Small business owners are turning to their dads for words of wisdom to ride out the recession, that’s according to a study from the Royal Mail Group.

Apparently more than a quarter of small and medium sized businesses (27%) have asked ‘downturn dads’ for advice and nine in ten rate his advice as good – higher than any other informal source, including their partners.

However, it’s not all parental advice. The survey of 600 small and medium sized businesses showed that 57% of SMEs used professional sources of advice.

From my point of view, I use my business mentor for advice. Max Felstead
is always a good sounding board and offers the sort of business and financial experience I simply don’t possess. In the current downturn, I have been using his services regularly!

Having said that, I always ask my wife and co-director Alison for her take as well. That way I usually end up with a balanced view.

Although, according to this survey, it seems not all family advice is good: family and friends provided the worst advice according to businesses!

The survey is part of a Royal Mail campaign to promote its its Partners for Growth campaign. It is offering small businesses the opportunity to get free tailored help and advice at its website royalmail.com/growth. Getting hold of expert advice, especially if it’s free, should be a worthwhile step.

Finally, the Royal Mail provides these top four business tips – but of the enigmatic variety:

1. You can milk a cow everyday but only barbeque it once

2. Don’t pay until you see the whites of their eyes

3. There is no settling the point of precedence between a louse and a flea

4. Slowly slowly catchee monkey – don’t grow too big too quick

Who do you turn to for business advice?