Talking To Teens: Expert Tips for Parenting Teenagers

Andy:
We're talking today about money for teenagers. How can teenagers make money, how can they save money? That's super important, and then how can they actually put that money to work for them and use it to do cool things in their life, accomplish things that they want to accomplish. You are the man to talk about it. So why is that? How did you get into this field? How did you develop this specific area of expertise and what inspired you to write a book about it?

Chris:
Gosh, five big questions straight out of the gate. I love it Andy, I love it. Firstly can I say thanks so much for inviting me to Talking to Teens. You've been so prolific with all your episodes and it's a thrill to be here so thank you and hi to everyone listening and I appreciate your time, so thanks Andy my man. I hope you can understand my English accent as well.

Andy:
Yeah, we like it. It sounds classy.

Chris:
Very Downton Abbey.

Andy:
There we go, yes.

Chris:
There we go, love Downton Abbey. Well to answer your first question I mean longish story short, but essentially... I'd love to know your thoughts on this as well. I think there's two things that are not taught in school. One is mental health and two is financial literacy. I'm just a bigger advocate on mental health that is essentially is everything in life, but we're not here to talk about mental health of course, as important as it is. But financial literacy just as important, how many of us as adults struggle financially? Most of us, including myself, to varying degrees because simply we haven't been taught the skills from an early age and I think to compound to that is the challenge that most parents know that they should be teaching or their child or their teen should be taught something about finance, but they don't feel qualified to teach it themselves so we essentially kind of duplicate this. You know the old saying, "We repeat what we don't repair." It's absolutely true in life.

Chris:
So we're kind of caught in this endless cycle of never really knowing what to do with our children and teens, and so to answer one of your other questions about how I kind of came to do this. For the last gosh 12 years or so I've taught, if you like, entrepreneurship how to create mainly online businesses, that's really kind of been my thing. I love online, I love being able to automate things as much as possible. After you do a bit of initial hard work, it is work, like anything worth achieving, but I'm always reminded of something Brian Tracy once said. He said, "All skills are learnable." I always loved that saying, that really impacted me as a younger man. I thought all skills are learnable.

Chris:
The reason I'm mentioning that is because essentially creating an online business is a skill, which therefore can be learned. So I spend a long time learning this myself and then I don't know if it's because I'm English, but I found being able to explain things that are seemingly complex, is an easy to understand manner, if you like, a skill of mine. I think I can explain things simply only because I need to understand things simply. The reason for telling you this whole story. So as a result I would put on events for adults about teaching entrepreneurship, but it was interesting because most... I'm generalizing a little bit, but certainly a lot of adults would have limiting beliefs and ideas about oh that can't be done, and often adults would bring their children or their teens to some of these talks we put on. You know where this is going now. And it was the children, the teens that were more open and receptive.

Andy:
Sure. Hey yeah, possibilities are endless, right.

Chris:
Exactly, and my business partner and I, at one event actually it was my business partner's event. At one event there was an 11 year old young man that had come along, implemented something that we talked about, and during the lunch break had made something like... It wasn't loads, but it's something like $115. Then after the lunch break kind of came up almost sheepishly and we brought him up on stage. You can see all the adults in the room were like, "You little," you know what. "How dare you. How dare you prove that this can be done if we get over ourselves and learn some skills?" So essentially this is a longish way Andy, forgive me, of answering your questions, which is why we realize that maybe we should aim at teaching children and teens skills that can set them up for life. And also, of course, they obviously have time more on their side.

Chris:
We realized that this is actually something that I think children and teens will benefit from. Teaching financial literacy is arguably one of the most important things that you can teach for a child because here's the thing, when somebody gets... Sorry, I get so excited about this Andy. When you teach a child or a teen something where you can actually see a tangible result like let's say some extra dollars or pounds or euros in a bank account. That's obviously a tangible thing you can physically see rather than a soft skill, let's say like confidence. Which is of course just as important, but arguably more difficult to manage. But my point is, when you can see the result of implementing something, ironically, although we start with teaching finance, it actually does impact somebody's self-esteem. If you look after your finances you're probably going to look after your health better. If you look after your health you're probably going to look after your relationships a bit better.

Chris:
So really the whole goal with our company is to empower children and teens to lead extraordinary lives, but this starts with getting a grip on finances because that's tangible. But then we want to expand out, and as I say, talk about and teach about good goal setting and creating good routines and habits and impacting others and giving back to your family and to your community, and really making the world pleased that you were put here, shining a light and becoming... It sounds terrible corny, forgive me, but becoming the best version of yourself. So that's our bigger goal and it starts by getting a grip on how to understand money.

Andy:
So in the book you kind of go through these four steps. You call it LEAP, L-E-A-P, which stands for learn, earn, accelerate, and then play. Why are those the four steps of the process?

