to take a blended placement year of Work and Study Abroad which is taken as an additional year of study between levels 5 and 6.

On this module you will undertake a semester long work placement. The placement consists of a period of full time work experience in a host organisation equivalent to a full semester of study which is relevant to your studies.

The placement is an important element of your course structure and it will provide you with the opportunity to:

• Experience the environment of a real workplace which will help you decide the type of career you would like to follow after graduation
• Develop your organisational and interpersonal skills required to enable you to work efficiently as a member of a team
• Acquire and develop relevant technical skills associated with the nature of your work
• Identify, analyse and discuss with experienced practitioners how theoretical concepts are adapted and applied to suit practical requirements
• Apply knowledge that will help you to plan and evaluate future study and career development.

This is a Pass/Fail module and so does not contribute to your degree classification. When taken and passed, however, the Placement Year is recognised in your transcript as a 60 credit Work Placement Module. The learning and teaching on your placement will be recorded in the training agreement signed by you, the placement provider, and the University. Combining this with the study abroad semester as part of the third year out of the University, this will be recognised on your degree certificate in the format “Degree title (with Study Abroad and Work Placement Year)”.

More information

NX9529 -

Newcastle Business School Blended Placement Year: Study Abroad Semester (Optional,60 Credits)

The Study Abroad Semester module is a semester long 60 credit module which is available on degree courses which include the option to take a blended placement year of Work and Study Abroad which is taken as an additional year of study between levels 5 and 6.

You will undertake a semester abroad at a partner university equivalent to 60 UK credits.

The study abroad placement is an important element of your course structure and gives you access to modules from your discipline taught in a different learning culture and so broadens your overall experience of learning. When taken and passed the study abroad semester will be recognised in your transcript as a 60 credit Study Abroad Module. The learning and teaching on your study abroad placement will be dependent on the partner and will be recorded in the learning agreement signed by you, the host University, and the University. Combining this with the work placement semester as part of the third year out of the University, this will be recognised on your degree certificate in the format “Degree title (with Study Abroad and Work Placement Year)”.

More information

SM9550 -

Business Start Up Placement Year (Optional,120 Credits)

The business start-up year is a full year 120 credit module available on BA (Hons) Entrepreneurship. It is taken as an additional year between levels 5 and 6 and gives you an opportunity to focus on and run your business venture.

The placement consists of 48 weeks of running your own business, supported by the university.

This experience year is an important element of your course structure and it will provide you with the opportunity to develop and test your business ideas, and decide whether self-employment, running a business or entrepreneurship is the path you want to take on graduating or in the future. It will also provide you with a rich variety of learning experiences which will enhance and feed into your final year when you return.

This is a Pass/Fail module and so does not contribute to your degree classification. However, when taken and passed, the business start-up year is recognised in your transcript as a 120 credit Work Placement Module and on your degree certificate in the format "BA (Hons) (with Work Placement Year)". The learning and teaching on your placement will be recorded in the training agreement signed by you, your assigned university mentor, and the University.

More information

Year four

NX9624 -

Management Enquiry (Optional,40 Credits)

The Management Enquiry module is a student-led individual project that enables you to undertake a significant piece of assessed work commensurate with a capstone module. The module aims to provide you with an opportunity to demonstrate an authentic engagement with managers and/or professionals in your discipline, and to integrate the knowledge you have developed during your programme to explore the theory in practice. The learning on this module is experiential and problem based, where the focus is upon you discovering, probing and questioning key practice-based issues. Through the module you will be offered the opportunity to develop and enhance key transferable employability skills including; time management, project management, communication (written, aural and verbal), negotiation, persuasion and influence, discovery, initiative, problem-solving and analysis.

The module has five thematic areas; explore, review, engage, reflect and connect. These form the key elements of the assessed submission.

