College Can't Teach Successful Entrepreneurship But it Has Other Benefits
You don't need to go to college to become a successful entrepreneur, there's no arguing that most business millionaire success stories don't come from college graduates, but those who dropped out or never went to college at all. Learning to become an entrepreneur starts with working with or watching others who've built successful products and services. The smallest hustle or hobby backed by a determined person can grow into six figure thousands or multi-million dollar empires right from an internet enabled PC or home garage. These success stories have become very common in the Millenium Generation, those born in the late 1980's and early 1990's.
Young entrepreneurs are apprentices, they observe, learn, and brainstorm new ideas very quickly independent of a college curriculum. A college curriculum is not and has never been the source of hugely successful young entrepreneurs. You learn how to run a successful start-up business by working with people who know how to build companies, rather than from reading college text books and hearing lectures. Today most entrepreneurs gain ideas and information through the internet, special business focused television programs, and networking with other entrepreneurs.
Though more colleges are encouraging and supporting the pursuit of young entrepreneurship, there's no scientific evidence to support studying entrepreneurship in college creates better or more successful entrepreneurs.
But this is no reason to skip college. If given the opportunity and time to go to college, do it! It's not the main breeding ground for entrepreneurs, but a higher education and degree will make it much easier to get hired to work somewhere that gives you access to successful and established entrepreneurs or people in positions to invest money into your start-up business or idea.
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Good entrepreneurs are a very unique breed of people. They will struggle with ideas and businesses for a very long time and still don't give up. Even when people think they're failures they still keep going. That's how Thomas Edison and Henry Ford were. Edison failed more than eight times trying before he got the light bulb to work, and Ford was taken to court to prove that someone like him without a college education wasn't as intelligent and knowledgeable as the lawyers putting him on trial. But they both proved everybody wrong. Thomas Edison did get the light bulb to work and made a fortune from it, and Henry Ford proved to the court and world that because he didn't have a college education that didn't mean he couldn't invent the world's first automobile which he did. In fact they tried to prove that he was mentally crazy for trying to do something like making a horseless carriage. He proved them wrong. So basically entrepreneurs see success in things most of us never will because we wouldn't want to spend time going out of the way and out of the norm to be successful.
My dad never spent a day in college but he managed to start a successful real estate business and it's been making lots of money for the past 20 years. He taught me everything he knew and did to be successful and now I'm doing the similar things in real estate. Even with the bad US economy I've made a pretty decent profit and now I'm doing online videos to give others advice on how to do it correctly.
From experience, I've found that it's a good idea to align yourself with success minded people or people who believe in what you're doing. Entrepreneurs especially young ones need to hear positive encouragement about their business endeavers, and this is where I think being in a college environment might be an advantage to anyone trying to create the next successful product or service. In college everybody is trying to reach a goal, whether it's graduating to work in business or become a doctor or lawyer, so you have people constantly striving to be something successful. College may not teach you how to be a better entrepreneur, but it's full of people who will serve as positive mental and moral encouragement. Part of becoming wealthy and successful is being in the right environment as often as possible. The things you see and hear everyday greatly affect your drive and motivation. Young entrepreneurs outside of a higher learning environment have to struggle more to block out negative vibes from family members who might not understand what they're doing or constantly hear things like "why don't just get a job." Those entrepreneurs have to hustle a little harder and focus more in my opinion.
I used to live on the infamous Southside of Chicago and life there isn't easy. My mom was on public assistance and going to school everyday for me was sort of like taking a trip into the unknown, you just never knew what to expect from people in the neighborhood. We got out recently thanks to a program from the Government for Moms who want to start their own businesses. She started a daycare with the help of my grandmother and my aunt and believe it or not because of how much people knew her and trusted her in the neighborhood where we lived she actually started making a decent income. In high school I studied a lot about business and starting your own especially using the internet to get your idea out there and get customer and support. I started a social media fan page and blog and pretty much every popular free online marketing tool you could think of. She makes enough money to get of the public assistance and I actually help to manage the marketing part of her little business. I'm hoping to get a bigger word out about what we're doing and get us into a better and safer place where we can focus on building the brand of her daycare business. It's not everyday entrepreneurs come out of the Southside of Chicago, but when they do it's a big deal. People like Farrah Gray the young "Reallionaire" motivational speaker did. When I saw him on Good Morning America about 2 years ago I knew being in the Southside wasn't an excuse to not succeed even though we were surrounded by a pretty bad environment. Positive thinking goes a long way for entrepreneurs and hustlers. Anybody who gets into business to make a quick buck won't make it, it takes planning, drive and determination, and working with the right people to succeed financially or otherwise.
No doubt most education systems are not designed to produce entrepreneurs, but rather people who learn specific skills to work for others. What's more surprising is that most people don't want to be entrepreneurs, they would rather much more have something cut and prepared for them to apply their skills in exchange for money. There's too much work and responsibility associated with it. Most people are conditioned from kindergarden to pursue a career ambition that leads to employment subject to rules and policies of companies. The entrepreneurial spirit is fueled by desire, drive, and perseverance, and without these basic traits anyone who aspires to become a successful entrepreneur won't get very far. Most give up because they don't see results right away. That's not what hustling is about. You keep trying and trying. Each time if something doesn't work, just learn what you did wrong and revise your plan or business strategy. This is what entrepreneurs do and this can't be taught in a classroom unfortunately, it takes trial and errors. If it wasn't for entrepreneurs and risk takers, human beings and most of our technology and medical science wouldn't get very far.
You definitely don't need college to be a successful business owner. The most successful and richest people in the America never went to college or did go and dropped out to turn their business idea into reality. Think of Bill Gates, Michael Dell, Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, and the list go on and on. none of these people graduated college. Don't get me wrong, you need to go to college for certain 9 to 5 professions, I wouldn't trust my heart surgery to my local mechanic but a certified and trained surgeon instead. Business and entrepreneurship is a whole different story though, college can't teach these things, you either have the drive to start a business and see it through, and learn real world success and failure, or you simply do what most others do, settle for the 9 to 5 rat race working their entire lives for a company.
Any good entrepreneur young or old know that the secret to becoming successful is hustling and being everywhere you can be to connect with the right people to get exposure for your business startup. Always have a few good ideas on reserve to throw at the wall to see what sticks with people and what doesn't. A good entrepreneur will try many things and fail at many but keep revising their original idea until it's near perfect.