Beyoncé and Jay-Z Aren't Trying to Start a Dynasty for Their Kids

Beyonce in a black dress and hat, Jay-Z in a black suit, and Blue Ivy Carter in a white dress sittin...

Photo by Christopher Polk/Getty Images for NARAS

Blue Ivy Carter already has a few charted songs to her credit and a Grammy, so you’d assume that parents Beyoncé and Jay-Z are preparing for their kids to enter the family business in their own right one day. Much like Succession’s Logan Roy, who wants to pass off CEO duties to one of his kids, or the way the Kennedys split control of the Massachusetts Democratic Party for decades, it’s easy to imagine the Knowles-Carters planning a multi-generation dynasty that could run the record business for years to come. That isn’t the case, however, as Jay-Z recently stated in a rare interview. Sure, he’s not quite as press-shy as his wife, but Jay has rarely opened up about his parenting methods.

When asked by The Sunday Times whether he thought any of his children, including Sir and Rumi, wanted to make music, Jay-Z was quick to push the assumption back.

“Feeling loved is the most important thing a child needs, you know?” he told interviewer Louis Wise. “Not ‘Here’s this business that I’m going to hand over to you, that I’m creating for you.’”

“What if my child doesn’t want to be in music or sports?” he continued. “I have no idea, right? But as long as your child feels supported, and feels loved, I think anything is possible.”

“[The goal is to] just make sure we provide a loving environment, be very attentive to who they want to be. It’s easy for us, as human beings, to want our children to do certain things, but we have no idea. We’re just guides.”

In other words, the Knowles-Carter children aren’t expected to enter the music business one day, nor take over any of their parents’ other business endeavors (those include Parkwood Entertainment, Ivy Park, a spot on Tidal’s board, Roc Nation, the 40/40 Club, Rocawear, or mentorship duties of Chloe x Halle, just to name a few ventures). That’s an easier parenting position to make when your family is quite economically comfortable, but also a valid one. Nepotism doesn’t seem to be getting the world anywhere.

Although Beyoncé did win a trademark battle over the rights to the term “Blue Ivy,” it doesn’t appear that the musician opened letal action because she wanted to make her young daughter a mini-mogul. That was just to make sure no one else misused her name.

The added bonus of raising your kids to pursue their own dreams is it also curtails the possibility of your children facing off against once another for control of the family business in an Empire or Succession-style battle. We’d just assume that Blue Ivy would win.