If you plan to start a small business, it is best to learn the “hard skills” in college, such as engineering, programming, design, biotech, even the fundamental sciences like chemistry or physics, although you plan to start a totally unrelated business. This is so that you’ll develop a scientific, methodical, data-driven approach to your business. This will give you a competitive edge in your business, because many people come into business fully believing in their “gut feeling” or “intuition”.

The “business” element (accounting, finance, etc) of a small business is trivial and can be learned as you go, by reading or by experience.

If you plan to start big (for example, getting a RM100 million financing to create the next AirAsia), then definitely you’ll need a proper business education because then your business decisions will have great impact on your company.

The latter category is quite rare but is not unheard of. I know some people my age who run businesses worth more than RM 25 million. But most people learn business from the ground up, and you do not need a formal business education to start and run a small business. It’s all common sense and smart planning.

I am not knocking MBAs, though. A few people in Aidan is working on their MBA, and I am fully supportive of their effort. But one must understand the reason to get an MBA. If the reason is “to while away two years overseas and get a master’s degree from a foreign university” then the time is better spent working. If you need MBA to help you in business (learn how to market effectively, learn about finance, investment, risk, etc) then definitely go for it.

What I wished I knew earlier?
When I started, I knew a little bit of accounting, because I used to work in a large financial company. But small business finance is different. I learned about managing small business finance by books and by talking to my accountant. I wished I had known more programming, though. I did learn a few programming languages like C++ and OcamL on my own, but I am a little rusty on both.

Say I were to start my own biz in future, do u think it necessary to go and major in something like ‘entrepreneurship’ in Uni, or, any biz major would do fine, or its all just common sense(like in your case?).

Also, is there any skills that you wished u had when starting your biz? Like maybe web design, accounting or maybe even more languages?

Akmal,
People think that using jargons and obfuscations will make them sound smart. It may look like that to the average guy on the street, but for people who know better, bullshit is bullshit.

Hafiz,
Dari tulis atas tapak tangan, baik tulis atas WACOM(TM) Graphic Tablet.

Lorraine,
B-school is necessary, e.g. to network (although I suspect if this is the case, because many people who were sent to B-School overseas and came back to Malaysia never actually do business with their former classmates. So where is the “networking” part?)

B-School is useful to learn the hard skills, e.g., financial analysis, investment valuations, risk management, M&A, supply chain management, etc. Many people, unfortunately, came out of B-School with no further skills than the ability to bullshit / razzle-dazzle people with big business-y words. And they call this “soft skills”.

Inas,
Yes. Of course there are many things that HAVE TO BE in the business plan (needless to say), but if your business plan has no clear plan on how to make money, then your business plan is bunk.

I’m just using hyperbole to make my point.

Kesemua nota yang beliau tulis akan dihafal sebelum air liur di telapak tangannya kering.

o:-)