O Jogo de Empresas no Processo de Aprendizagem em Administração: o Discurso Coletivo de Alunos

Abstract

This paper aims to analyze the perception students have about the meaning of business games in the managementlearning process. Business games are as useful in the academic environment as they are in the commercialenvironment, as they offer simulated experience of business situations and associated decision-making. Researchthat proves the validity of such games as an educational practice able to add knowledge to management trainingand contribute a meaningful learning experience is still incipient. Thus, this research was undertaken with 72students from undergraduate and specialization courses in Management and related areas who have taken part inbusiness games. The collected data was analyzed, qualitatively and quantitatively, using the Collective SubjectSpeech (CSS) method, developed by Lefevre and Lefevre (2003, 2005). What emerged is that the meaning of thebusiness games for the students is related to its contributions to the management learning process. Some factorswere identified as the main contributions: (a) the aid in developing decision-making skills, an integralcharacteristic of management roles; (b) the simulated experience of business activities; (c) the development ofinterpersonal abilities for teamwork; and (d) the application of knowledge acquired during Management courses.

Keywords

• learning process
• business games
• collective subject speech.