With layoffs making the news in just about every sector, you might find yourself wondering if you should venture into self-employment. Lucky for you, experts agree even economic downturns provide plenty of opportunities for entrepreneurship.
“It’s always a good time to be an entrepreneur,” says Angela Lee, a professor of entrepreneurship at Columbia Business School and faculty director of the school’s entrepreneurship center. But, the founder of investment network 37 Angels warns, “the bar is higher than before” for startup founders looking for funding thanks to growing competition and emerging technology.
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Business owners today also have more resources than ever at their disposal, be it artificial intelligence or remote workers. “There’s lots of opportunities and lots of new ways to do things,” says Brandy Aven, an associate professor of entrepreneurship at the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University
But even if you don’t ever want to start a company, having an entrepreneurial mindset can be incredibly valuable. “Entrepreneurial skills teach you how to be agile, they teach you how to be scrappy, they teach you how to make decisions with very limited information—all of which are useful skills in 2024 and beyond,” says Lee. Beyond this, learning like a founder exposes you to useful topics such as business finance, management, and building productive teams.
Online courses are a great way to develop the skill set and confidence of a business owner, and there’s an abundance of options for both self-disciplined learners and those that like more direction.
Below, we’ve compiled 16 free and paid entrepreneurship courses taught by top companies, institutions, and experts.
8 free entrepreneurship courses you can take online
If you’re just starting out or money is tight, consider taking one of these free introduction courses to get your feet wet and figure out where you want to take your entrepreneurial journey next.
1. The Elements of Entrepreneurial Success by Stanford
Provided by Alison, a free learning platform, The Elements of Entrepreneurial Success pairs Stanford’s reputation with the fundamentals of starting a business. The course covers leadership and hiring, the five types of organizational culture, and managing risk and reward, and ends with a final assessment to lock those learnings in. You’ll also hear advice and stories from experts like Yahoo’s Marissa Mayer and venture capitalist Guy Kawasaki.
Length: 4–5 hours
Structure: Self-paced
2. Business Growth: Start-Ups, Investment and Negotiation by Stanford
Business Growth: Start-Ups, Investment and Negotiation differs from Stanford’s other course on Alison in that it focuses on finding meaning as a business owner, as well as for your employees. It’s also mostly targeted at founders interested in partnering with VCs and covers negotiation tactics, product development techniques, and how to go about finding angel investors.
Length: 4–5 hours
Structure: Self-paced
3. Starting a Business by MOBI
My Own Business Institute (MOBI) is part of the Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University and offers free online education to aspiring business owners, with its curriculum based on the work of entrepreneur, Phil Holland. MOBI’s course, Starting a Business, aims to provide all the basics of entrepreneurship—licenses and permits, financing, and expansion—and focuses especially on the importance of writing a business plan.
Length: 15 sessions/1–4 hours per session
Structure: Self-paced
4. Launch Your Online Business by SUNY
Offered by The State University of New York (SUNY), one of the largest higher education institutions in the country, Launch Your Online Business is built for budding entrepreneurs in the ecommerce or web space. Its curriculum includes coming up with a unique product, creating a pitch deck, defining key performance indicators (KPIs) for success, and keeping up marketing and sales after you’ve launched, and ties in learnings from real business owners. You can purchase the certificate course for $49.
Length: 4 modules/14 hours
Structure: Self-paced
5. Identifying Entrepreneurial Opportunities by the University System of Maryland
Identifying Entrepreneurial Opportunities is based on The Opportunity Analysis Canvas, created by faculty and director of entrepreneurship at the University of Maryland James Green. The idea pairs together psychology, sociology, and business principles to teach students how to think like an entrepreneur or innovator. You can upgrade to a certification for a small fee.
Length: 4 modules/2–3 hours per week for 4 weeks
Structure: Self-paced
6. Grow Your Business with Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women
Grow Your Business with Goldman Sachs 10,000 Women is one of 10 courses Goldman Sachs offers aspiring female entrepreneurs for free online. This specific topic covers business growth plans, which can help guide your product’s growth and development, but other classes include the fundamentals of funding, competition, and business finance.
Length: 4 hours
Structure: Self-paced
7. The Entrepreneurial Mindset by Babson
Backed by legacy institution Babson College, The Entrepreneurial Mindset dives into the school’s Entrepreneurial Thought & Action method and how it applies to real-world business scenarios and problems. You can upgrade to the certification for $189.
Length: 4–6 hours per week for 6 weeks
Structure: Self-paced
8. Side Hustle “From Zero to 100” by City, University of London
Udemy’s Side Hustle “From Zero to 100” is in partnership with the City, University of London’s entrepreneurial arm CityVentures. Side hustles are how some of the most successful entrepreneurs got their start, and this course is a great primer in growing a social media following, networking, and knowing when to go off on your own full time, as it’s taught by real-life business owners who’ve done these things successfully. Upon completion, graduates will receive an official certificate from the institution.
Length: 13 lectures/1 hour and 58 minutes
Structure: Self-paced
8 paid entrepreneurship courses you can take online
With a paid online course or certification, you can take your entrepreneurship education deeper through hands-on experience and mentorship, with the backing of a major organization.
