“Tough times create strong men;
Strong men create easy times;
Easy times create weak men;
Weak men create tough times."
————
You need to raise warriors.
Be strong
The great challenge is to maintain strength across generations. It is said that only about 1/3rd of businesses make it through the second generation of family ownership. *
But this multigenerational family challenge is avoidable.
The lure of "Easy times" likely produces some "weak men" in the post-success generation. Admittedly, many other reasons may be offered for the children's lack of success. Time - without expanding effort - works against success. Of course, success has many definitions, beyond business or material wealth.
But those are mostly excuses, diversions, and not in the parent's control.
Within the parents' control is to help their children start strong, stay strong, and finish strong. In order to help children be strong and achieve success, however they define it, parents should Raise Warriors. Warrior children will resist the siren's call of easy times.
Next, discussed is how to make 'strong' the multigenerational family business. This message is for all families, no matter where you are on the generational cycle.
The future is your playing field and strong starts today.
About the author: Jeff Hulett is the proud parent of four adult children and is happily married to their amazing Mom. Jeff is a career banker, data scientist, behavioral economist, and choice architect. Jeff has held banking and consulting leadership roles at Wells Fargo, Citibank, KPMG, and IBM. Today, Jeff is an executive with the Definitive Companies. He teaches personal finance at James Madison University and provides personal finance seminars. Check out his new book -- Making Choices, Making Money: Your Guide to Making Confident Financial Decisions -- at jeffhulett.com.
Raise Warriors
Warrior Parents wish their children to exceed their success. They raise warrior children AS IF they live in a world below the means of the parent's generation. Relative scarcity, in a supportive environment, helps them learn that "the effort yields its own reward." - Gene Roddenberry
Warrior Children are raised to be passionate, appreciative, and to live by The Golden Rule. Warrior children are willing to put in the work and take success-enabling risks. Warrior children behold their life and resources as gifts. Warrior children are raised in loving environments emphasizing "To whom much is given, much will be required." - Luke 12:48
Warrior Children are raised with failure not only being possible, but children experiencing failure in a way that provides resilience as a great life lesson. They learn to fear failure less - while understanding, leveraging, and growing with failure more. Warrior children are raised to "Improvise, Adapt, and Overcome." - U.S. Marines Motto
Warrior Children are raised to act. They are encouraged to be curious, test, learn by thinking, and learn by doing. They appreciate that "perfect is the enemy of good" - Voltaire.
Warrior Children embrace that "good" only results by perfecting the pursuit of their imperfect doing. They intuitively know "... the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.” - Theodore Roosevelt
Warrior Children are raised with love and acceptance. Confidence grows by the child believing they can be themself. They are encouraged to "be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind." - Dr. Seuss
Warrior Children are raised by parents resisting the urge to bulldoze their children's obstacles by wielding the parents' resources. They are instead raised with the parent's wealth reserved to help their children forge their own success. Warrior children learn that skin in the game is the essential way to generate feedback from inevitable mistakes. “The more risks you allow your children to make, the better they learn to look after themselves.” - Roald Dahl
Adult children, raised as warriors are encouraged to inspect the unspoken beliefs endowed by their parents. Successful adult children make their parent's beliefs an affirmative choice, not an implied assumption. “The person who follows the crowd will usually go no further than the crowd. The person who walks alone is likely to find himself in places no one has ever seen before.” - Albert Einstein
Adult children, raised as warriors embrace their own success AND apply their success in the service of others. “Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace…” - 1 Peter 4
Successful adult children,
Raised as warriors,
Raise warriors of their own.
Strong is the family business.
* The Harvard Business Review