Chris:
Well that's a great question, so the listeners are talking to the teens really get a clear reference of what we're talking about. Our company's called FUNancial Freedom. Not financial, FUNancial. Putting the fun in finance. I think I said that a few times in my career. So it's FUNancial because I personally believe that any business, anything should have an element of entertainment to it because it makes the content slightly easier to consume and certainly more enjoyable if it's entertaining, hence the name FUNancial. The reason I'm mentioning that is what we teach, and we have a book that you very kindly referenced, we have a membership site as well, but how we teach... This kind of, Andy, brings me back to what I said earlier. It's one thing to know something, but it's a totally different skillset to be able to communicate that thing in an easy to understand manner.

Chris:
The world is riddled with people that are very knowledgeable about something, but if you listen to them often... It sounds awful to say, within a couple of minutes you're thinking, "I can't listen to this person, it's just dull, it's just boring." We've all been on webinars where somebody, they certainly know the subject matter, I'm not saying that they don't know that, but it's important how we convey the information, particularly to an audience that are on Instagram or on TikTok that within 30 seconds are going to be like, "Dude, I'm bored, I'm out of here." We're very, very aware of that. That's why this LEAP method that you mentioned, L-E-A-P, is how we teach. The L stands for learn, so the idea is as follows. We want a child or teen every month to learn something about finance in a fun way.

Chris:
It could be something like, I don't know, how the banking system works, how credit cards work, what cryptocurrency is, what interest rates are. All these things that obviously as adults we know about, but many adults may not know how they work--

Andy:
Well hey, yeah, I learned a few things in this book too here, yeah.

Chris:
Oh did you? Oh that's very nice of you to say. We've had a lot of parents say, "I'm kind of reading this book myself." That's the L of leap how we like to teach. We want a child or teen to go to bed at night thinking, "Huh, when I woke this morning I didn't know that. I didn't know what the difference between a savings account and a checking account is or an online bank account and what interest rates are and what compounding is." All this stuff that can sound, let's be honest about it, a little bit dull at first. But we want to, again, convey in an entertaining manner. So, to answer your question, this LEAP method, the L stands for learn. So every month or every chapter in the book we teach something, so a teen can sit down with a buddy of his and say, "Did you know this?" For example, let's say bitcoin, cryptocurrency, most people have heard about bitcoin but there's 4,000 different coins out there in the crypto space.

Chris:
So we start by teaching something in the learn section, then we pivot to the E of LEAP, which stands for earn. In the earn section, now that we've shared something in the learn section about learning about money, in the E we say, "Okay, let's go and make you some money," which sounds a terribly dramatic thing to say to somebody and I'm sure some listeners right now thinking, "Oh right, how to make money. It's not easy." But, here's the thing, these days, like I've talked earlier with limited beliefs, once you learn some skills you can setup a business that a child or teen can run from home. For example, every month in earn we introduce a child or teen to a business that can earn them a little bit of pocket money and we pivot every month between an offline business to an online business.

Chris:
One month Depop, for example. Have you heard of Depop?

Andy:
No, what's Depop?

Chris:
Exactly, so Depop is blowing up online. It's an app that you download on your phone, so there's tens of thousands of children and teens that are making regular pocket money, an extra few hundred dollars a month using Depop, which is free, and you take pictures of clothes that you've grown out of or that you no longer want, you put it on Depop, somebody buys it, and you send it out and you make some money. It's like eBay basically, but really aimed at children and teens. So simple, so easy, so much fun.

Andy:
And they're getting rid of their old stuff, you don’t have to clear stuff out for them

Chris:
That's the gain with their parents: decluttering. You're not just throwing it out, you're selling it. There's so many benefits because-

Andy:
They'll start going through your closet too. "Oh hey, do you need those old...”

Chris:
Andy it’s funny you say that because we got some students that are going to local thrift stores, buying stuff for cents on the dollar, putting it on Depop for $10 and what's happening here, obviously making money is nice, but it's allowing often children and teens to start thinking differently. That gosh, this is ecommerce what we're talking about here.

Andy:
Yeah right.

Chris:
This is an introduction into ecommerce, and tell me a time when you can run a business literally, I'm not exaggerating, 100% through a cell phone. You don't need a laptop, you certainly don't need a desktop, you can run it all through a cell phone. We've never lived in this time. It certainly wasn't like this when I was a kid. I mean you're a young guy, but I suspect even when you were a kid it wasn't quite as vertical as zero barriers to entry. In the earn section, again we encourage children teens, often just to start thinking a little bit differently and every month we share a business like Depop and we pivot, as I mention. Sometimes we share an offline business like setting up a yard sale or a garage sale. Hardly anything completely radical, but something that done once a month can make you a few hundred dollars, and again it's not necessarily the money, it's that confidence feeling that you get that you've created this thing that was just an idea in your head a few weeks ago and now you've made a few hundred dollars from it.

