Recent calls to close the rigour-relevance gap in business school education have suggested incorporating principles and ideas from action learning in small business management education. In this paper we discuss how business simulation exercises can be used as a platform to trigger students' learning by providing them with a platform where they can merge theory with practice. We provide theoretical arguments accompanied by illustrations to show how such initiatives can create a more student-centred teaching structure than what is usually practised in contemporary business school education. This may in turn work as a potential bridge between the safe harbour of traditional classroom teaching and the more chaotic and complex world of managerial practice. (Contains 1 table and 3 figures.)