Part A (35%, 3,500 Words)
• Explore: Interviewing a manager and/or professional in your discipline. In this interview you will either explore a key issue which you feel the discipline is facing or, alternatively, explore with the manager or professional the key issues that they feel they are facing in practice. It is expected that you will apply appropriate interview methods and provide evidence of the interview within the submitted enquiry report (e.g. within the appendices).
• Review: Critically examining the appropriate literature to support the exploration, displaying an ability to critically assess and appraise the knowledge of your discipline related to a specific key issue arising from your exploration.

Part B (65%, 6,500 Words)
• Engage: Displaying an authentic engagement with the discipline problem/issue identified in Part A, by collecting/generating and analysing further live data (beyond the initial interview) regarding the discipline problem/issue. This live data may be primary data (e.g. further interviews with, or questionnaire to, managers and/or professionals in practice) or secondary data (e.g. industry data). Application of appropriate, ethically-considered, research methods and appropriate qualitative or quantitative data analysis.
• Reflect and Connect: Demonstrating an ability to critically evaluate and reflect on the issues arising from the Management Enquiry. Demonstrating how you have connected and fed-back to the participants of the Enquiry (usually the manager and/or participants) your key findings to provide clear prioritised, well-justified, practical and actionable recommendations for change/enhancement/improvement to existing practice to show how the recommendations would potentially affect workplace professional decision making.

More information

NX9625 -

Dissertation (Optional,40 Credits)

The dissertation module aims to equip you with the necessary intellectual and practical skills for undertaking an individual student-led, ethical investigation into an applied business (or the named degree) problem or issue. In addition, the dissertation aims to equip you with key transferable, employability skills, including: time management, project management, communication (written and verbal), negotiation, persuasion and influence, discovery, initiative, creativity and innovation in problem-solving, analysis.

The module is student-led but you are supported by, initially, weekly lectures and seminar-workshops which provide an introduction to undertaking Business-Management research followed by one-to-one or small-group supervision meetings.
The lectures and seminar-workshops will cover the following topics:
1. Developing a research aim/question (focusing and scoping the research)
2. Developing a literature review
3. Writing a research proposal
4. Researching ethically
5. Quantitative research techniques
6. Qualitative research techniques
7. Quantitative analysis techniques
8. Qualitative analysis techniques

Upon completion of the module you will be able to:
1. Conduct independent and ethical academic research involving the application and critical evaluation of appropriate theories and models,
2. Engage critically with relevant literature to establish a framework in which to analyse and synthesise the results of your primary or secondary research
3. Generate / collect relevant primary or secondary data using an appropriate and justified method
4. Analyse your data using an appropriate and justified method of analysis
5. Recognise the ethical implications of your work
6. Critically evaluate the source of your data and the method you adopted

More information

NX9626 -

Undergraduate Consultancy Project (Optional,40 Credits)

The module aims to provide you with an opportunity to integrate the knowledge acquired during the programme and apply this to a consultancy project for a real organisation. This consultancy project provides a vehicle for participants to develop and demonstrate key employability skills, to relate theory to practice, and to undertake a significant piece of assessed work commensurate with a capstone module.

You will work on behalf of an external organisation, which has identified a business problem or question, requiring a solution, working in small group of typically 4 individuals (you will select their own team members), participating in group and individual activities. The host organisation will provide a project briefing, and review; students will be supported by appropriate academic input and guidance from Newcastle Business School in the form of a mentor and via the Business Clinic.

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SM9640 -

Digital Entrepreneurship (Optional,20 Credits)

This module aims to provide you with the knowledge and skills to understand the start-up and development of companies operating within digital markets. The module is delivered through lectures and seminars.

The module will cover the following issues:

• The growth and scope of e-commerce
• Business models for digital enterprises
• Digital platforms
• Management within digital markets
• Competition within digital markets
• Public policy and regulatory implications

Through this module you will gain skills enabling you to analyse the growth and developing of digital entrepreneurial activities. On completing the module, you will understand how companies grow and appreciate the dynamic and complex nature of the relationship between the digital enterprise and its wider context.

