Your financial plan should involve the dreams, goals, resources, and responsibilities of the entire family. If you have a spouse, partner, or children, you may need to provide guidance as your family develops a financial plan. The success of any financial plan is dependent on the support, persistence, and dedication of all people involved. Without the participation of the entire household, you’ll face a continual uphill battle when it comes to your finances.
Your spouse, partner, or children can be a help or a hindrance. As a family, you will face many challenges along your financial journey. But if family members are truly on board, they will work to help find solutions and not create additional challenges for you.
How do you get your family on board with your financial goals? You must inspire them, just like a coach might. A coach needs the cooperation and coordination of each player on his team. In order to get teams to pull together, great coaches lead by example and command the utmost respect from each and every team member. Their team members strive to perform at their very best each and every game, not only for themselves, but also for their coach and their team. Great coaches inspire greatness.
So how can you inspire your family when it comes to your personal finances? Share your vision, in living color, with your family members — your team. When you present your vision, make sure that you include the vivid details of why a goal is important to you and your family, and what accomplishing this goal will enable you all to enjoy. Elaborate on the payoff for putting in the hard work, compromise, or sacrifices that may be required to achieve these goals. The example shown here points out the objective and provides a few suggestions to help family members design creative solutions instead of just focusing on problems.
Now you must figure out how to inspire your own family. On a sheet of paper, write down what you’d like to say to your family as you seek to bring them on board with your financial future. What subjects are near and dear to your spouse’s or children’s hearts? Start there — they’ll be highly motivated to help you help them get what they want.