Ali Hasan
When you’re into entrepreneurship, you have to deal with a lot of aspects of starting and running a business such as:-
- Operations
- Marketing and Sales
- Accounting and Finance
- Legal and Compliance
- Human Resource
- Executive Decision Making
While you might be good at many aspects of running a business, you wouldn’t be perfect in many things. New or first generation entrepreneurs face this problem a lot as they don’t come from a family where the parents teach their kids about business. In fact, many parents teach their kids against starting a business and ask them to simply get a stable 9-5 job instead.
When an aspiring entrepreneur doesn’t have the necessary skills and competence, he will try to educate himself through Google, YouTube or books and I have done this for the past 3-4 years. Today, I will be sharing my experience with you and I will point out the mistakes that you should completely avoid when self educating yourself for anything as self education has its disadvantages as well.
First we will discuss about the pros of self education which are as follows:-
- Free content – The first and foremost advantage of self education is that most of the content is completely free of cost. Today we are living in the information age and anybody can access almost anything from the internet, even our privacy (sad but true).
If you want to learn any skill, then you can learn it for free. You just have to go to Google and YouTube and you’ll be on your way to add another skill in your arsenal. Let’s say that you have to learn Digital Marketing, so you can go to the internet and learn it for free or even with a paid course.
Now we have so many platforms that have both free as well as paid courses that can teach you almost everything. The paid courses aren’t very expensive but good enough to educate you about the basics to get started.
Some of the platforms where you can learn almost anything are as follows:-
Note – We aren’t sponsored by anyone (cries in corner).
- Choice of choosing a medium – When we said that we are in the information age, we meant it. Today there are so many ways to learn a skill that it makes it quite easy for each and every one of us to learn according to our desire. Today you can learn from books, videos, magazines, newspapers, newsletters, journals, documentaries, articles, blogs, interviews and much more.
If you don’t like reading books, then you can watch videos. If you don’t like newspapers, then you can watch an interview of a CEO that manages a billion dollar company. In short in today’s time, you have the luxury to learn a skill in your way and don’t have to rely on just a single source of information. Today there are millions of opportunities if you want to learn anything.
- Custom and Tailor-made – You don’t just have the luxury of free content or choosing a medium to learn, you also have the luxury of specific courses that are almost tailor made for your skill and competence.
For example, if you’re a beginner, then there’s a course for you. If you’re on an intermediate level, then there’s a course for you and if you’re an expert but want to hone your skill to the fullest, even then there’s a course for you. In short, you’ll never feel bored or disinterested just because the course is either too hard or too easy for you. So, more power to you if you want to learn anything on any level.
While these were the advantages, there are some disadvantages as well which are as follows:-
- Quality Issues – While there is ample information on the internet, all the information isn’t true or verified. Since almost anybody can start a blog or a YouTube channel, there isn’t a body or an organization to moderate or control what is being posted on the internet.
This gives the freedom to the common people to post whatever they want to post. Almost anyone can voice his/her opinion on the internet even if it’s unscientific. Just remember that there are many people who still believe that the earth is flat (that’s for you, flat earthers).
On the other hand, there are a lot of genuine people making quality content but this means that it’s your responsibility to ensure that the content which you’re consuming is true and helpful to you. Before buying any course you should try to do a background check about the credibility of the organization or person from where you’re buying a course.
- Scamming – Building on the previous point, there are many people who are selling their low quality courses on how to get rich in a few months at high prices and they are making money out of your pocket.
The internet is a dual edged sword as scammers prey on the weak and young. If you want to get rich in a short span of time and you’re quite ambitious, then they will show you a big dream where you’ll have almost anything and everything that you desire. Nowadays scammers are scamming people in the name of Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency, so beware.
Once I was reading a blog on the internet about building muscle. After reading for a few seconds, I closed that blog as it was claiming that you can gain an inch of biceps in just a day by doing 900 reps. An inch of biceps gain in just a day, that’s simply bullshit.
I was young and wanted to look like my idol Arnold Schwarzenegger but I still had my senses intact and I closed that blog after deciding that it’s sheer bullshit. But what about the few percentage of young boys who might have attempted to do this to look like their idol or maybe, impress girls?
This is the dark side of the internet as scammers exactly know where to hit you in order to get your money. They know the psychological aspect of human desires and this makes you prone to a scam. This makes self education a bit problematic.
There’s a quote and I like it a lot “It doesn’t matter what you learn, what truly matters is who you’re learning from”. Hence, always learn from someone who inspires you and you want to be like them.
- Implementation is Difficult – If you’re thinking that pursuing a 3 month course will help you achieve your dream job or make you rich in just a few years, then you’re highly mistaken. The problem with self education is that it will only provide you with a path and any information or knowledge acquired by you will only help you if you apply the knowledge.
You can read millions of books, watch millions of videos or attend many conferences but all of it won’t help you even a bit if you don’t help yourself. When people sell you a course or recommend you a book, they don’t tell you that even after gaining knowledge, it will be tough for you as almost everyone has access to the same information.
What will truly separate you from the crowd is your ability to execute and implement your ideas and convert them into reality. Today, there are millions of people who have billion dollar ideas to make them rich but how many of them are actually rich?
If an idea had the potential to make you rich then every person with an internet connection would have been rich by now but that isn’t the case. An idea is a billion dollar idea only after its made a billion dollar in profits. Until then, it’s merely a concept. I have to admit that I made the mistake of thinking that self education alone will make me rich but now I know how big of a fool I was.
I think self education is extremely important and you should try to educate yourself until your death but at the same time, you should also know that knowledge and information won’t take you anywhere if you don’t apply what you learn.
There is a quote from a book that I highly recommend. The book is Unscripted by MJ DeMarco and the quote is “An ounce of action is worth a ton of theory”. To put things in perspective, an ounce is only 28.35 grams whereas a ton is about 1,000 kilos. Now you might get the entire picture. There’s one more book by the author named The Millionaire Fastlane. Do read both of them and apply some knowledge into your life to become a better entrepreneur.
The Impact of Self Education
We live in an era where the internet has democratized most of the things that were simply reserved for the rich like:-
- Starting a business – Now you can start a business with just a website and a little bit of SEO to get started.
- Becoming Famous – Now almost everyone and anyone can become a celebrity with the help of social media. Just one video can make you viral and you’re the next big thing.
- Education – While there are many things that were reserved for the rich such as higher education at the prestigious ivy leagues universities, the internet has democratized this luxury as a necessity. Now you can learn anything for free. After the pandemic, various universities have suffered huge losses and some might even go bankrupt because many students now prefer to skip college in order to save themselves from student debt. This is where self education comes handy and saves the day for you.
Remember the world can be your playground if you can create enough value. Hence, keep educating and keep growing but be a little careful while doing that. We wish you all the best for your future.
