How to coach teens for success in way that will actually work
Starting a business is hard. Raising happy, successful teenagers might just be even harder.
The high school years are a notorious minefield of raging hormones, peer pressure and questionable decision making. Parents see the dangers, but teens tend to respond to advice with eye rolls. Their drive for independence means whatever Mom and Dad want them to do becomes instantly, wildly uncool.
How do you steer your beautifully headstrong — but occasionally wildly dumb — teenager around the very real pitfalls of adolescence when telling them what to do is pretty much guaranteed to produce the opposite reaction?
I recently heard a brilliant suggestion for how to steer teens towards success from the author of the best-selling young adult book series “The School for Good and Evil,” Soman Chainani, on “The Tim Ferriss Show.”
A Jedi mind trick for influencing teens
As an adult, you may not have heard of Chainani’s book series, but your teen probably has. Altogether, the books have sold more than 4 million copies and have been adapted by Netflix, which on its own suggests Chainani knows a thing or two about how teens think. But in addition to penning runaway bestsellers, Chainani has also spent many years coaching teens and teaching them in writing workshops.
What’s his advice to parents? His conversation with Ferriss is full of great suggestions, and if you’re struggling with guiding your teenager towards success and happiness, then I definitely recommend you check it out. But one tip in particular struck me as both incredibly counterintuitive and incredibly useful.
“When your kid takes initiative and does something on their own, like they start making their bed or they start working out after school, do not mention it,” Chainani instructs. “Don’t say, ‘Oh it’s great you made the bed’ or ‘That’s so cool that you’re working out.’ Do not. Then it’s your thing. That means every time they’re going to go make the bed they’re now thinking of your approval and little by little it’s going to stop them doing it because it’s now become your thing. Leave it. It’s their thing.”
Chainani notes he’s shared this “secret” with many parents over the years, but few have listened. It’s natural for parents to want to praise good behavior in kids, but Chainani isn’t the only one who says these attempts to encourage can backfire badly, especially for older children.
Why praise can kill passion
When Margot Machol Bisnow interviewed dozens of successful founders and their parents for her book “Raising an Entrepreneur,” many of them emphasized the importance of allowing your child the space to discover and nurture their own passion.
“Almost every entrepreneur I spoke to was passionate about something. Because they loved something, they worked hard; because they worked hard, they developed grit, perseverance, tenacity. Without them, you will never be an entrepreneur,” Machol Bisnow explained in an interview with Inc. com.
Bill Gates too, when asked how to become world-class in any given field, stressed the importance of genuine passion. “The thing that you’re likely to be world-class at is whatever you obsessed over from age 12 to 18. In my case, it was writing software,” the Microsoft founder told a group of Harvard students.
Being self-motivated to do something because you personally love to do it is a huge driver not only of career success, but also of overall grit and self-esteem. Too much praise from parents, however well intentioned, can undermine that intrinsic motivation.
At the end of the day, achieving great things requires self-directed effort and tenacity. The passions that drive us furthest and give us the deepest satisfaction aren’t about others’ expectations.
If you drown your teenager’s budding passions in praise, they may never learn the pleasure of doing something because they want to.
Understand this as a parent, and you’ll be better positioned to nudge your teen toward a happy, successful, self-driven adulthood.