1. Entrepreneurship Essentials by Harvard
Backed by Harvard Business School Online, Entrepreneurship Essentials is a great place to start if you have no entrepreneurial experience. It’ll take you through market research and coming up with a business idea, weighing the pros and cons of self-employment, and how to make key financial decisions, all while touching on the MBA program’s popular framework: People, Opportunity, Context, Deal.
Cost: $1,750
Length: 4 modules/6–8 hours per week for 4 weeks
Structure: Self-paced
2. Entrepreneurship Specialization by Wharton
With Wharton’s Entrepreneurship Specialization, you’ll learn how to spot opportunities in your industry, the art of pivoting and scaling, and financial modeling. Your journey will end with a capstone project of creating a pitch deck. If your capstone receives top marks, you may be introduced to investors in Wharton Entrepreneurship’s network.
Cost: $79 a month
Length: 5 courses/2–3 hours per week for 20 weeks
Structure: Self-paced
3. Developing New Business Ventures (Online): From Ideation to Successful Launch by Columbia Business School
Columbia’s Business School’s New Business Ventures online education program is for entrepreneurs with a business idea who aren’t sure how to proceed. It’ll teach you how to frame your idea for customers and investors, save on costs associated with development, define metrics for success, and build the right team to support your needs.
Cost: $2,450
Length: 4 live modules and 4 self-paced/2–4 hours per week for 8 weeks
Structure: Hybrid, next course starts April 8, 2024
4. Key Technologies for Business Specialization by IBM
IBM’s Key Technologies for Business Specialization prepares business owners for understanding and being able to work with three of today’s most powerful technologies and trends: cloud computing, AI, and data science. Within each topic, the course covers their definitions, popular models and tools, and business cases and applications.
Cost: $49 a month after a 7-day free trial
Length: 3 courses/10 hours a week for 1 month
Structure: Self-paced
5. Attract and Engage Customers with Digital Marketing by Google
How you market your product or service to customers is crucial for success, and Google’s Attract and Engage Customers with Digital Marketing is one of the best courses for picking up such a skill. You’ll learn from the leading search engine topics such as SEO best practices for ranking high in shopping searches and using ads to drive leads, as well as how to create a customer persona.
Cost: $49 a month after a 7-day free trial
Length: 4 modules/21 hours
Structure: Self-paced
6. Building Your Freelancing Career Specialization by CalArts
Freelancers are also often business owners, and this Building Your Freelance Career Specialization by the California Institute of the Arts aims to teach aspiring contractors everything they need to know to work for themselves: setting goals, creating a business budget, building a portfolio and personal brand, and navigating issues such as taxes or intellectual property.
Cost: $49 a month after a 7-day free trial
Length: 5 courses/10 hours a week for 1 month
Structure: Self-paced
7. Self-Made Entrepreneurship with Sara Blakely by MasterClass
Sara Blakely, the founder of successful intimates brand Spanx, teaches self-made entrepreneurship by using her story as proof you can bootstrap yourself to success without an MBA or previous experience. In this course, she’ll touch on defining your purpose, branding and marketing techniques, and other tools that helped her achieve billionaire status.
Cost: Starts at $10 a month
Length: 14 lessons/3 hours and 30 minutes
Structure: Self-paced
8. Designing a Business by IDEO University
Designing a Business is run by IDEO, an award-winning global design company, and covers its unique human-centric, design-thinking approach to prototyping, marketing, testing, and business strategy—and is back by real entrepreneur stories.
Cost: $799
Length: 4 hours a week for 5 weeks
Structure: Live
5 tips before diving into entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurship can be highly rewarding (and lucrative) if you have a smart business idea paired with the determination and skills to make it happen. But it also has its risks and downsides. Aven and Lee shared their best tips for entrepreneurs just starting out or professionals curious about going off on their own:
Focus on solving a problem: “People who make good entrepreneurs are people who fiercely want to solve a problem, which is very different from somebody who fiercely wants to start a company,” says Lee. When your primary goal is to help others or solve a common or persistent need, the rest—sales, growth, prestige—more easily follow.
Make sure the lifestyle suits you: Entrepreneurs, especially those just starting out, work unstructured and often long days, and many don’t see income for months or years. Lee suggests taking the time to think through this new work schedule and financial hurdle—and running it by your family for support. “It’s really hard work, lots of risks certainly in the beginning,” she says. “I think that’s important to know.”
Become data-driven: Data underpins everything an entrepreneur does—it’s how they know what kind of product to make, whom to serve, and how to attract an audience. “We’re looking for people who are able to run small experiments, very quickly fail, and then say, ‘Okay, well I’m going to go in this direction because that’s what the market’s telling me to do,’” says Lee.
Read and listen voraciously: Beyond courses, expert advice can be found anywhere, from books to podcasts. A couple recommendations from Lee include The Lean Startup, Talking to Humans, and Traction.
Ask for help (and be open to feedback): Entrepreneurship isn’t a solo journey, and founders should regularly ask for help when they need it, from the right people—experts with a similar manner, skill set, or business. “That person is going to speak a language and have a similar perspective to help…direct you in the right position,” Aven says, adding that the most resilient founders don’t let advice or harsh feedback deflate them, but rather motivate them. Bringing on a cofounder or two, she adds, can help supplement skills or areas where you’re weaker or less confident.
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