Kevin O'Leary's Tough-Love Approach to Kids and Money

Twice now I've heard Kevin O'Leary talk about about how he makes his kids fly coach while he enjoys the softer seats and sumptuous service of first class. He tells them that they can't sit up front because they don't have any money. If you're familiar with Kevin's work on Dragons' Den, Shark Tank or on The Lang & O'Leary Exchange you won't be surprised because you'll know that with Kevin "it's always about the money," even with his kids it seems! Let's call it O'Leary's tough-love approach to financial education.

BC HRMA Conference April 2011

While I don't agree with every aspect of Kevin's "business is war" philosophy, I do admire his realistic approach to talking to kids about money, which is why on April 13th I took my seven-year-old daughter to see him do a presentation called "Up Close and All Business with Kevin O'Leary" hosted by the BC Human Resources Association  at the Vancouver Trade and Convention Centre. Actually, I didn't really take my daughter to the presentation, she had to take herself.

One Tough Mom Equals One Tough Kid
When we first heard about Kevin's talk, my daughter was anxious to go. She's a big fan of Kevin's sense of humour, especially when he is being tough on pitchers in the Den. I thought it might be fun to go, too. I've been hoping to interview Kevin for this blog for quite a while. But when I saw the ticket price was $57 plus HST I decided against it (parking would be another $25!).

My daughter persisted so I told her that if she paid for her own ticket, we could go. The funny thing is that even though she is a shareholder and has a healthy pile of cash in her ING kids account, she said that she didn't want to spend her savings. That left us with figuring out how she could earn $57 plus HST.

Ella-Rose's Tip #2

To make a long story short, she spent the second week of March break providing money-saving tips to a group of subscribers (which included David Chilton, author of The Wealthy Barber, family, friends and a few of my blog followers) at the rate of $2 a day for 5 days.

I helped her choose her money-saving tips and did the uploading and emailing (some of the tips were images, some were videos) but the creative piece was hers alone. There were days when she came home from art camp and did not want to "work" but she did it anyways and ended up raising $80, which was more than she needed.

I was proud of her and pleased that she was willing to work so hard to earn money to do something that she wanted to do. She didn't complain. She didn't argue with me about why I was making her pay for her own ticket. She was able to deal with this "tough-love" money lesson with a tremendous amount of fortitude. I imagine that Kevin's kids can do the same.

Up Close & All Business with Kevin O'Leary

It wasn't until Kevin mentioned the "I make my kids fly coach" story again at the presentation that I realized that I have been using O'Leary's tough-love approach to financial education without being aware of it. One of my parenting catch phrases is, "Sorry. Mom's job is to buy the stuff you need,  not the stuff you want."

It seems to be working.

The cool thing about the tough-love approach to financial education is that it doesn't matter how wealthy your family is. Whether it's a first class plane ticket worth thousands of dollars or a front row seat at a Kevin O'Leary talk for $57 plus HST, the point is that you make your kids hungry to get there...and then you step back, do a little coaching and watch them go.

Copyright 2011. Laura Tomas. All Rights Reserved.
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