I didn’t know when I first began having children that I
would learn more from them than they would from me. I certainly didn’t expect to learn about
success in business from watching my youngest child, but that’s what
happened.
For
awhile, I’ve been working at making freelance writing into a full-time
career. It’s a dream I’ve had since
college. I’ve always known how to write,
but I needed to learn how to market myself to succeed. There have been many days I’ve just wanted
to give up and do something else. Then, I
thought the successes of my 11-year-old son.
This
child is the youngest of four. He is
the classic youngest child. He is funny,
smart, loves attention, talks incessantly and everyone in the family adores
him. My husband and I also believe that
he’ll probably become a millionaire at a young age but will continue to live at
home for free, because, well, it’s free.
Since he
was able to walk and talk, this child has been intrigued by money. He would pick up coins he found and put them
somewhere safe. He’d watch transactions
that involved money. Quickly, he figured
out that if he had something to sell, people would pay him money. And off he went.
These
are the lessons I’ve learned from him.
First
Lesson: Plan and Execute. When he was 4, we were doing some large
scale renovations to our house. My son
decided that old scrap pieces of sheetrock provided excellent material for
large artwork. He began gathering them
up, painting pictures on them and created an art shop in the corner of the
house. To him, this was not a pretend shop. Each piece of art had a price and family
members were expected to purchase something for full price. He succeeded and made the sale not just because
he had a captive audience but because he had an idea, put together a plan and executed
it. At age 4.
Second
Lesson: Have confidence: A year or so
later, my child was a little older and still finding ways to make money. One day, he was bored and I gave him
play-doh. Instead of seeing it as a
child’s toy, he saw an opportunity to make more money. He began making play-doh sculptures. Then, he got a box and a chair and went out
to the cul-de-sac with his sculptures.
I almost wanted to cry for him.
He wanted to sell play-doh sculptures on a quiet cul-de-sac in the
middle of a workday. My son located the contractors who were doing
work on a neighbor’s house and sold a couple of his sculptures to them. My son never lacks confidence that he will
succeed and make the sale. As a result,
he always does.
Third
Lesson: Just do it and don’t
waiver. The same weekend every year,
our neighborhood has a garage sale.
It’s a great day to have a garage sale, especially if you’re like me and
hate putting them together. You don’t
have to advertise, because the neighborhood has done it. My son
has frequently put out items he wanted to sell.
This year, at 11-years-old, he took it to a whole new level. The night before, he found items he wanted to
sell. These were not just one dollar
junk items. Instead, he looked for
higher dollar items and researched what they were selling for online and then
developed his price points. His garage
sale was about quality not quantity. The
next morning, he was up early and working hard. A few times, people would ask if he had
specific items they were looking for.
If we had them, he’d sell them, with my permission, of course. Before noon, he had sold almost every item he
had put out. He negotiated very little on prices. It was his best money-making venture
ever.
I’m sure
I’ll continue to learn from my son. My
future success in business will largely be owed to him.
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