5 Brilliant Things I Learned About Business From My 7 Year Old Son
My 7 year old son started a business last weekend.
It was his decision. He started telling me about his ideas and what he would do. My first thought was: “This is fantastic! An opportunity to teach my son about business and life!” Little did I know that it was going to be the other way around … 🙂
Like we well-meaning parents often do, I first tried to guide him in shaping his ideas, but soon realised that I was merely interfering. He already knew what he wanted to do and didn’t need my help. His ideas were brilliant already and there was nothing to add. So I just let him run with his ideas and started listening instead.
What amazed me was that his ideas mostly aligned with what I know about people and online marketing but he added some simple uncomplicated brilliance to them that only a child can.
This is what I’ve learned about business from my son so far:
- Most importantly: have fun! Do whatever is fun and don’t worry about having all details. Do what feels right for you. Do what you are excited about. You’ll learn more about yourself, your business and the opportunities out there as you go along and that will organically shape your business in the future.
- Create products that you love. That way you’ll love what you do everyday. Some of my son’s creations may not make business sense to me but I think he knows his market better than I do 🙂
- Create your business one step at a time. Trust that the next idea will come once his ready for it.
- Expect success like a child in everything you do.
- Just start with whatever you got. My son is creating his products out of our recycling bin at the moment! No huge investment required!
No matter what happens, I believe by following his ideas, my son will be learning an important lesson about business, life and himself. One that no one else will be able to teach him, because you can only learn it by doing. It’s the lesson that you can only learn when you get started and get out there as an entrepreneur.
Not to mention what I will be learning…!
Curious to see what he’s up to?
He’s is yet to publish his website. That’s because he’s waiting for me to get the site up and running (another lesson about outsourcing here…). But I’ll let you know once it’s up so you can take a look at it!
Do you have a little entrepreneur in your family? I’d love to hear about it!
Blog post by:
Minna Salmesvuo
Owner & Social Media and Online Marketing Consultant @ Social Media Tribe
