But its their latest initiative that perhaps gives me cause
to be most concerned – not because it affects 'us' (people currently setting up
new enterprises), but our children: the next generation of entrepreneurs...
As a parent, I'm constantly trying to make sure my boys are
best equipped to get on in the world, and develop resilience to be able to deal
with the inevitable adversity and set-backs that we all face. Part of this is about
appreciating the true value of money, and the need to earn it. But the
governments' latest scheme is to offer primary school children 'loans' of £5 to
set up their own businesses as a means to help them learn about being an
entrepreneur – all well and admirable on the face of it, as it will offer some
children an opportunity they might not otherwise have enjoyed, but there are 2
key issues with this that make me upset:
1)
in the 1980's, there was a short-lived scheme
that gave unemployed people small grants to set up their own businesses as a
means to move out of unemployment: 30 years on, and this government policy has
so impacted the collective consciousness that most people I meet who are
thinking of setting up their own enterprise expect that they're automatically
entitled to such a hand-out without having to do anything to merit it – if this
is the legacy of a scheme targeting unemployed adults, then this £5 'loan' will
surely engender at least the next generation of entrepreneurs to expect that
there'll always be government cash to help them out and so become less
resilient...
2)
what about all the work of encouraging
entrepreneurship amongst school children of all ages that already takes place
through national bodies such as Young Enterprise and Live Unltd? Their
approaches seem to work very well without the need to be offering 'financial
incentives' to participants, and are based on developing long-term supportive
relationships – much more beneficial to any enterprise than a quick cash
hand-out...
If government really is serious about encouraging
entrepreneurship amongst children, then it needs to make some more informed
choices about how it does this: investing in existing, proven national
programmes rather than wasting money on new schemes and managing them would be
a good start; teaching financial literacy from an earlier age would be good too
– I can't tell you how much I despair when start-ups I'm walking alongside
deliberately avoid wanting to understand how the money in their enterprise is
working and as a result, many I haven't been able to 'win over' have
subsequently gone bankrupt, racking up greater personal debt and making people
unemployed, and yet could easily have been prevented but for their being more
comfortable with some basic financial literacy...
So – the government’s latest great idea to stimulate and
encourage business growth and entrepreneurship seems to not only be doomed to
fail (like so many before it), but will so do in such a way that it'll drag
down the next generation and limit the future potential of our children.
