My daughter is nearly 10 years old, and per a recent Newsweek cover, is going on 15. Her school recently sponsored a phenomenal presentation on how best to prepare kids for the tricky act of maturation in a slightly confusing world. Deborah Roffman, a vivacious, 35-year veteran teacher of The Park School out of Baltimore, led the session.
Deb started off sharing five needs kids have until they hit their early twenties and as I sat there, furiously generating my trademarkable scrawl, I realized some interesting parallels between raising kids and the art of engaging employees.
Once kids are out of school (and out of the house!), their employer, and more specifically their leader/manager, takes over in providing these needs to varying degrees. I was struck by the starkness of the crossover; there is a very similar dynamic between enabling kids to navigate “growing up” and allowing your employees to “step up.”
| Kids Need | Employees Need | |
| Affirmation | Unconditional love and no sense of entitlement; mistakes are “mis-takes” | Belief and trust in their abilities, with no entitlement; mistakes are still “mis-takes” |
| Information | Straight talk that is age/stage appropriate | Straight talk that is timely and level appropriate |
| Clarity About Values | Creation of family values that can be used as benchmarks | Creation of team/company values that can be used as benchmarks |
| Limit Setting | Both to know what the limits are AND to understand they control the when/how much they are relaxed | To appreciate the boundaries of their function AND what they must do to expand them |
| Anticipatory Guidance | Based on our life experiences, we set expectations and scenario plan should something go wrong | As leaders, based on our career experiences, we set expectations and provide support should something go wrong |
One slightly major and obvious difference between dealing with these groups is you get to hire your employees, versus your kids (though my daughter just scheduled my quarterly performance review). This noted, I am amazed at the productive power of simply treating your employees like family.
Lawler Kang
Karen Davis
Patricia Aburdene
