Are you a wealthy and successful businessman who is worried you’re raising entitled children, like many of their fellow rich kids? You can actually prevent that from happening, according to an article written by Josh Baron and Rob Lachenauer for Harvard Business Review.
Parental choices are crucial
Baron and Lachenauer state that based on their experience working with family businesses, parents have something to do with their kids growing up either believing that the world owes them a living or highly motivated and engaged. They say the common choices all parents make—often with the best of intentions— also significantly increase to a greater or lesser degree the odds that they will become entitled children.
Avoiding the entitlement trap
While the authors have no specific recommendations on how your kids can go about avoiding the entitlement trap, as they call it, they say you can start by asking yourself certain questions that concern your kids. These questions involve their capability to hold down jobs (if they even have a job) and build careers. You may also need to answer questions regarding your own protectiveness of them to the point where they are not allowed to suffer, as well as how grateful they are of being in a family that basically has everything. If the answers to these questions are on the negative side of things, then you may have your work cut out for you to prevent them from becoming entitled children.
It is a sad, but very common sight nowadays: children of successful businessmen growing up to be lazy, good-for-nothings who are not contributing to society. It is typical for these kids to say that they don’t’ need to do anything, since “daddy’s loaded anyway”. However, it would be unfair to say that all so-called trust fund babies are like this. I personally know some children born into wealthy families who are responsible, intelligent and industrious, just like their parents. I agree with the observation of the authors that parents have a lot to do with it. As long as wealthy parents spend time with their children and guide them accordingly, avoiding the entitlement trap is entirely possible.
To read the full article, click here.
