If you have kids and teens who have entrepreneurial potential, you might want to ask already established and successful teen entrepreneurs the way to success.
Starting a business is tough for adults and what more when children do it? As a parent, you want to be there as a supporter at the start and end of the day for your children. But what if you have questions? You don’t have to worry as we’ve got it covered, from the basic questions a parent can ask an entrepreneur to help potential teen start-up bosses.
What Entrepreneurial Traits Can I Teach Kids and Teens Early On?
It’s never too late or too early to teach kids about teen entrepreneurs and the skills that might be beneficial to them in running their own business in the future. As young as they are, you can start teaching them these entrepreneurial skills.
- Problem Solving
When running a small business, there is a lot of problem-solving involved that it becomes a daily activity. A small business is basically giving and providing answers to the questions of the customers.
Problem-solving is a necessary entrepreneurial skill that should be taught to children and teens. You can do this by talking to them about certain problems and encourage them to come up with possible solutions and their consequences.
- Curiosity
Teen Entrepreneurs are always looking and finding ways to improve themselves and what they offer, and it all starts from being curious. Determining problems and identifying potential ways to overcome such problems can lead to startup business ideas.
Encourage children to try out new interests and hobbies.
- Creativity
A creative mind is what makes teen entrepreneurs successful in building their empire. Encourage their creativity, let them play and be versatile in what they are doing.
- Self Confidence
Give young entrepreneurs opportunities and encourage them to take action and make decisions. Let them have a choice and a say in matters which can help build up their self-esteem.
- Tenacity
Tenacity is one of the business skills for teens that they should learn early on. Business can be tough, and you can’t gain success overnight. Entrepreneurs, at some point, will experience difficulties and while it can be hard for a parent to see your child struggling and upset, it is equally important to teach them not to quit at the first sign of failure. Make them work hard for what they want to achieve instead of simply handing success to them.
- Leadership
A true entrepreneur is a leader, someone who inspires and motivates employees instead of simply bossing them around. Encourage teens to go out and participate in team building activities. Let them talk and build a relationship with other children.
How to Sell and Earn Money
No matter what the product or service, a business is essentially selling to make money. You can teach your teens to find jobs, even at home, that needs to be done. Talk about the job’s description and negotiate a price.
But, that is entirely different than selling to other people. In this case, you can always encourage your children to go door to door sales, which can also teach them to talk to potential customers and clients and face the fear of rejection.
How Can I Support My Teen Entrepreneurs Without Crossing the Line?
It is important to listen to their ideas and try to be open-minded about their possible success. And while every parent would like to help their children become successful, there is a fine line in encouraging teens to start home business ideas and babying them.
Encourage them to work on their goals and let them make their own decisions and face the consequences. Let them become independent and avoid hovering on top of their every decision.
How Can I Encourage Discipline and Success in a Teen Entrepreneurs?
There’s no exact method that works for parents in instilling discipline to entrepreneurial teens. As the saying goes, the best form of discipline is self-discipline. But how can you encourage that to them?
Talk to them and make it crystal clear that while you are there to help with their money making ideas, the final responsibility in running their business doesn’t lie with you. Encourage them to take responsibility for running their own tasks.
What Are the Business Options for Teens?
There are a lot of easy businesses to start for teens especially with the boom in technology right now. Let them do what they like best, their interests, hobbies, and talents.
Teens these days spend a huge part of their time in social media, and that can be another aspect they might want to get into. For one, blogging has become quite popular as a way to build a business at home. There are countless blog topics ideas, and they can choose based on what their interests are.
Technological teens can also dabble in the world of websites and software. They can also create the next big thing in gaming or social media or create in demands products like season cards, toys, and many more.
Other best small business to start includes activities and services that teens can do and charge other people for it like tutoring other kids, helping paint, shoveling snow, mowing lawns, walking dogs, or watching smaller children for a few hours.
What Not to Do or Say When You Have a Potential Teen Entrepreneur?
Actions and words can be very impactful to children especially as they start to learn the ropes into becoming a young business person.
One of the things you should never do is to project failure to your ambitious child. It’s not a successful business if it hasn’t failed or gotten near failure at least once. Being an entrepreneur is a real struggle, but you should avoid discouraging them just because you know someone who has failed as an entrepreneur.
Don’t tell them they are going to fail. Instead, make them see and understand the possible consequences of their decisions and help them mitigate these.
What you do as a parent can have a huge impact on the success of your teen entrepreneur. Support and guidance are important, but you also have to know that it is not all on you. The key is to teach them useful entrepreneurial skills instead of putting them in a box and prevent them from experiencing possible failures.
