Educate Your Child To Become A Young Entrepreneur

It’s always turns out to be an interesting conversation when I ask my two youngest daughters what they want to be when they grow up. My nine year old says that she wants to be Lord Alan Sugar’s apprentice or to open her own beauty salon whereas my ten year old replies that she wants to be a famous singer.

Interestingly neither of them ever say that they want to follow any of the traditional careers like becoming a teacher or a nurse. Is this a good thing or a bad thing ?  How do you educate your child?

It’s claimed that as individuals we are influenced by who we surround ourselves with. Therefore, given that both my wife and I are successful entrepreneurs operating numerous businesses from home, could this be why both of our daughters aspire to want to think ‘outside of the box’ and not wanting to follow the more traditional career routes?

Or could it be that they have already been subconsciously been persuaded to take a different career direction based on our influences. Influences like:

1. Having both parents constantly at home (albeit that some of that time is spent in our home office) and always being available to attend school concerts, sports days etc, compared to some of their friend’s parents being unable to attend due to work commitments.

2. Being aware of our reading choices based around self improvement and business success. Even night time reading usually consists of reading autobiographies of successful people such as Lord Sugar and Sir Richard Branson.

3. Helping me to set up the office ready for a video recording. They both love holding up my script for me as a prompt.

4. Watching entrepreneurial and self educating programmes together as a family.

I don’t suppose that we will never know for certain how much our children’s choices are influenced by our own actions, but I am sure that other aspects of their upbringing will have played a part in helping them to develop into confidant individuals.

As well as valuing the traditional education that is offered to our children, we also feel that it is important to educate a child to stimulate their imagination. This can be done in the following ways;

Reading And Writing Short Stories
Research has shown that children, who are regularly told stories have a better vocabulary, are keener readers and enjoy more cognitive skills and higher self confidence.

From a young age we have always encouraged our children to think of their own version of how a story being read to them, is going to end. It was always entertaining hearing how different their versions were. We also used to all write short stories after coming in from a walk. We would all have gone on the same walk but our stories were all completely different. The children used to love this and would also draw lovely illustrations with their story.

Nurturing Their Create Skills
Enjoying creative time with your child is important as it help them to develop other skills. Our children enjoy making things outdoors such as dens, jewellery made from twigs, leaves, string and flowers, wood chimes and even crowns made from cardboard with leaves and flowers stuck to them. Who knows, these fun activities could be preparing them with the entrepreneurial skills that they could use in the future.  After all, many successful entrepreneurs have built up thriving businesses despite leaving school with no qualifications, simply by using their creative skills and by their determination to succeed.

Teaching Them Useful Skills
From a young age our children have always enjoyed helping us with everyday activities. Both of our daughters have loved helping me with DIY. They particularly enjoyed helping me build a new home for their pet rabbits and tortoises. They were amazed by how some pieces of spare wood could be transformed into such a fabulous living area for their pets.

They have also always enjoyed cooking, progressing from being able to make a sandwich and cupcakes when they were younger, to being able to cook a meal now that they are older. This in itself has helped my ten year old daughter to become involved in a major TV programme. It is amazing and sometimes very emotional to watch how confident she has become in selecting ingredients and cooking some wonderful dishes. Who would have thought that cooking a few fairy cakes would have led to her becoming such a competent cook? She has even displayed some entrepreneurial ambition, announcing that she would like to publish her own children’s cookbook… So watch this space !

Lessons In Finance
We have always tried to teach our children the importance of budgeting their finances. They are each given tasks to do to earn pocket money. They both also have savings accounts. When we first opened up their savings accounts I can recall my youngest daughter being distraught as she thought that the bank had taken all of her money. However she was very pleased when we were able to demonstrate to her that in fact she was actually making more money via ‘interest’ being paid to her by the bank. We used to play shops and Monopoly with the children which helped enormously with teaching them how to count money.

Whether your child goes on to succeed academically, learns a trade or even decides to start their own business, some of the skills that they have acquired during their childhood will help them to develop into confident individuals. Even those who lack great academical results can easily go on to use their creative skills to start their own business.

As a parent there are endless opportunities towards educating your child to reap better rewards in life. Don’t hold them back, help them to develop and grow their confidence and skills with as many everyday activities and hobbies as possible.

If you would like to learn more about entrepreneurial skills or starting your own business, feel free to Contact Me at any time

Kind Regards
ROY DERRICK