Can you raise your child to be an entrepreneur? Should you? There are some great things about being an entrepreneur, such as the potential for enormous financial success and personal satisfaction. An entrepreneur might also change the world in a significant way. On the other hand, there’s also a lot of hard work and disappointment, and it can be hard to ever work for anyone else once you have that entrepreneurial mindset. But the essential qualities that they will develop in preparing for entrepreneurship can be useful in many walks of life. Your best bet is to give your child the encouragement and the tools and let them to decide the course that’s right for them. The tips below can help you do that.
Frame Entrepreneurship Positively
As a parent, you can talk positively about entrepreneurship, especially if you are one yourself. You can make working for yourself seem like second nature. Talk to your kid about the benefits of building your own business and discuss other business leaders that you admire. Whether or not you’ve made that leap yourself, you can both extol and model the virtues of entrepreneurship, such as innovation, courage, and hard work. Essentially, your goal is to make this a very ordinary rather than an extraordinary ambition to pursue, something that is entirely within the realm of possibility.
Give Practical Support
Some famous entrepreneurs have built themselves up from having virtually nothing, but that’s increasingly difficult to do. If you’ve got money and connections, you can give your child a big boost in the world of startups and new businesses. However, there’s plenty you can do even if you don’t. College is a place where your kid can learn a lot about the industry that interests them and the world of business as well as making some of those valuable connections themselves. Of course, one of the problems that they may encounter is the cost.
Even if your child qualifies for federal aid, there is a cap on how much they can borrow. Private loans are another option, but they can be difficult for most students to access on their own because of a lack of an established credit history. You don’t have to be wealthy to have good credit yourself, and if you do, you can help your child in an enormous way by cosigning on a student loan. You do need to understand your obligations as a cosigner and that you will be responsible if your child defaults. You can review a guide that explains this and everything else you need to know about cosigning on a student loan.
Teach Accountability
Your child can have a greater chance of success if they learn to be accountable. If they want to try to start their own business when they’re still a minor, you can help them figure out things like getting permits and filing taxes. However, it’s important that you don’t step in and do the difficult things for them. You can talk to them about how to deal with an unhappy customer but let them do that and the other parts that are boring or unpleasant. This will teach them to deal with the dull or less fun parts of entrepreneurship as an adult as well.
Give Moral Support
Even if you can’t offer much in the way of practical help, you can do something even more important, and that’s giving them moral support. This starts in childhood, when you make it clear that you are there for them and extends through encouraging them to be creative and take risks. Don’t blame them for their failures; give them support for making the effort. In fact, you can help them reframe failure because of having the courage to try something hard.
