How to Establish a Business Relationship with Parents

One of the best benefits of being a family child care providers is being your own boss. Providers can set their own rules:

• Highly structured or no structure

• Many/few field trips

• Lots/no religious activities

• Meat/vegetarian

Providers can’t discriminate because of : race, color, sex, religion, disability, or national origin.

• Why do parents not always treat their provider as a business? Because some providers don’t always understand how to act like a business.

• It is always the responsibility of the provider to set the rules of her business, communicate them, and enforce them. We will never see classes for parents on “How to Pay Your Child Care Provider on Time.”

• Providers should not treat parents as their “friend.” Parents are looking for someone to care for their child, not for a friend.

• Providers may have a more difficult time establishing a business relationship with parents as compared to a child care center.

Tom Copeland -­‐ www.tomcopelandblog.com