As an entrepreneur with decades of experience, Alan Manly OAM is now the CEO of Universal Business School Sydney (UBSS) and author of The Unlikely Entrepreneur. He shares the five toughest business lessons he learned the hard way, so you don’t have to.

When you’re winning, people perceive that you’ve learned the required lessons, and that is certainly true for me. My entrepreneurial journey started in my mid-thirties with endless enthusiasm, just enough confidence and a little knowledge – a dangerous combination.

Given my time over I would do it all again, only next time I would hope to learn more from others more quickly.

While we’ve all been forced to learn some hard lessons during the COVID era, when I look back now, there are five tough lessons I learned throughout my career I want to share, so you can learn from my mistakes.