When I look back, I wasted so much of my time behind the walls of educational institutions. 5 years — primary school3 years — elementary school4 years — high school 4 years — bachelor’s degree university2 years — master’s degree= 18 years!That’s a shocking number to me. I’m not saying that all of those years were wasted. Of course, there were times I enjoyed the learnings. That’s not the main point.The question here is did I have to wait 25 years to finally get to a point that I can pull up my sleeves and get involved in the process of bringing new ideas to life in real settings?You see, I'm a firm believer in the “learn by doing” mantra. Knowledge without practical experience of actually applying it to solve real problems is of no weight for me. It doesn’t stick.So you may say how about fields that require knowing a lot of information such as nanotechnology or bioengineering? There are certain fields which I’d like to call as hard science. Yes, of course, you need to commit to years of learning the theory to be able to create something new in such fields.What I refer to is the creative fields such as design, coding, management, and entrepreneurship. What I’d argue is that for such fields, you really don’t need so much education. And instead, you need more hard-earned practical experiences.Imagine I would have skipped my bachelor’s and master’s degrees all together and then jumped into an internship in the field of human-computer interaction.
By the age of 30, I’d have 10 years of experience instead of 4 years. I have a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering, a master's in innovation and sustainable development. I worked most of my career in the startup world as a UX designer. So as you can see, I’ve jumped between fields quite a lot. Out of all of my experiences, the most satisfying form of work has been entrepreneurship for me. Entrepreneurship is the most ultimate creative game you can play so to speak.
Entrepreneurship is a fantastic real-life educational program. It comes with all sorts of hardships. There are no course books. The program revolves around challenges.Depending on where you're in your journey, it offers you a unique set of challenges. It usually starts with:
- Market research & understanding your competition
Soon it asks you to
- Learn about business models and create one for your venture
Then it poses a new challenge.
- Marketing, branding, and communication: how to get the market HOT ???? about what you offer
- Then you need to get your head around website & UX design
As soon as you hit $, comes a new challenge
- Accounting and setting up company structure etc.
Then you stabilize revenue,
- There comes the topic of scaling your operation
???? Personal development, organizational processes, team management, and culture-building
- Then when you get to a point that you can actually invest in new ideas either as a continuation of what you’ve started or a completely new brand.
All along this path, you get to meet interesting people who are committed, driven and use their creativity in such novel ways. You learn about friendship, partnership, negotiation, honesty, and integrity. You learn to work in teams. ???? Invaluable education all for freeAll you need is the willingness to learn, do the work, and stick to itAnd there may be a reward on the other side of the wall:???? Financial freedom ????So please tell me which university can offer you such a priceless curriculum?This post is for all of you who are in the trenches laying the foundation for the future ❤️Check out our The Business of Design article for more tips and advice.Join our growing community of startups and product innovators: Design Thinking and Innovation – Only Workshops