I wrote a post a while back about how we Baby Boomers have become helicopter parents — hovering over our children during every step of their development. I also speculated that this could dampen what could become the most entrepreneurial generation in over a century.
At that time I heard some people joke that they could just imagine that some day a “helicopter” parent might hover over their children right into their entrance into the job market. Well, it seems that it is no joke and that day is now here. I have heard first hand accounts of parents showing up at job interviews with their children — these were graduate students, mind you. In today’s USA Today there is a story about parents trying to interject themselves into getting internships, finding full-time jobs, and even try to get directly involved in the negotiating process!
“Psychologically, it’s somewhat eroding. When an employer is hiring someone, they’re hiring an adult for an adult job, and then they have to deal with a parent,” says Charles Wardell in New York, the managing director and head of the northeast region at Korn/Ferry. “There comes a time when you’ve prepared children, and you need to let go.”
In my opinion, letting go should start somewhere around their early teens, not early thirties. Let them stumble, let them fall, and for goodness sake let them learn on their own from life experiences.
As I stressed in an earlier post, “We seem to have forgotten that failure, in fact, builds character. And it is the fear of failure that inhibits creativity and keeps us from learning….You will fail. Failure is a prerequisite for success.”