I’m currently reading a book called Parenting with Love and Logic Teaching Children Responsibility by Foster Cline, M.D., and Jim Fay. You are probably wondering what in the world this has to do with business, let alone a blog post here. In reading this book, I realized the concepts could be applied to any relationship.

The book Everyone Wins! that I posted about last week was about conflict resolution. The Love and Logic book is about teaching children how to think for themselves so that they can problem solve and make good decisions on their own. Sometimes letting a child fail teaches them more than if we were to forcing them to succeed. One of the examples in the book discusses letting a child miss the bus and being confined to their bedroom for the school day. Their parents inform them they need to explain to the teacher (and the school) why they missed class as the parent doesn’t write an “excuse” letter for them. Most children don’t miss the bus again.

What if you let one of your staff miss a deadline for a major project? Would you have the guts to let that person explain to the other employees why they missed the deadline or would you try to finish the project yourself so that the deadline could be met? If that staff had to take responsibility for failing to complete a project as promised and there were consequences (such as an CEO or deductions in pay/missed bonus opportunities) it is unlikely that they would miss a deadline again.

If these concepts were applied in the business environment it might be a little frustrating for the supervisors at first, but in the long run they would end up with better employees. Even though Love and Logic is not a business book, it is about creating positive and respectful relationships as well as teaching the “younger” (younger does not necessarily mean a young person) staff responsibility. Don’t we need these skills in business too?