More information

SM9642 -

Entrepreneurial Ecosystems and Policy (Optional,20 Credits)

This module focuses on the external context for entrepreneurial businesses and the design and implementation of public policy to stimulate levels of entrepreneurship. You will therefore learn how entrepreneurial success at the level of a country or region can be shaped by the external environment and how governments are seeking to encourage and support entrepreneurship. An entrepreneurial ecosystem is ‘a set of interconnected entrepreneurial actors (both potential and existing), entrepreneurial organisations, institutions and entrepreneurial processes which formally and informally coalesce to connect, mediate and govern the performance within the local entrepreneurial environment’ (Mason and Brown, 2014). You will explore the nature of these elements and their combination in different contexts as a means to understand the differences in levels of entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial behaviour in different places. Examples will be provided of successful and less developed locations, and the local policy responses.

Specific topics will include:
Definitions and elements in entrepreneurial ecosystems
The role of institutions such as universities, finance capital etc
Measuring entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurship policies
Entrepreneurship in metropolitan contexts
High tech enterprise and university spin offs
Rural enterprise
Entrepreneurship policy in developing countries

More information

SM9643 -

Family Business Studies (Optional,20 Credits)

This module will introduce students to all aspects of family business studies. It will cover seminal issues including the evolution of family businesses and differing interpretations of family business including the distinction between family and non-family business. The role of family businesses worldwide and how they operate in different socioeconomic, political and cultural contexts. Drivers of longevity in family business including succession planning/management, next-generation engagement, innovation, transgenerational issues (such as transmission of skills), change management and entrepreneurship. Finally, there will be special focus areas such as: emotions in family business (including socioemotional wealth); values in family business (including governance and CSR); family business strategy and competitive advantage (including Resource-Based View); and the function family business history (including identity creation/maintenance, branding and impression management).

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SM9650 -

Business Ethics for International Management (Optional,20 Credits)

You will develop an understanding of moral philosophy and be able to apply these intellectual frameworks in the context of various contemporary issues in international business. In doing so, you will be able to identify the taken for granted assumptions and logics which shape practices in international business and critically evaluate their veracity. This will enable you to better apply you own independent critical thought in situations where conflicts arise and therefore require a degree of negotiation, for example in issues such as executive pay, philanthropy, workplace rights, climate change, privacy or modern slavery.

Whether developing organisational policy, representing the organisation in the media or making agreements with a range of multinational organisational stakeholders, you will be required to anticipate and plan for objections and to identify weaknesses and contradictions in your own arguments, thereby enabling you to better manage ethical conflict at work. .

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SM9654 -

Contemporary Issues in Entrepreneurship (Core,20 Credits)

This module offers an opportunity to develop an understanding of and interest in contemporary issues in entrepreneurship.

The word “entrepreneurship” has evolved over recent years and the term now covers a diverse range of social and economic actors, processes and situations. Entrepreneurship as an academic domain has exploded in diverse ways. This module aims to introduce you to some of the key themes of contemporary entrepreneurship research. The content will be flexible in order to showcase the current, leading-edge research interests of faculty and will have three broad themes:

Entrepreneurial performance and growth: Consideration of the links between economic and entrepreneurial performance, and lessons for growth, prosperity, economic policy and job creation. Possible topics will include creative/rural industries entrepreneurship, small business creation and development, innovation, incubation and networks, supporting small business, and SME finance and venture capital.
Entrepreneurial actors: Consideration of the person of the entrepreneur and entrepreneurial behaviours as well as socioeconomic dimensions such as labour markets, demography and entrepreneurial heterogeneity. Possible topics will include gender, entrepreneurship, social, community and ethnic entrepreneurship, management and leadership skills development and growth issues.
Entrepreneurial frameworks: Consideration of entrepreneurship theoretical frameworks and the ethics of entrepreneurship, as well as the impact of culture (organisational, regional, national and international) including entrepreneurship education and training. Possible topics will include entrepreneurial learning and entrepreneurship education, sustainability and environmental issues, and entrepreneurial philanthropy.

On completion of the module, you will be able to demonstrate critical thinking skills and oral & written communication skills.

