Best practice in building business clinics

Setting up a business clinic in a business school has far-reaching benefits. It can help strengthen the regional skills base, support inclusion and prepare students to be effective and versatile professionals through “learning by doing”.

Liverpool Business School’s (LBS) business, law and accountancy clinics work primarily with small and medium enterprises (SMEs) to integrate community value, learning and outreach activities, directly into teaching. 

Here we share our experience and the experiences of 25 other participants from five countries via the National Centre for Entrepreneurship in Education (NCEE) Symposium in 2024 hosted by LBS.

Business clinic strategy

1. Build a shared institutional understanding and strategic commitment to the business clinic aims and objectives to create a supportive and collaborative environment. Align and refine the clinic’s offerings with your business school’s strengths, desired outcomes for students and local needs. Whether it's expertise in finance, law, marketing, policymaking or digital transformation, ensure the clinic reflects what the school does best, to enhance credibility and ensure high-quality support for clients.

2. You must decide whether to embed business clinic projects in the curriculum or make the clinic extracurricular. This decision is foundational, so consider:

• Embedding business clinic activities into the curriculum may facilitate funding from the university and workload allocation of staff.
• Extracurricular models can be challenging, particularly in funding and staffing. One participant in the symposium reported a challenge getting buy-in from staff. 
• Business clinics moving from extracurricular to embedded core modules may need to deal with students who do not want to be there. Students who opt in to extracurricular projects are more likely to be motivated. 

3. Forge partnerships with local charities, special interest groups, chambers of commerce, government agencies, business development centres and financial institutions. These community partners can provide referrals, resources and support to both the clinic and the organisations it serves.

• Spotlight guide: Getting students workplace-ready
• Ways to cultivate an entrepreneurial mindset in students
• Spotlight guide: Why knowledge exchange is important for universities

Position the clinic as a go-to hub for SME and third sector organisations by creating co-branded events or workshops. Use digital marketing, social media and networking events to raise awareness. Recruit a mix of experienced faculty and industry professionals with drive and enthusiasm to serve as mentors. Their practical knowledge will complement academic expertise, ensuring the clinic provides actionable and relevant advice.

4. From the start, set clear, measurable goals for the clinic’s impact on students, clients and the school. Track success stories, SME growth and student learning and employability outcomes. This data will help secure future funding and demonstrate the clinic’s value.

Build a student-centric experience

1. Help students make links between academic theories and real-world practice so they can apply their classroom knowledge during live projects. This means working and reflecting on dynamic consultancy processes and techniques, options appraisals, critical thinking, problem solving, creativity, listening skills and innovation. 

2. Experiential learning requires ongoing dialogue, shared knowledge and understanding which involves clients, academic staff, students, business mentors and potentially AI. It differs from a more standard independent project which concludes with a presentation of findings.

3. The students’ level of study and disciplinary background is a crucial factor influencing the outputs and client expectations. Master’s-level projects are typically at a higher level of analytical depth including, for example, advanced market analyses. When clients engage it is essential to communicate in advance the disciplinary background, clearly delineating the capabilities and achievements expected from the students.

4. Unengaged students failing to produce a consultancy report for a client are likely to cause dissatisfaction with the service. For these students, internal projects sourced from within the university can be assigned to minimise any risk to the institution or client relations. 

Establish effective mentors

1. Identify who can best support and guide students in the business clinic setting. This should be based on supporting real-life projects and facilitating the quality and depth of reflection on the learning experience.

2. Designated mentors must play a crucial role in ensuring the feasibility of students’ proposed business ideas and solutions, thereby enhancing the quality assurance process. 

3. Offering a mix of short-term consultations, mini-internships and longer-term projects to balance student schedules with both the curriculum and client organisation needs, can be of value to all stakeholders.

Manage and meet client expectations

1. SMEs asked to provide disproportionate guidance may disengage with the process. Therefore, students must be effectively mentored by an academic or additional business consultant, to ensure optimal value for the student, while generating tangible benefits for the business. Delivering value is likely to mean repeat business and maintaining employer satisfaction with students’ accomplishments. 

