Do your kids work in your newsagency? I know many newsagencies where this is the case. Some are even into third generation family employee situations.
It can be a blessing and a curse – all in a day in some businesses. In others it is a delight every day. While in others it can lead to hurtful breakdowns in family relationships.
I know of some family newsagencies where one or more of the kids have resigned or been sacked several times over the years.
It can be tough for your child working in your newsagency – at any age including as an adult. In some cases colleagues will feel that your child has not earned their place – regardless of how well they may be contributing to the business. Your child may feel this too. Often these feelings are not discussed openly, making a situation worse.
I have seen situations where kids of the owner have had it much tougher than other employees – tougher without due acknowledgement.
Some suppliers and or their reps, too, may feel your child has not earned their place. This could play out in how they treat your child and your business. Shame on suppliers and or reps who do this.
I appreciate none of this is new, nor is it unique to the newsagency channel. My goal with this post is to acknowledge a situation in which many newsagents and their kids find themselves and through this to offer some support.
It’s important that there is respect between kids and parents working in the same business and that the family ties are not abused. We need to make sure there are appropriate skills development opportunities. Plus we need to provide opportunities for leadership as skills are developed. Parents and kids need to be appreciative of each other for the additional emotional and practical support family members often provide each other.
If you have kids working in your business, take a moment to think about their role, how you treat them and what it means to have the with you. Talk with them.
If you’re a kid working in your parent’s business, open the topic for discussion.
We are currently discussing this with one of our children who feels his only option now is to work for us full time and forever as he struggles to stay at other employment because he suffers social anxiety.
This has thrown a spanner in the works as we have also been discussing selling our business but now feel we need to keep it for his sake.
I have been giving him shifts recently but I now need to make a full time position which will mean putting off an employee I have had working two days a week for the last 6 months.
Two (including this one) of our kids have worked full time in our shop before but I have never put staff off to make positions for them so this is a bit worrying for me to do as we are in a small town and she is an OK worker but then family should come first and he is starting to lose hope not working full time.
The other ichallenge is teaching him more of what I do so that in time he could run it for us, but he struggled at school, doesn’t pick things up easily and has confidence problems and the anxiety can affect how he feels day to day.
The positives is he is now 24, so more mature and we need to support him however we can.
Anonymous if your other staff member is a worthy employer I would not put him off to give your son a full time job. You sound like you are making a rod for your own back. Part time should be enough for him particularly if he is living at home. I sacked my daughter a number of times because she thought as the boss’s daughter she could come in late when she felt like a sleep in etc. She learnt to be a very responsible worker but needed to have boundaries drawn. She has had jobs in other newsagencies while studying . I don’t think they ever used her to her ability as she new the business inside our by the time she left home to go to Uni. but they were employing family who received favours and did not work on an equal footing with other staff. We paid her the same wages as other staff and treated the other staff as equals. My strictness taught her to work as a team and that you have to pull you weight in any job.
I agree Carol, our six children (all adults now) all worked for us while doing higher
education and they have all left us now (for greener pastures) but we now have the pleasure of having 4 of our 8 grandchildren doing hours for us after school and weekends.
It has been lovely to “reconnect” with my babies as young adults (14, 15, 16,18) and find a commonality of purpose with them.
I think it has been one of my favourite things about the business – not to mention that they know FB etc and insist
that I have a FB page and know how to use it.