21/03/2025
My sister just sent me this photo and it brought back all the memories. You’re looking at young, lanky Fred. What you don’t see is that this 18-year-old was a school headmaster. Managing people twice his age, dealing with anxious parents, teaching classes, and keeping the school afloat.. all while barely figuring out life himself.
A lot of people know this story. After my father passed away, my Mum (suddenly a single mother with four kids) started a small school and handed me the keys to run it. Not because I was particularly qualified, but because there was no other option.
I share this story often to young people because I see the same hesitation in their eyes that I once had. They feel unprepared. They think they need to know more, take more courses, get more experience first. They wait for the perfect moment. But the truth is: entrepreneurship doesn’t come with a manual.
People ask, “Can entrepreneurship be taught?” Maybe. But what I know for sure is that it can only truly be learned by doing. There is no classroom that can fully prepare you for the reality of running something from the ground up. The mindset, the resilience, the ability to navigate uncertainty.. these don’t come from textbooks.
The best entrepreneurs I know didn’t start because they had all the answers. They started because they saw a problem that needed solving and figured things out along the way. And that’s the real edge in entrepreneurship. It is NOT in knowing everything, but having the courage to start anyway.