Chris:
The increase in self-esteem is incredible. This is only in the second section of the LEAP map and we teach this quite in detail in the book. I'm trying to go through it relatively quickly so I don't want to-

Andy:
I mean, but I just to point out here, you have 37 different ways in the earn section that teenagers can make money and each one of them you actually then spell out how they can do it. This is not something where there's just only one or two examples, there is an extensive list of options for people to go through and some of these are really savvy.

Chris:
Another one is let's say if you have a particular skill, selling that skill on Fiverr is another good example. We know that dozens of children and teens that might be good at, I don't know, using Photoshop or Adobe Edition or some software, or some thing. They might be good at design, making logos, and we encourage them to think about okay, here's a product or a service that you could sell on Fiverr. Jim Rohn, who's generally regarded as America's fore thinker and business leadership once said, "We get paid in direct proportion for how much value we bring to the marketplace. So if you want to make more money the idea is to become more valuable." We encourage children and teens to think about this. "How do we become more valuable?" Like we talked about earlier Andy, by learning new skills.

Chris:
So again, we're just trying to take children and teens by the hand and say, "Look, this is something that you can do. Often though it requires a slightly different level of thinking to maybe how you've thought before." We do what we've always done we're going to get what we've always got. It's a cliché but it's true, so we really want to encourage children and teens, and I've done lots of talks around the world now on the subject matter and it's so incredible seeing during the breaks. I often don't get to lunch or a break or a coffee because there's a line of teens that just... I can see it in their eyes, they're hungry. They may not have had an outlet to share this kind of passion that they want to do something, they want to kind of become a better version of themselves and they realize that this is something that can be done. And as I say, isn't really, although we do teach how to make money, it isn't really about the finance. As I said earlier, it's really about empowering children and teens to become a better version of themselves.

Chris:
Yeah, so that's the first two steps of LEAP. I'm happy to go into the others.

Andy:
Okay, L, E. A is accelerate.

Chris:
I was just testing whether you could spell LEAP and you passed, well done.

Andy:
I read the book.

Chris:
Well done Andy, top of the class. The A step of LEAP stands for accelerate. Let's just be clear. The L stands for learn, that's where we teach something about money. The E stands for earn, that's where we show how to make money. The A stands for accelerate. This is about growing and scaling. In the accelerate section of the book and indeed in the membership site we introduce essentially it's savings and investings. Again, two things that sound incredibly dull when anybody talks about them, so we want to convey this in an interesting way. Many things we teach, but one thing we teach in particular is that you're not going to save your way to wealth. A lot of people think they will. They'll get a good job and try and make as much money as they can and then try and save a little bit.

Chris:
And yes, over 40 years you may be comfortable, but you're never going to save your way to wealth. You do need to have some sort of investment vehicles, and therefore you need to understand what they are. You do really also need to have some sort of side hustle, something else you're doing where you're not relying on a job or the government. You need to kind of take control of your own destiny, and this is really what we teach in accelerate, simple saving systems. We talk about things such as compounding, which again sounds so dull but Albert Einstein said compounding was the eighth wonder of the world. Warren Buffett, arguably the most successful investor ever, when he was asked in his autobiography, The Snowball, Warren Buffett was asked what's his number one tip for growing wealth.

Chris:
Now that's a great question to ask an investor, isn't it, who you think, "Hang on, if I can save 40 years by going straight to the top guy…”

Andy:
Guy's worth $100 billion and probably knows a thing or two.

Chris:
Even more than Andy Earle! Exactly, he knows a thing or two, and without missing a beat Warren Buffett said the number one thing that he's done to grow his wealth is he understood the power of compounding. Again, if we're even vaguely smart, if you're listening to this right now thinking, "I don't even know what compounding is." That's fine, most people don't, but my point is don't you think we owe it to ourselves to at least do a Google search and understand it? Because if Warren Buffett's saying this, if Einstein is saying this, we should think, "Okay, maybe I need to investigate this." And again, this is children and teens of course have the luxury of time on their sides, so we really want to encourage children and teens to say, "Look, I know compounding sounds dull, but here's why it's not." Because if at 10 or 11 or 13 or 15 you understand it, by the time you're 30 you can have seven figures in your bank account if you understand compounding and implement some simple saving systems and simple investing systems, which is what we teach in the accelerate section.

