Building AI enhanced entrepreneur training for young immigrants

Researchers Giuggioli and Pellegrini (2023) conducted a thorough literature review of 60 academic articles on the relationship between entrepreneurship and AI. They found that AI is a strong enabler for entrepreneurs and demonstrated AI’s profound implications on entrepreneurship. AI enables entrepreneurs create new opportunities, make better predictions and decisions, and improve the performance of their company.

As part of the Upbeat project, a recent survey shed light on the needs and aspirations of young immigrant entrepreneurs in Finland. The survey helped the project team co-create an AI focused entrepreneurship training course for young newcomers to Finland and Estonia.

Survey results enriching target group understanding

The Finnish part of the Upbeat survey was disseminated through project partner StartUp Refugees, as well as Haaga-Helia’s networks. Of the 63 respondents, 27 were in the intended target group of 16–29-year-olds.

Most respondents originated from Ukraine and lived in Finland for the past 1–3 years. Most respondents were students (81 %), and their education level varied between secondary education (41%), bachelor’s degree (26 %) and vocational training (22 %).

The most popular sectors for starting a business were creative industries, food and beverages, hospitality, retail, beauty and cosmetic services, technology and education. Most respondents reported proficient IT skills, and also listed entrepreneurial strengths as customer understanding, communication skills, leadership abilities and content creation.

When asked about their primary training needs, the respondents highlighted financial management, business planning, taxation and legal issues, marketing and sales as well as proficient Finnish language skills. This is backed up by StartUp Refugees’ analysis of over 200 applications for their entrepreneurship course, which also emphasises practical steps for starting a business, mentorship and consultation, networking opportunities and industry-specific support.

Most respondents were on some level interested in applying AI in entrepreneurship, thus confirming the intended approach to focus on applying AI tools to a variety of business development tasks.

Customer-focused curriculum design

Our survey also addressed the practical issues of entrepreneurship training. As the attempt is to make the training as accessible as possible, it is of importance to understand the participants’ schedules and expectations.

One interesting finding was that the respondents had very different preferences to the length of the training period. Almost equally popular were 1-2 weeks, one month and three months. Most respondents preferred a hybrid course format with both in person and online components. The most suitable time for the training was in the evenings.

The primary pedagogical method for developing entrepreneurial mindset supports the integrated learning approach, which includes practical elements such as learning logs, projects, case studies, brainstorming, prototyping and testing, personal reflections, self-directed assignments, and ideation exercises.

The Upbeat project’s survey provided a clear roadmap for designing an entrepreneurship training program. After analysing the results, the first draft of the curriculum for the training was designed at Haaga-Helia. The draft was further co-designed with the other project partners StartUp Refugees and Estonian Refugees Council at a workshop in Tallinn in November 2024.

Picture: Project partners at the co-designing workshop in Tallinn, November 2024. (Upbeat team)

A diversely co-designed training starts in April 2025

The co-designed curriculum consists of the following.

• Pre-training onboarding materials
• Skill assessments
• An online kick off meeting
• Two half day onsite training sessions
• Two half day online training sessions
• Onsite or online coaching

The training session topics are divided into four themes: Understanding AI basics, AI for business planning, Business prompting and AI for business success.

Haaga-Helia is responsible for the branding of the course, and making all training materials, including additional materials on the learning platform. We also build the tailored AI tools and train the StartUp Refugees and Estonian Refugee Council’s trainers, who will deliver the actual trainings in Helsinki and Tallinn. The expected number of participants will be about 60 students divided between the two countries and two batches.

At Haaga-Helia we involve students in the development activities of the project. One group of marketing students has designed the name and brand of the training course. Another group has made industry-specific training materials intended for the young target group. An individual international business student helps the project team plan and carry out user-based testing of the AI tools created in the project.

All entrepreneurship training course assignments and practical experiments with AI tools are still to be co-designed with the trainers, utilizing their individual skills and preferences. The trainings will begin in both countries mid-April and finish by the end of May. The second batch is scheduled for late Autumn 2025.

As the findings of the survey and the user-based testing are translated into actionable programs, the Upbeat project continues to inspire and support entrepreneurs in their journey toward success.

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