The Code Switch Required From the Board Room to the Family Room; Communicating Effectively with Your Teenager

After a morning of reviewing key performance indicators with her immediate team and then, diving into late morning meetings; lunch with a trustee; and afternoon briefings with collaborators, Jane was both tired and wired. By 7:00 p.m., her afternoon caffeine boost had fully worn off. She was eager to head home to catch up on the news of the day with family members, particularly her teen Lucy who she hadn’t seen in a few days due to competing schedules. Lucy was a high performing student and involved in several extracurriculars at school including the fall play and basketball. Jane strategically ordered take-out to be delivered upon her arrival so that she could fully focus on her family and not worry about who would cook the meal. Jane, Jane’s husband Theo, and Lucy rushed to sit down together all coming from their respective activities. “Tell me everything!” Jane exhaled out to her daughter hoping to dive into the heart of Lucy’s life quickly. Lucy shrugged and gave her a look that said “you aren’t getting anything out of me.” She scarfed her meal down in mere seconds and left the table. Theo and Jane, abandoned at the table, looked at each other in disbelief. “How could she not feel any guilt or even sense of obligation to respond to my question?”

Communicating with politicians, news reporters, and venture capitalists cannot rival the challenge of communicating with your teenager. But like other communication challenges, becoming intentional about how, when, and where you communicate can make all of the difference. Teenagers typically have an internal battle raging that directly impacts your relationship. They do all they can to strive for independence while feeling deeply dependent on you and your family for their lives and emotional well-being. You often feel the heat from this raging battle without doing anything in particular but trying to connect.

My colleagues and I (a high school principal, an executive leadership coach/consultant and myself) brought together teens, parents, and educators to deepen their communication skills in a “Leadership Lab.” We used a research-based framework from the M.I.T. Presencing Institute, an action research center in the Sloan School of Management. The framework is used around the world to address a wide range of social issues. We tested it in a modern high school. Some of the lessons we learned can translate well into our communications with our teens.

First, a pause was necessary. Yes, in our busy lives, we can frequently remain in an impulsive, reflexive state of mind (ourselves and our teen) if we are moving quickly. The pause helps our brains move to a more grounded state where we have access to a wider range of thinking beyond fight, flight, or freeze. For executives with limited time with family, this can seem daunting. However, the pause does not require a lot of time. It simply requires intentionality. When we attempted stillness with high school students – two minutes of quiet without devices – we were concerned they couldn’t do it. In contrast, they not only took that quiet moment but relished in it and wanted more of it when we returned together. We all simply feel better when our heart rate slows, our mind calms and becomes curious and our hearts open. In my new book, this is courage habit number one and there are many more simple, practical applications for the pause in family life.

Second, we considered the different kinds of listening and looked at which would engage our teens. In the Theory U framework, the Presencing Institute discusses four levels of listening. They are:

• Downloading or confirming what we already know.
• Factual, or sharing data/information.
• Empathetic, or seeking, sharing, and attempting to understand feelings and thoughts of the other person.
• Generative, creating an open (judgement-free) space where something new or creative can be co-conceived.

Take a look at these and if you can, attempt to assign a percentage of your time talking with your teen to each of the types of listening you engage in. Test yourself! Take a day and actively observe yourself and your interactions. Our own investigation in our family led to a new rule at dinnertime – no planning, no logistics, no agenda items. Only connection. How often do you engage in empathetic or generative listening with family members?

Engaging the Leadership Lab adults – parents and educators – in empathetic and generative listening took practice and discipline. We asked one student per group to talk about a significant challenge in their school culture. Adults were asked to only listen for feelings and thoughts. After the speaker was finished, they silently reflected on what they heard, taking notes if it helped. When they reflected back to the speaker, they only offered what they heard were the thoughts and feelings communicated. No fixing. No advising. No making connections to their own lives or thoughts and feelings. A parent reflected after the experience, “I used to think I was a great listener until my listening skills were put to the test in the Leadership lab. I am a better listener than I was at the beginning of this program.” Another said, “I went home and used this style of listening with my college-age son and it worked like a charm. I couldn’t believe it!”

For one Mom, also an executive, and her daughter – a high performer in academics and in sports – changing their communication style was literally a matter of life and death. The mother came to seek my support after she and her daughter had been fighting each time they encountered one another. I sought specific details on what those conversations sounded like. In every single one, mom was asking daughter about her homework, her papers, her teacher, her responsibilities growing increasingly worried with her daughter’s nonresponses. Daughter was burned out and angry about her mom’s hounding. My assignment to the mother was to take her daughter out to her favorite bakery. Grab a treat and simply listen with an open heart and open mind. No fixing. No judging…just a reflecting back of her thoughts and feelings. The mom assured me she could do this.

In our next session, mom could barely get through the story of what unfolded, her emotions overwhelmed her. She was capable of empathetically listening to her daughter. When she did, after she gave it a little time, her daughter opened up to her that she was depressed by her inability to keep up with performance pressures. She was sleeping in her sister’s room at night because she was scared of harming herself, she’d become that desperate. Her mom felt a rush of compassion and immediately sought a therapist in which to get her support through this difficult time. Mom committed to finding the time regularly to just listen without advising. Over time, their relationship improved and so did the daughter’s emotional well-being.

Of course, the timing and conditions of our connecting between parent and teen matter too. Driving in a car when your teen doesn’t have to look you straight in the eyes can feel like a safer time to discuss issues. The dinner table can be one of the most difficult times because for a teen, there is no escape and they may feel put on the spot. So finding those moments of connection when you can sidle alongside them or hang out in their space can help create safer conditions for open-hearted conversations.

At times, our deep investment in and high hopes for their future can get in the way of our intimate relationship today. If we become more aware of both the content and context of our conversations, we can become intentional in creating a safe, non-judgmental space for our teens to be themselves. Our ability to create that safe space for their true self (versus their socially and culturally adapted self) helps them grow their identity, their own self-trust, and their confidence in who they are becoming.

The code switches required are from talking to listening; from judging to accepting; from fixing to allowing; from directing to facilitating. You are capable. When you begin to realize that these daily communication stakes are as high or higher than performing well on an exam, you’ll begin to prioritize this critical shift. Imagine the difference between a teen who feels they can come to you with their problems versus one who does not. Consider: How can you create an intentional pause with your teen? How can you create times and spaces to listen with empathy? What are the listening conditions required for your teen to be receptive? What and who will keep you accountable?

Written by Jennifer S. Miller.
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