Now I have not done any academic research on what I am about to suggest; but I do have good anecdotal evidence to support it. People who feel motivated or even compelled to set up their own business are quite likely to have been brought up in a family firm or a family where at least one of the breadwinners ran a one-man band.
I was brought up in a family that owned and ran a newsagent’s ‘corner’ shop. I did my first paper round when I was ten and heard my parents talk about the good times and more worrying times that affect all business owners more or less every day of my life. I learnt a lot from that experience; I may not have realised it at the time but profit, how much we could safely draw from the business and cashflow were concepts with which I was very familiar before I set up my first enterprise.
So I would say I learnt a lot from the family business:
· The basics of how money works
- Knowing that working smart was as important as working hard
- I know it’s trite but I learnt to look after the pennies knowing that the pounds would look after themselves
- Don’t over extend yourself in terms of borrowings
- Keep tight control of the finances
- In fact keep your finger on the pulse all the time. I f you look away something will go wrong
- Know your customers
- Finally, a most important lesson – I knew that I wanted to do something on a much bigger scale than the traditional family firm. I dared to go big
So if you were brought up in a home where your parents climbed the corporate ladder or worked for big companies, make sure before you jump into entrepeneurism that you have got the same head start as the offspring of family businesses. You can cover the basics of business by reading or talking to people running small businesses so as to get a handle on the mindset of the person running their own thing. It’s dead easy to do: people who run their own businesses love talking about them and they will all give you some information that is the same as everyone else and some that is peculiar to what they are doing.
Tip from Shaf – Listening to experience
So, the next time you go into a restaurant when it’s quiet ask the owner how their business is doing, what is going well and what, if anything, is worrying them. Do the same in your local IT shop; talk to social acquaintances and so on. You will be surprised how much real, practical information you will pick up.
Being brought up in a family business gives an aspiring entrepreneur a head start. Make sure you learn the same basics as they did automatically before you take the plunge
