Whether it be in business, finances, churches or even the home, if there is poor management it is obvious.
A poorly managed business will lack quality and customer service all while the bottom-line of profits disappear. A poorly run business will eventually go bankrupt.
Good management will reflect in the attitude of the employees, product and profit. It is a business that will grow, meet needs and evolve with changing times.
Some of you may have been there before.
Some of you may be there now.
Some of you hope to never be there.
It’s the place when hard financial times hit. They may come from an un-expected catastrophe or maybe from job loss. These situations can empty your savings before you know it and leave you questioning the future… questioning everything.
So how do you respond?
How do you prepare for these times?
Today was another real life lesson in economics.
The children had some money they had worked for and they were ready to hit the yard sales. They could only buy what they had money for, and Olivia made sure EVERYONE haggled for the lowest price! And if the seller would not come down Olivia wouldn’t let them buy it. 😉
Peach scored some new shades for 50 cents! She lost her last pair so she had to replace them herself.
“Institutions of higher learning must move, as the historian Walter Russell Mead puts it, from a model of “time served” to a model of “stuff learned.” Because increasingly the world does not care what you know. Everything is on Google. The world only cares, and will only pay for, what you can do with what you know. . . . We’re moving to a more competency-based world where there will be less interest in how you acquired the competency — in an online course, at a four-year-college or in a company-administered class — and more demand to prove that you mastered the competency. . . “
I recently set up a Mint account (it’s free). Mint brings all your financial accounts together online or on your mobile device, automatically categorizes your transactions, lets you set budgets and helps you achieve your savings goals. Although I know I am not using it to it’s full potential yet, I love it so far. It is a great free budgeting resource. Take an hour or two and set up an account. I’m going to have my older girls set up an account to help them learn more about budgeting.
Being self-employed makes buying insurance VERY expensive. A couple of years ago we decided to use Samaritan Ministries for our health care needs. Jeff is not on our family plan because he uses tobacco (cigars), so we carry a separate insurance policy for him, but our children and myself are on a family plan. The cost for Samaritans is much less than if we had to carry a normal health insurance policy. We pay $385 a month for all 5 of us. It would be the same price if Jeff were on it.
A couple weeks ago I posted why I believe older kids should have to help pay their own way. Today I’d like to break down how we do a few things and the benefits of living as a family.
Auto Insurance - Our adult children can be on our auto insurance as long as they live in our house. They pay their portion, which is a lot cheaper that getting their own.
Family Phone Plan - We have 5 phones on our plan, one belongs to my mother, who also lives here, we each pay a share and divide minutes. Our girls are allowed a smaller amount of minutes because they don’t ‘need’ as many, so they pay less. If they abuse the privilege of the family plan they are removed and can get their own plan and pay more!
Diana left this comment in the comment section of The Two Most Important Things in Education:
As our kids are getting into the higher teens and they are getting income from various places we have struggled with what to require of them (for example a friend our ours has her children contribute half of any income they earn to the family..but she is a single mom now with 8 kids and they need to do that..they are very hard workers and really take care of each other). We want a family economy but just aren’t sure what to require. We don’t want to encourage mooching as they head into adulthood but feel a bit guilty about having them contribute cash.
Lindsay Binegar, of Greenville, Ohio, started showed a hog at age 4 through her 4-H program. At 19 years old she was able to buy a $40,000, four-bedroom, two-bath house with a two-car garage which she is now renting out to her aunt and uncle.
Lindsay saved every cent of her winnings, including $15,540 in prize money won at the county fair in recent years.
Her dad says she is pretty tight with money! She bought the house through an auction company her father runs.
There are three things that all of us need to be doing so that hard economic times (and they will come and go throughout our lives) will not devastate us.
First, live debt free. If you have debt, do all you can to pinch every penny to get the debt eliminated. The best source for how to go about doing this is Dave Ramsey. There are also tons of websites/blogs to learn how to be frugal. My all-time favorite is Money Saving Mom . I’ve also started using Southern Savers to help me with grocery shopping…love it!
