A Family Business is Not an Easy Career

You own a family business. It’s been successful, but you worry that your children simply see it as an easy career. By virtue of the sheer luck of being born into your family, they will always have a job waiting for them.

You’re not wrong to be worried. Experts warn that this point of view can be detrimental to children. It does not give them the mindset that they need to run the company effectively.

Some families have even made children work elsewhere, at least while they are in high school and college. They have to get their own part-time jobs. This gets them real-world experience without any advantages. It forces them to go to interviews, fill out applications, deal with bosses and supervisors who don’t know them and much more. They really learn how to work. They have to try hard and push themselves.

In the end, many of these children do come back to the family business. But they come back to it with practical, real-world knowledge. They know not to take the company for granted.

After all, most family-owned businesses fail as they pass on to the next generation. This is not an easy job or an easy career. If your child thinks that that’s all it is, odds are the company will fail, so the best thing you can do for them is to help break them of this illusion.

As you and your family move forward and plan for the success of your company, make sure you take the time to carefully consider all sides of business succession planning and how your children fit into that picture.