What Teachers Can Learn From Business Owners

Teachers have a lot on their plates

Lesson planning, grading papers, managing a classroom, and working with parents are just a few of the things we have to juggle. But hey, don’t stress out too much – there are ways we can take inspiration and lessons from other fields to make our lives a little easier and be more effective in the classroom. In fact there are a few things teachers can learn from business owners!

What Teachers Can Learn From Business Owners

There are actually a lot of similarities between these two disciplines. By understanding and applying some of the principles of entrepreneurship to our classrooms, we can improve our effectiveness as teachers and better support our students on both a content, and emotional level.

So, what are these principles?

Delegation

As a business owner, it’s important to recognize that you can’t do everything yourself, and you need to delegate tasks to others to focus on the things only you can do. And guess what – the same is true for us teachers. We often try to do everything ourselves, from grading papers to preparing materials for our lessons, but this can lead to burnout. By delegating tasks to others, whether it be other teachers or students, we can free up our time to focus on the things that really matter.

Systems

Having clear systems in place can help everything run smoothly and efficiently in a business. And in the classroom, systems and processes are just as important. By setting up clear systems for things like how students enter and exit the room, how to raise their hand and when to stop talking, we can save ourselves time and energy and be more effective in actually teaching the content!

Reverse Engineer

The idea is simple. In business we forecast a few things…

How much money will we make this year?

How many employees will hire in the next three years?

How many clients can I acquire in the next 90 days?

So when the beginning of September comes, you want to find a moment to reverse engineer what the end of the year will look like? Obviously what will your students learn and comprehend but how will they act? How will they think? What type of person will they become and more importantly, how can I shape this growth in my classroom?

In summary, there are a lot of similarities between teaching and entrepreneurship, and by applying some of the business principles to our classrooms, we can improve our effectiveness as teachers and make a bigger impact in the lives of our students. So next time you’re feeling overwhelmed, just remember to take a deep breath and think about how you can apply some of these principles to your teaching – it could make a big difference.