Chris:
That's kind of what we go through in the accelerate bit. Which brings me on to P for play. So the last bit of LEAP, L-E-A-P, P stands for play and in the P section play is really all about... It's really all about impact, it's really all about... I almost hesitate saying this because I don't want to sound cliché and lot of people say things like this and don't really mean it, so that's why I sometimes resist saying it, but they say things like, "Giving back." It makes them a very wordy person to say that, but we genuinely do mean it. We encourage children and teens to start living in a scarcity mindset, which incidentally 95% of people... In fact let me zoom out a little bit, 95% of people are in debt or scarcity right now. What that means is, it means if you go out to a restaurant the first thing you look at is the right hand side of the menu when you're looking at the prices, regardless of what the food is. When you're thinking of vacation first thing you look at is the price.

Chris:
Now no judgment, absolutely nothing wrong with that, 95% of people are in the debt and scarcity level, but it doesn't mean we have to stay there. The first step out of that is to start... Again, if do what we've always done we're going to get what we've always got. Most people have limiting beliefs about money, so we teach in the play section that how you think about money often needs to be addressed. It might be an environment, your situation, could even be a religious thing. There's many blockages people have around money, so we teach to stop thinking in a scarcity mindset and start thinking in an abundant mindset. One way to do that is to help others, is anytime you make some money is to give... And this is one thing we teach. Is to give 10% of it away. That's like shocking, what? Give it away?

Chris:
We want children and teens to identify something that means something to them. It might be an animal sanctuary, it might be a charity that's close to a disease that maybe has effected your family personally, but giving 10% away automatically will force you to get into this abundant mindset. It's with tithing in other words, so impacting immediately your family, your community, and one thing also we like to encourage, we have a two year goal that we want children and teens within two years of coming aboard to pay for a family holiday for your family obviously. Now imagine Andy if you were 16 and you have made enough money from a side hustle he had, you know Depop or local garage sale or selling something on Fiverr or making ebook covers or whatever. Imagine you've made enough money to take your family on holiday for a week somewhere? You are never ever, ever, ever A forget that, but B that feeling that's been instilled upon you as a teenager, that is going to make you almost bulletproof for the rest of life.

Chris:
Yes there's going to be challenges of course that are going to come up in life, but you're going to have the skillset and the fortitude to be able to handle those. So that's really what we teach in the play. It's about giving back, it's about the bigger picture. Yes, of course everybody wants to make money, but we have to ask ourselves why. And really living a life of meaning, what does that actually mean? So I think a lot of people make the mistake in life thinking can they pursue happiness? Even the movie was called The Pursuit of Happiness. Personally I think that's wrong. I think we should pursue something of meaning and happiness kind of comes as a byproduct. If we just pursue happiness often we can end up in quite a nihilistic existence, so this is one of the things we teach in the play section about impact, giving back, tithing, and giving back to your family, community, and others.

Chris:
That my good man is how we try and teach as entertainingly as we can in the LEAP model.

Andy:
I got a couple other topics here I'd love to cover. One of them is debt. You talk about bad debt versus good debt. What's the difference and how do I know and how do I get rid of the bad kind and get more of the good kind?

Chris:
Well this is a great question, so bad debt versus good debt. In the book and in our members area we really kind of dig down deep into certain specifics in the learn section and debt is one of them. We want children to come away learning something, so debt's a perfect example of everybody thinks that debt sounds a negative word, but we do actually teach there is good debt and without getting too granular, if you like right now, although I'm happy to, we encourage children and teens to think about if you are going to go into debt because the money that you need from taking out... Let's say that loan is going to better you as a person or whether it's going to educate you in a skillset that long-term is going to improve your lot, then that's good debt. It's okay to have good debt.

Chris:
Really this comes down to investing in yourself and if there's a financial cost to invest in yourself then don't think that all debt is bad. We go even further, we talk about assets and liabilities, which again I am always aware that words like this can sound... If you say this to teenagers at events you can sort of see teenagers eyes glaze over, assets, liabilities, it sounds so boring. But when it's explained simply that an asset is something that puts money in your pocket and are liabilities that something takes money out of your pocket. Now I can't take credit for that excellent explanation Robert Kiyosaki talks about there in his excellent book Rich Dad Poor Dad, but that, assets and liabilities, good debt and bad debt, is a perfect example of something that we teach in the learn section. A child or a teen will come away thinking, "Okay, most adults don't even know that. Most adults think that debt is bad and should be avoided." Well not necessarily.

Chris:
As I say, if it's allowing you to skill up in an area, and particularly we even dig even deeper. We encourage and we share how to look for trends, what's going on in the world right now with obviously the whole change that we've all had in 2020 there's so many opportunities to learn how to present online, for example. If a child or teen wanted to take a course about, I don't know, teaching businesses how to communicate more effectively using online services. That's going to be something that's going to make them more valuable. So to go back to that Jim Rohn quote, "You make more money by becoming more valuable to the marketplace." This is an example of one of the things that we teach in the learn section, assets, liabilities, good debt, and bad debt.