Do We Need Higher Education to Succeed in Business?

Welcome to The Smarter Brain, a curation of thought-provoking ideas and actionable reads to help you build better habits and become more productive.

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The Smarter Brain Team

Estimated Reading Time: 2 mins

3 Ideas for Better Habits

The Value of Self-Education

An American polymath, inventor, writer, and Founding Father of the United States. Known for his curiosity, practical wisdom, and lifelong commitment to self-education.

“Being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn.”

Source: Poor Richard’s Almanack

Creating Your Own Path

Thiel emphasizes that every business opportunity is different. Rather than following a standard path simply because others have, entrepreneurs need to think independently, recognize opportunities, and develop their own solutions.

“Every moment in business happens only once.”

Source: Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future

Learning Beyond the Classroom

Kaufman argues that understanding essential business principles doesn't necessarily require an expensive formal degree.

“The vast majority of modern business practice requires little more than common sense, simple arithmetic, and knowledge of a few very important ideas and principles.”

Source: The Personal MBA: Master the Art of Business

Productivity Tools and Resources

Do You Need An MBA To Be An Entrepreneur? It Depends

Explores whether an MBA is necessary for entrepreneurship and why the answer depends on your goals, business, and what you need to learn. It challenges the idea that every aspiring founder must follow the same educational path. Read more here.

Do You Need College and Formal Training to Become an Entrepreneur?

Examines the value of formal education, business courses, mentoring, and practical skills. It offers a useful perspective on choosing an educational path that fits the kind of business you want to build. Read more here.

Learn Business

Coursera - Learn business fundamentals, accounting, marketing, entrepreneurship, and management through online courses from universities and other educational institutions. Some courses offer free access to learning materials; certificates may cost extra.

Build a Business

Useful for entrepreneurs who want to launch an online store. Shopify provides tools to manage products, orders, customers, and sales, giving you a practical way to learn e-commerce operations while building a business. Running a store requires a paid plan, although learning resources are available separately.

What We're Reading

Entrepreneur Daily delivers curated business articles, practical advice, and stories about people building companies. Its content explores startup ideas, marketing, leadership, business growth, and the challenges entrepreneurs face. It's useful for readers who want to learn from real business experiences and discover strategies they can apply without relying exclusively on formal business education. The publication also offers newsletters focused on money-making opportunities and entrepreneurial success stories.

Y Combinator shares startup advice, founder insights, and lessons from building early-stage companies. Its newsletter and online resources cover finding customers, developing products, testing business ideas, and growing a startup. It's especially relevant to people wondering whether they need a university degree before becoming entrepreneurs, because it emphasizes practical problem-solving, learning from customers, and taking action. Its resources can help aspiring founders build knowledge while working on real ideas.

Brain Food

Today I Learned: A 2019 systematic review published in the Journal of Economic Surveys examined 21 experimental and quasi-experimental studies on education, business training, and entrepreneurship. It found that formal education had small positive effects on business profits and entrepreneurial earnings, while many other interventions showed no statistically significant effects. (Source)

Science: A separate 2021 study, published in the Journal of Business Research, found that the relationship between higher education and entrepreneurship differed depending on the type and scale of business ownership examined in its Chinese sample. (Source)

Have a productive rest of your week,

The Smarter Brain Team

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