School taught you to memorize facts and follow rules. Meanwhile, entrepreneurs who built empires from nothing learned their most valuable lessons through painful trial and error. They lost money, made mistakes, and figured out the hard way what actually matters in business. You can’t learn that in the classroom.

Schools teach subjects: maths, creative writing and sciences. But businesses can’t be split into discrete categories. Within one day, an entrepreneur is an accountant, a marketer, manager, lawyer and practitioner. They switch between skills depending on what’s required.

The real world demands more from business owners than school is currently teaching. Here’s what successful entrepreneurs wish they had known ahead of entering the playing field.

Christina Theo, a psychologist specializing in the brain-body connection, said, "I wish school had taught me how trauma rewires your body before it reshapes your beliefs. I was raised to achieve, perform, and please. As a 2nd-gen Greek Cypriot in North London, I followed unspoken rules: get it right, don't take up space, don't be a burden. No one told me my drive wasn't just ambition, it was fear."

Setting up on your own requires using fear as your driver, not your limiter. Let’s teach kids they can reach for the moon, no matter who is trying to keep them playing small. True outliers are audacious and definitely don’t aim to fit in; skills we could all have benefitted from learning earlier.

Picture classrooms where teenagers learn emotional intelligence alongside algebra. They graduate knowing their triggers, their strengths, their motivations. These students become the CEOs who build companies with soul, the leaders who inspire without manipulating, the entrepreneurs who succeed without burning out. They make millions while sleeping well at night.

"I wish I learned sales in school,” said Patrina Pellett, who runs her own business as an AI for medical affairs specialist. “As I've gotten older and now that I have my own business, I'm 100% convinced it's the most valuable skill. It will open so many doors in your life."

People think sales skills are born, not taught. But that’s because they are rarely taught. What if we learned young that selling means solving other people’s problems? What if “sales” wasn’t considered a dirty word because we set it up better during the early years.

Schools that teach sales (in a real, useful way) could create graduates who pitch cancer cures to investors, not just products to customers. These students become the consultants companies hire at 22 because they understand human psychology. They lead movements, not just meetings. Watch them turn rejection into data, negotiations into collaborations, and every conversation into opportunity.

"I wish I'd learned how to read and respond to financial data confidently. For years, I thought being good at business meant working hard, not understanding the story my numbers were telling me,” said Joan Adams, who built her career as a director and fractional CFO. “Once I learned to decode the finances, everything changed: I made better decisions, grew faster, and finally paid myself what I was worth."

Business success requires the numbers to add up. But how do you know if you’ve never been taught? If schools gave maths lessons in terms of revenue and profit, would it set tomorrow’s entrepreneurs up for wealth on their terms?

Imagine a generation of kids that understand P&L statements as if they were social media posts. Students who graduate understanding compound interest become the investors backing tomorrow's unicorns by 25. They skip the debt trap, build multiple income streams before college ends, and treat money as a tool they control. These kids start companies in dorm rooms not from naivety but from knowledge.

Suman R., who works as a content creation specialist, said, "I wish school had taught me that there's not only one way to become successful; you can turn your hobby into revenue-generating stuff if you keep pace with advancements in technology."

Sitting down with a careers advisor at age 16 gave me the false impression that there were a finite number of careers available. But technology moves fast, and by the time I sat my final exams, new options had opened up.

People learn fastest by doing. Millions of adults are learning how to leverage AI by just playing with ChatGPT. What if we taught kids that the possibilities were endless, if they just got curious, ran experiments, and connected passion and purpose to making money?

"I wish school had taught us how to share what we know online,” said David Nge, founder and writer at MakingThatWebsite.com. “After Covid-19, I started a blog to document website tips from client work, and it ended up landing me a content marketing role that paid four times more than my previous job. Turns out, your body of work is the best resume you can build."

Share what you know online, build your reputation one day at a time. Schools don’t teach this, but everyone who has successfully built their personal brand wishes they had started sooner. The ROI is infinite if you get this right.

Students who learn personal branding in school could become the thought leaders shaping industries by 30. They would build audiences before they built products, and create demand before supply exists. These graduates land dream jobs through DMs, not applications. They get funded through followers, not pitch decks. High school projects could turn into Harvard case studies, teenage blogs into book deals, and college experiments into empire foundations. All because they doubled down on who they were.

"I wish I had learned at school that you can't please a bully, and standing up for yourself doesn't mean you have to fight with them,” said Birgit Itse, who works as a self-employed story architect. She paraphrases George Bernard Shaw, “That fighting with a bully is like wrestling with a pig. You both get muddy but the pig likes it."

Kids are mean and playgrounds can be brutal for self-confidence and self-worth. Schools teaching resilience would create entrepreneurs who see failure as data collection. They’d be hardened to anything that life and work threw their way.

These students would graduate knowing how to bounce back before they need to. They would build companies that survive recessions because they practiced recovery in controlled environments. Teenage setbacks become startup stories, classroom conflicts make boardroom confidence. They negotiate with VCs at 23 because they learned to stand their ground at 13.

After years as a digital nomad, Gabe Marusca runs a business consultancy. "I wish school had taught me how to feel safe with uncertainty,” he said. “Growing up, everything was about stability: choose a career, buy a house, stay in one place. But nothing prepared me for an entrepreneurial life where Wi-Fi drops mid-client call in the jungle of Thailand."

The education conveyor belt plays it safe. It teaches kids to tend towards settling. Secure that dream job, partner, mortgage and family. Go on holiday once a year. Live within a few miles of where you grew up. But that life isn’t for everyone. Some people are born to explore.

Picture students running real businesses from secondary school, failing safely with teacher-mentors as guides. They graduate with portfolios of attempts, not just transcripts of grades. They thrive in uncertainty because they were exposed to it from a young age. Maybe they build billion-dollar businesses because they learned iteration beats perfection when they were 15.

These entrepreneurs learned these lessons the hard way. They paid tuition in mistakes, lost opportunities, and hard-won lessons.

The education system needs a reality check. While students memorize formulas they'll never use, real entrepreneurs are out there figuring out cash flow through trial and error. While kids write essays about Shakespeare, founders are learning to write pitch decks after their third rejection. While careers advisors have you choose from a list, the roles of the future haven’t been invented yet. The disconnect costs careers, dreams, and billions in lost potential.

Schools create employees when the world needs builders. They teach compliance when success demands audacity. They grade on memorization when money flows to those who can sell, connect, and adapt.

Teach kids to read financials and they'll spot opportunities others miss. Show them how to sell and they'll fund their own futures. Build their resilience and they'll bounce back from failures that would crush their parents. Let them practice entrepreneurship in safe spaces and they'll build empires in the real world. Fix the curriculum and watch what happens.