Business, Finance and Entrepreneurship· Intermediate level

Business splits roughly three ways, and they suit different people.

Numbers covers accounting, audit, tax, banking and financial analysis. It rewards accuracy and patience and punishes carelessness. It also has the clearest professional ladder.

People covers sales, marketing, human resources and customer operations. It rewards persistence and the ability to be told no repeatedly.

Things covers operations, logistics, procurement and supply chain. It rewards planning and problem-solving under pressure, and it is often overlooked by students, which makes it less crowded.

Entrepreneurship cuts across all three, and it works better after you have learned one of them properly somewhere else.

Pick one main and one backup, and write what each role is actually judged on.

There is more than one door, and the expensive one is not always the best.

In Ghana, business degrees run at universities including the business schools at the University of Ghana, KNUST and the University of Professional Studies in Accra. Technical universities offer HND programmes in accountancy, marketing and related fields, with a route to top up to a degree later. There is also the professional accountancy route through bodies such as the Institute of Chartered Accountants, Ghana, which many people study for while working. Confirm any institution is accredited by the Ghana Tertiary Education Commission before paying.

In Canada, the professional accounting designation requires a university degree covering specific prerequisite subjects, followed by a professional education programme and a period of supervised practical experience. Colleges also offer two and three-year business diplomas that lead to employment directly and sometimes transfer into a degree.

Compare on four things: how long it takes, what it costs, what job it qualifies you for at the end, and whether you can work while studying.

Profit and cash are not the same thing, and confusing them closes businesses.

Take your earlier money exercise, or a small real activity, and build three things. A list of every cost, split into the ones that happen whether or not you sell anything and the ones that only happen when you do. A month-by-month cash record showing when money actually arrives and leaves. And a simple statement of whether you made money over the period.

Then add the things beginners leave out: your own time at some hourly value, transport, breakages and waste, the customer who has not paid yet, and any tax or fee that applies.

If you can explain to an adult why a business can be profitable and still run out of cash, you have understood the most useful idea in this pathway.

Almost every failed idea failed because nobody asked first.

Pick a problem you think you could solve. Find five people who actually have that problem. Ask them what they do about it now, what it costs them in money or time, and what they have already tried. Do not describe your solution until the end, and do not argue when they are unimpressed.

Write down what they said, not what you wish they had said. Then change the idea, drop it, or narrow it to the one thing several of them agreed on.

Keep it safe. Interview people in public or at home with a guardian aware, do not collect anyone's personal details, and do not take money at this stage.

Bring your route comparison, your figures and your customer notes to a mentor.

Ask which route they would take now if they were starting again, and what they think you have underestimated. Ask what an employer in your specialism looks for in someone with no experience. Ask whether the professional exam route is realistic alongside work in their experience.

Then write a term plan: the subject you are strengthening, the programme pages you will read, the schools you will email with unanswered questions, and the date of your next review.