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Should You Take Up A Business Course?
So, should you take up a diploma in Business Studies or even a degree? The answer to this question cannot be a simple ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. It depends on many considerations and we must take into account about the ever important role business reflexes play in the real world.

The world has changed tremendously, and the concept

of an iron rice bowl (ie. permanent job) no longer exists. In this globalised era, even the Civil Service got to be realistic about job permanence of its staff. In old Singapore, the civil servants retired with a pension that lasted till the day they died. However, such privileges no longer exist the current workers. The pension scheme probably proved too costly and risky to the big companies and the government to the extent that if you join the army or an MNC, you are a salaried worker with at best a lump sum cash incentive at the end of your career. Fortunately or unfortunately, job insecurity is the reality of our modern world that will not go away.

A worker with business reflexes should feel safer and more capable than someone without business instincts. You see, most businessmen have faced a very tough time in surviving or excelling in their business at least once in their lifetime. A business person is unsalaried and does not have the comfort of a monthly salary waiting for him at the end of each month. This uncertainty drives the business minded person to seek for business opportunities, deals, work and any other activity that can bring the cash. With time, the business person learn to cope with the cycles of up and down, spot possible goldmines, work much smarter and faster, become innovative and unable to sit down on his backside waiting for money to trickle in. These habits or reflexes make him different from what he was and uniquely different from non-business persons. Given a challenge at the workplace, who do you think would be a better problem solver? Would do you think the company would value? Who therefore feels more secure with his job?

I was once a National school teacher. In 1998, I dived into the world of business by setting up my own tuition centre. That experience re-wired me totally. With my monthly salary snatched away, I had to creatively create a demand for either my services or my company’s services so that I could survive. I started to appreciate having a consistent flow of monthly income. To me, those who had big salaries at the end of each month were fortunate. Gradually, I changed and I realized the importance of gratitude for my earnings, street wisdom, hard work and creativity. I saw opportunities and losses which never crossed my mind in previous years. When I read the newspaper about social problems, government initiatives and business updates, I started to understand these issues with a greater depth. I become an extremely innovative teacher and started to develop skills that no one ever recognized me for (eg. project management and marketing). To me, a taste of the business world is a crucial phase of education that all leaders, big and small, must experience for it will make them better leaders.

If a business course can provide you with the platform to experience the business world for yourself, then you should sign up with the school as soon as possible. But you must ask yourself , “Can the theory of business help you develop the reflexes needed to excel in this globalised era?” Most certainly it can. But if all you learn are textbook stuff, then realize that you can gain that information without even attending a course. All you need to do is visit a bookshop and buy a few books on business and read them. So the point is this – if the course you are attending simply teaches information about the business world rather than real knowledge of it, you are better off saving your money by buying and reading business books.

One way to tell whether a course will really help you would be to ask who the lecturers are. What real world experience have they had in business? It is easy to teach the theory of almost every subject. But is that education? If the lecturers for your business programme are just academic lecturers, then what real world practical advice can they offer you? A positive and seasoned businessman can offer you many insights in running a business or even in being the most valued employee of a company/organization. So yes, if the course you attend has good lecturers with real world experience in business, it would really be a good course to attend. This is true no matter what your career path is – you may be a teacher, a politician wannabe, a media person, a road sweeper, a nurse, a lawyer, etc. This is so because a good business programme can empower you with people skills, creative sparks, solid and plain old wisdom, insights into trends and many more habits and knowledge. In the end, you will become a more effective teacher, lawyer, doctor, nurse, technician, politician and professional.

The success of EDB, SIA, MOE and the whole of Singapore can be attributed to the sound practice of good business principles and habits. If it is good enough for Singapore, then Business Studies may be good enough for you.
 
 
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