On the afternoon of September 16, Dr. Qihai Huang, Head of the Institute for Entrepreneurship & Enterprise Development, Lancaster University Management School, came to visit our school at the invitation of the Department of Business Administration, the Economics and Management School of Wuhan University, and gave a masterly academic report for our students and teachers at a symposium presided by Professor Yan Ruosen, Dean of the Department of Business Administration.

Dr. Qihai Huang first introduced the specialties of Lancaster University Management School, and its cooperative programs with Chinese universities. Then he gave a lecture titled “The Change and Development of Entrepreneurial Networks”, discussing the dynamic evolution of entrepreneurs’ social networks during the entrepreneurial process. Using the structural, relational and spatial dimensions of networks, he analyzed network changes at three stages relating to the generation of ideas, the development of products and commercialization respectively. His report helped us understand changes in social networks and relevant effects caused during the entrepreneurial process. At the end of the symposium, students and teachers present raised a succession of questions, questing opinions and advice from Dr. Huang concerning issues like research methodologies and the publication of papers.

Lancaster University is one of the UK’s top ten universities, and its Management School is also among the top ten. Dr. Qihai Huang graduated from Peking University and the University of Bristol in Britain successively, and is currently a Reader and the Head of the Institute for Entrepreneurship & Enterprise Development, at Lancaster University Management School. His research focuses on the use of both qualitative and quantitative methods in entrepreneurship and human resource management.