2. Managing client expectations in terms of results is pivotal for ensuring client satisfaction with the project outcomes. 

Topics covered here and experiences of working with mentors, structuring project briefs, dealing with conflict in a project team, group assessments, ground rules and team contracts are expanded in the full NCEE report which can be found here. 

Track Dinning is associate dean, education, and deputy director of Liverpool Business School, Liverpool John Moores University.

Liverpool Business School is shortlisted for Business School of the Year at the Times Higher Education Awards 2024 #THEAwards. A full list of shortlisted candidates can be found here. 

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This video will cover:

00:05 What is a business clinic and why is it worthwhile

01:20 How to prepare students to take part in a business clinic project

02:19 How to ensure business clinic projects work for everyone involved

A business clinic is centred on experiential learning, where students apply academic theories to real world challenges. It goes beyond applying concepts. Students reflect on how conceptual models function in practice, refining their approaches based on client needs. This ensures students gain a deeper understanding of how theory translates into solutions. Businesses benefit from fresh perspectives and established models. 

The clinic supports Liverpool Business School's vision of shaping a better future by fostering sustainable business practices and employability. Strengthening the connection between theory and practice through these engagements, students not only enhance their professional skills but also contribute directly to the success of the business community

A business clinic transitions students from theory to practice. They act as junior consultants, gaining real world experience that boosts employability. Businesses receive fresh ideas while developing future talent. For us as a university, the business clinic strengthens our commitment to community impact and curriculum development. By involving students in practical projects, the clinic fosters a deeper understanding of how learning can drive innovation and support regional growth.

Industry specialist mentors support students by connecting academic theory to business needs. They're often local and have taken part in previous clinic projects or have connections with the university already. They could be marketing specialists, project managers, or those with experience of scaling up a business or refining business operations and processes. 

Students arrange themselves into their own teams before a business clinic project is assigned. Team sizes vary between four and six members. Teamwork is key and, while it's not always smooth, guidance tutors help students navigate challenges, fostering collaboration and critical thinking. 

Students actively shape the direction of the project and are accountable for the outcomes. We've found creating a team contract helps set expectations for working together, preparing students for working in diverse teams and building important skills. This step also encourages students to take ownership of their contributions, preparing them for future professional environments.  

It's essential to be clear, this is a free business clinic, not consultancy. We work with businesses to define the project scope, ensuring both students and clients benefit. This aligns with our vision of being an engaged business school, delivering measurable value to the community and enhanced learning experiences for students. Regular communication ensures these partnerships succeed, providing businesses with timely and relevant insights. 

It is important to have a support structure in place to manage the daily administration of the business clinic projects and maintain and grow client relationships. So, a clinic needs staff buy-in, commitment and funding in order to function. 

We've learned over the years that this clinical experiential learning requires ongoing dialogue and shared knowledge between clients, academic staff, students and industry mentors. We learned early on to put the teamwork contract in place to address unengaged students and dissatisfied clients. 

Our approach has drawn on two decades of experience including insights from our own research and development. More recently, a symposium hosted by the National Centre for Entrepreneurship in Education, and led by our own Dr Track Dinning, saw 25 academics from five countries create a best practice guide. 

Our business clinic model is now being adopted by international partners, extending the global reach of our approach. The model's success shows how adaptability and collaboration have been key to its growth. 

It is crucial to align the business clinic with your institution's priorities. For us, we support small businesses and third sector organisations in line with the regional growth plan. Clinics enhance student employability while making a lasting impact on the community. 

Strong internal support ensures these initiatives are sustainable. Embedding the business clinic into the wider curriculum also ensures its sustainability, aligning it with long-term educational goals. 

In closing, the business clinic model at Liverpool Business School has proven to be a powerful tool for shaping a better future, providing students with meaningful experiential learning and delivering real impact to the business community, supporting our mission as an inclusive civic university.