Were you ever taught to manager your finances, at school, or by your parents?
It is incredible when you dig below the surface to see how many people have simply stepped into employment and fumbled around with how they will manage their money.
Financial distress is often not about the amount a person earns, but it is about how they manage their money. We see it so often in the FIFO sector where people step into roles where they are earning double or even triple what they used to earn and within 2 years, they are in major financial distress.
Contemplate the following. Were you ever taught how to:
- How to create and manage a cash flow budget.
- How to save up for things instead of buying on credit.
- How to manage credit cards.
- How to avoid impulse buying and binge shopping.
- How do be prudent in purchasing to ensure you only buy what you genuinely need.
- How to make savings work for you to earn interest.
- How to handle your “Money Ego”!
I had never been great with money. When my son got his first job at 17, I build a smart cash flow budget for him in Excel and taught him how to use it. I reckon Is aw him playing with it, running scenarios, every day for months on end. He was working out how to use his money without ever allowing his bank balance to go backwards. Now, 17 years later, he is money smart, wealthy running a brilliant business.
People with money worries spend a huge portion of their time thinking about their finances, constantly doing the calculations in their mind, ruminating over how they are going to meet their obligations. When employees are in this state, they cannot be focused on their work. They are prone to low productivity, mistakes and absenteeism.
Back in the early 2000’s, I visited a large Melbourne Motor Dealership to run some Work/Life Balance seminars. The dealer principal asked me into his office and wanted to know if I did sales motivation talks. I said I could and asked why. I was gob smacked when he told me he wanted me to motivate his sales team to up their lifestyle can go out and get bigger, more impressive homes.
I replied, “Let me guess. They buy a bigger home, so they have a bigger mortgage, so they have to sell more cars to survive. Am I correct?”
He replied that I was on the money.
So I said to him, “What about I deliver a seminar about self management, self discipline and financial responsibility. Stop spending and start saving. Then you get an investment specialist in to teach them how to build wealth. In a couple of years, they will have no money worries, then your sales targets to them will be a form of sport?”
He looked at me like I had two heads and bid me farewell. I didn’t want that gig anyway.
How can you help your people to get better at managing their money? Reach out if you need some ideas.
