“There needs to be a change in the ethos, kids should know about how to run businesses from as early as primary school,” says Ontirestse Mosiane, the inspiring 22-year old Johannesburg-based entrepreneur and founder Corporate Youth.

Corporate Youth, which Mosiane started about four years ago, began life as a media company, producing a digital magazine which preaches the ethos of a lean startup. The magazine is still going, but like any good entrepreneur, Mosiane knows when to pivot around a new idea. Today, the firm’s core business about helping transform young South Africans from being job seekers to becoming creators.

And Mosiane has entrepreneurial spirit in buckets.

“I’m halfway with my B.Com Law degree right now, but that’s just so I have a qualification to satisfy my parents. I have no formal qualification in business, I’ve been grinding on the streets all along,” he says.

Mosiane believes that in order to encourage more South Africans to become entrepreneurs, schools need to present the idea of working for yourself as a career option, instead of only focusing on subjects like accounting, law, medicine and science.

To achieve this, Mosiane began by providing articles and advice on entrepreneurship, but today Corporate Youth has grown to a team of six that produces its own financial education board game called Shareholder.

Startup Monopoly for entrepreneurs?

At first glance Shareholder looks a lot like Monopoly. It’s even played in a similar manner. But the entire aim of the financial board game is to teach players about investing in and selling shares, and how the stock market works.

“Initially when I started with the magazine, I never thought that one day we would be doing games, it just happened,” Mosiane says.

Corporate Youth hosts a regular game night at JoziHub, the co-creation space in Milpark where the company is based. They target tertiary students through once-a-month events which also include a short seminar hosted by a speaker from the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.

Mosiane often taps into the pool of diverse startups available at JoziHub to help grow Corporate Youth, Shareholder and create new partnerships.

Shareholder is currently available for purchase from the Corporate Youth website and Kalahari.

Working with existing entrepreneurs and adults who want to understand more about business, however, is only part of the plan. Mosiane has recently been contracted by the North West Department of Education to tour rural schools with an entrepreneurship and business workshop that includes getting students to understand stocks and shares.

“We focus on youth from grade 10 all the way up to tertiary, so that we get to them as early as possible,” Mosiane says.

Corporate Youth is also looking at turning Shareholder into a mobile game that anyone can easily access. “It would be great if Shareholder would one day be featured as content on the tablets that are being rolled out to schools around Gauteng,” Mosiane adds.

The company hopes to begin manufacturing Shareholder locally too, and help create a few employment opportunities along the way. Right now it’s produced by a board game specialist in Germany.

One project Mosiane is particularly proud of being involved with is the EIC Funding Expo, which is hosted over five days annually alternating between Cape Town and Johannesburg and exposes entrepreneurs to international investors and the chance to secure funding.

Last year, a total of over R1 billion in funding was secured between 15 startups at the expos hosted at the University of Johannesburg’s Soweto campus.

What’s next for the Corporate Youth?  This year Mosiane says the company wants to venture into creating games that teach kids how to code.

“We want to use gaming principles to teach them skills that they can actually use once they leave school,” Mosiane hints.

We’ll be watching.