Not long ago, I was browsing a local 4-University for a potential guest lecture opportunities – not necessarily for pay – I’d just like to spread the wealth, the wealth of knowledge I’ve garnered from my real world experience. I ran across several announcements for permanent positions for lecturers, business professors and was blown away by the BS requirements – and thought to myself, do these arrogant academics even hear themselves think? Since when does a lecturer of business marketing or branding need a Ph.D. in a business related subject? Silly humans, did they forget the age old adage; Those Who Can’t Teach?

Well, I then thought maybe the pedagogical knowledge (knowledge of teaching) is relevant to helping human minds uptake the information departed from the lecturer or professor – sure I guess that makes sense, and yet, that’s not what they were requiring, rather they were requiring a Ph.D. in a business related topic? Are you serious? Anyone worth their salt learns what they need and then goes out into the real world and does it. After all, that’s what I did when I left school to run my company. In fact, nearly everyone I know ditched school prior to getting their MBA and launched their career, and mind you I knows so superstars of the business world – specifically the Franchising Sector.

As a founder of a Franchising Company and having set up businesses serving some 400+ cities in 23-states and multiple countries, it blows me away that I wouldn’t qualify to teach what I know to business students. In fact, during my business career I was equally intrigued by the number of business I competed with in the real world with executives from Harvard, Wharton, Yale, and the like – look we blew them out of the market and enjoyed earning their market share through direct competition and agility to serve the customers – even with their hot-shot investment banker friends on Wall Street.

Now why does that last paragraph matter? It’s simple really, what I am saying is that if you are learning business from someone who has never done it, been in academia all their lives, well, they might know all the theories, but they don’t get the reality – thus, you are wasting your money at the University learning from such folks. You’d be better off taking business courses from the Community College where there are working (business world) professors or retired business people. So, unless you are going to a top notch business school for networking opportunities or guaranteed placement after graduation – don’t waste your time or money on the tuition – it’s just BS, you don’t need it.