Using Your Parenting Skills to Be a Better Boss

Posted by: Lauren Young on July 06

This entry was written by Shari Storm, chief marketing officer for Verity Credit Union and author of the upcoming book, Motherhood is the New MBA: Using Your Parenting Skills to be a Better Boss.

A colleague was recently telling me about her experience potty training her young son. “I can’t believe I actually told my husband he needs to start keeping the door open when he goes to the bathroom! We are both modest people, so we naturally keep the door shut when we are in there. It dawned on me the other day that my son probably has no idea what the toilet is for!”

Parents understand that they are always on stage and they teach by doing. In her book, If You’ve Raised Kids, You Can Manage Anything, Ann Crittenden points out that, whether we like it or not, we are constantly setting an example. Valerie Hudson, a political science professor at Brigham Young University suggests we tend to pay closer attention to the moral weight of our actions, once we realize we are under the steady gaze of our impressionable children. She calls this “habits of integrity”.

The same is true at the office. As managers, we continually guide our people, not so much by what we say, but by what we do. Our conduct sets the tone for everyone else.

If you want your employees to behave a certain way, you must model that behavior. If you want your employees to have a healthy work-life balance, don’t work until 8 pm every night. Conversely, if you want your team to go above and beyond, don’t spend long lunch hours at the shopping mall or duck out early to golf. If you want your department to get along well with others, don’t speak disparagingly of anyone not present. If you want your staff to own up to their mistakes, be the first to apologize when something goes wrong.

Give careful thought to the kind of team you are working to build. Take every attribute you want to see in others and build your habits of integrity around them.

I love the bumper sticker “Lord, please let me be the person my dog thinks I am”. Once I had children, my mantra became, “Lord, please help me be the person I want my children to be”. The same can be said at work. Be the employee you want your staff to be.

Storm blogs on work-life issues at Motherhood is the New MBA.

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