I recently came across this short note from my son Dan at the time he was in America at college in around 1990. Even though we weren’t then living together, he wrote, he felt my presence around in his head, and this in the form of good memories of long talks, lectures, skits and jokes over dinner.
He went on to say that the things he had learnt from me have given him more real-life information and a way of clear thinking and problem solving than any college course or person ever could.
Why did I decide to share with you what he wrote to me all those years ago? It’s because it occurred to me that he was offering me what one might call an “upward appraisal”.
My performance as a father was top of the scale, he reckoned, in both the closeness and warmth of our relationship and in my helping him to develop as a young man.
Well, as a parent I was so fortunate to have two children who never went through rebellious times, and who were trustworthy. OK it was much to do with how we treated them, but that isn’t guaranteed to lead to happy outcomes.
They were easy to support in whatever they wanted to do without us having to act as stern, curtailing parents, and we enjoyed our cheerful friendship.
The big bonus for me, as I explained when I was giving my talk at the Engage 14 event in 2017, was that my “leadership style” with Dan and his sister Amy, strongly influenced how I emerged as a leader in my professional life.
So now let me ask you to what extent your children share with you how they assess the way you behave with them. Is there sufficient openness for them to identify areas where they would like you to act differently? To ask more than tell? To appreciate more than criticise?
To support rather than inhibit? I often talk and write about the importance of exchanging offers and requests, and here’s such an important place for that to occur in, so that agreements are reached and changes for the better take place.
It might be that someone else can become involved, an uncle or a grandmother, a sibling or a non-relative, who first listens to both sides’ “appraisals” separately and then brings parent and child together. For me it was my Uncle Alex, my father’s elder brother.
Sadly, as many of my readers are aware, my son Dan died in 1993, at the age of 22, so our relationship on this earth was forced to end.
His spirit lives on though, and just like he told me I inspired him as he was growing up, he continues to inspire me. He would have been in his fifties now, as his sister Amy also is, and so now let me share how she and I sometimes interact.
The term that immediately occurs to me is “mutual mentoring”. Just like I have continued mentoring her over the decades, she and I have been relaxed about what’s become known as “inverse mentoring”, as she is permanently concerned about my wellbeing.
Usually, it’s to reinforce that how I am approaching some issue is very OK, but sometimes it’s to offer an alternative perspective.
That requires some boldness, but happily, Amy’s emotional intelligence is such that she knows how to express her views in ways that are least likely to generate pushback from this old man. The more the differences between us on a particular issue, the more we are likely to laugh about it and, well, sometimes I cave in and sometimes I hold firm.
My readers also know only too well that I love what are called Adult-Adult relationships over Parent-Child ones, as these are much more likely to be constructive and solution-oriented, resulting in both being better off as a result.
Let me now therefore invite you, as a mother or a father, to reach out to your children and ask them how they feel about the way you interact with them. See what they like about your attitudes and behaviour, and what they would wish to be different.
Let me also ask the sons and daughters who are reading this to reach out to your parents in a similar way.
Mike Eldon is chairman of management consultancy The DEPOT, and co-founder of the Institute for Responsible Leadership. [email protected]
