Does your Family support you in your Home Business?

This subject has been heartbreaking in some cases and it is something that people struggle with a lot more than we all think. This is a universal problem in business, whether it be a network marketing venture, whether it be a home based business of any sort, or a family business, meaning, for example a family run restaurant .

Many couples and many families get along just fine, they support each other, they talk things over and work things out together and have good relationships, and all of a sudden things go a bit wayward when a home based business enters the picture.

When deciding that you want to have a Plan B and want to start a home based business it is important to include your partner and family in the business decision from the very beginning, once you have decided that is your goal to start a home based business, have a family meeting and write down your goals together as a family, and decide what is going to be important in the business life and what is going to be important in the family life.

Sometimes the only reason that a spouse is not supportive 100% is because they have not taken an active roll in the decision making of you becoming a business owner, and they feel left out, if you include your partner or spouse in the decision making from the start you have a much better chance of their support.

There are really three levels of support from your spouse or partner; we can call them positive, neutral, and negative. The positive support would be actively working together and have a good communication within the family, and help to contribute towards the business. A neutral spouse or family would be, not really contributing towards the business but saying “go ahead “I support you but I am not really going to be active in the business, and then there is the negative side, one of the problems that you can get from a spouse or family, is that they don’t believe that what you are doing is a real job, you hear that all the time “get a real job” that isn’t bringing in any money.

The first thing about a comment like that is the people aren’t thinking long term and they don’t really understand the entrepreneurial spirit, and about 90% come from an employee attitude, and that attitude is very slow to change, and some people just don’t want to change it. The other problem is that so many people have been stung by scams and it is really difficult to get people to understand the difference between a legitimate network marketing company and a pyramid scam, if people don’t want to know the difference there is really no point talking to them about it.

One way to describe to your spouse is that network marketing is just another way of delivering goods or services, so you could get goods and services downtown from a store, or from the internet, or signing up for a service from a traditional company, or you can get the same goods or services from a network marketing company, it’s just the structure that is different, so it’s a legitimate business. It’s not a scam and not a pyramid.

One of the problems in relationships, is the spouse see’s you going off to work and now you want to be self employed, and they know that you don’t have the skills yet, and so they are looking out for you in fear that they don’t want you to fail. So if you include them in on the process that it will be a learning experience for both of you, and as you learn you will be setting the PLAN B in motion, so give yourself a time line, as building a business is not an overnight success, So if you can work this out with the family that it may be a two or five year plan, then they are not going to be constantly be saying when you have a hiccup or problem “I told you so” ,because in any business you are going to have challenges, and if any challenge occurs and the family wants to throw in the towel, then you are not going to be in business very long. Also the most important thing, with that kind of stress level you are not going to be able to do your business very well, if you have challenges that you are bringing into your business life, your prospects, your customers, they are going to feel that, they are going to hear that in your voice, and it’s going to be really important that you have a positive a day as you can, as that is going to reflect in your business.

To your success

Garry Lish

"Live Life for a Brighter Future”