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SM9691 -

Student Enterprise: Leading a Venture (Core,20 Credits)

This module brings together all your entrepreneurial learning to support your future plans. The module will support you to understanding your own entrepreneurial effectiveness by how you have lead a venture or taken a leadership role in enterprising activities. You and your peers will work on understanding your own entrepreneurial effectiveness by integrating learning from your time on the programme and thinking about your future plans and thus a focus on how you, your venture or your enterprising activities need to develop before you graduate to support your future career. If you have decided to take a more enterprising career again you will focus on understanding how you need to develop your leadership capabilities for graduate success. You will do this by continuing to work in your coaching team and being supported by a Team Coach.

You will take a leadership role in the all programme events and supports on the programme to develop their entrepreneurial learning.

This module is self-directed so you and your peers will direct your own learning in coaching sessions with support from your team Coach however some of the topics you may cover are;

Sustaining a venture (From Digital Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneurial eco-systems and Policy
Securing finance for business growth
Running an ethically and socially responsible business
Hiring and employing staff
Professionalising your business
Legal and financial issues of sustaining a business
Options of closing a business

There are several activities which you will take part in across the year, some will be other cohorts on the programme

Bootcamp
Student led enterprise events

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Modules Overview 2026/27

Modules

Module information is indicative and is reviewed annually therefore may be subject to change. Applicants will be informed if there are any changes.

Year one Year two Year three Year four

Year one

AF4038 -

Financial Decision Making (Core,20 Credits)

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GA4001 -

Academic Language Skills for Newcastle Business School (Core – for International and EU students only,0 Credits)

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HR9409 -

Preparing for Professional Practice (Core,20 Credits)

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HR9412 -

Business, Economy and Society (Core,20 Credits)

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MK9414 -

Introduction to Marketing (Core,20 Credits)

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SM9413 -

Introduction to Entrepreneurship (Core,20 Credits)

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SM9414 -

Student Enterprise: Building a Venture Team (Core,20 Credits)

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Year two

SM9536 -

Creativity and Innovation (Core,20 Credits)

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SM9537 -

Born Global Enterprise (Optional,20 Credits)

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SM9538 -

Business Research and Analysis (Core,20 Credits)

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SM9540 -

Entrepreneurial Management (Core,20 Credits)

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SM9542 -

International Digital Economy (Optional,20 Credits)

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SM9543 -

Recognising Entrepreneurial Opportunities (Optional,20 Credits)

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SM9552 -

Entrepreneurship Theory (Core,20 Credits)

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SM9553 -

Student Enterprise: Developing a Venture Team (Core,20 Credits)

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Year three

ML5029 -

Placement Abroad (assistantship) (Optional,120 Credits)

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NX9525 -

Newcastle Business School Work Placement Year (Optional,120 Credits)

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NX9526 -

Newcastle Business School Study Abroad Year (Optional,120 Credits)

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NX9528 -

Newcastle Business School Blended Placement Year: Work Placement Semester (Optional,60 Credits)

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NX9529 -

Newcastle Business School Blended Placement Year: Study Abroad Semester (Optional,60 Credits)

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SM9550 -

Business Start Up Placement Year (Optional,120 Credits)

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Year four

NX9624 -

Management Enquiry (Optional,40 Credits)

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NX9625 -

Dissertation (Optional,40 Credits)

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NX9626 -

Undergraduate Consultancy Project (Optional,40 Credits)

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SM9640 -

Digital Entrepreneurship (Optional,20 Credits)

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SM9642 -

Entrepreneurial Ecosystems and Policy (Optional,20 Credits)

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SM9643 -

Family Business Studies (Optional,20 Credits)

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SM9650 -

Business Ethics for International Management (Optional,20 Credits)

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SM9654 -

Contemporary Issues in Entrepreneurship (Core,20 Credits)

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SM9691 -

Student Enterprise: Leading a Venture (Core,20 Credits)

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To start your application, simply select the month you would like to start your course.