Don't Give Your Children, Spouse, or Co-Workers Step-by-Step Instructions
Help them develop Wisdom by teaching them to think for themselves.
In their book Practical Wisdom, Barry Schwartz and Kenneth Sharpe write about the rules firefighters follow when they find themselves in unpredictable and life-threatening situations. In the past, successful firefighters generally adhered to four main guidelines when faced with a wildfire:
Build a back fire if you have time.
Get to the top of the ridge where the fuel is thinner, where there are stretches of rock and shale, and where winds usually fluctuate.
Turn into the fire and try to work through it by piecing together burned-out stretches.
Do not allow the fire to pick the spot where it hits you, because it will hit you where it is burning fiercest and fastest.
Beginning in the mid-1950s, however, this four-point list began to be replaced by longer and more detailed lists (some of which exceeding forty-eight items). The longer lists became extremely specific, detailing exactly what firefighters should do in each situation. The result? Firefighters began dying more often.
The original short list was a general guide. The firefighters could easily remember it, but they knew it needed to be interpreted, modified, and embellished based on circumstance. And they knew that experience would teach them how to do the modifying and embellishing. As a result, they were open to being taught by experience. The very shortness of the list gave the firefighters tacit permission even encouragement—to improvise in the face of unexpected events. Weick [the psychologist studying these rules] found that the longer the checklists for the wildland firefighters became, the more improvisation was shut down. Rules are aids, allies, guides, and checks. But too much reliance on rules can squeeze out the judgment that is necessary to do our work well.1
Rules are great boundary markers. We shouldn’t do away with rules (it goes without saying that we should keep moral rules), but when we tell people not only what to do, but describe each step in minute detail, we paralyze them. They are unable to think for themselves.
I’ve seen this happen, especially in controlling families or places where perfectionism (or the “right way”) is prioritized over everything else. Once, when I was a teacher, I gave a student a “B” for turning in—get this—“B” work. His mother accosted me a few days later, begging for me to give her son another chance at the project. It turns out, she had given her son very specific instructions on how to do the assignment, and she wanted to ensure he did it her way the second time. I obviously said no, but I quickly realized why this extremely bright student struggled in my class when I didn’t tell him exactly what to do, and when to do it.
Parents, let your kids figure things out. Be okay if their science project isn’t the best one in class—make them do a majority of the work. Give them an idea of how to load the dishwasher, but let them figure out how to best place the dishes. Tell them you think they are a smart and will find the answers. Be willing to give them ideas and assistance, but give them space to problem solve. Too many instructions stifle improvisational problem-solving skills. Your low self-esteem and desire to control only hurts your child. If they can’t figure out a dishwasher when they are ten, how are they going to learn solve a complex issue at work when they are twenty-four? Or, will they be like one in four Gen Zers who bring their parents with them to job interviews?2
We all know at least one young adult who has failed to launch (or has launched very slowly). They just can’t seem to think for themselves. They have to be told what to do at all times. But life doesn’t work like this. It is unpredictable. It will pull the ground out from under you and knock you upside down. If you want to succeed, and make a difference in the world, you need to be like a jazz musician: know the rules but be ready to improvise.
As a COO, I’ve learned the same principle applies to the supervisor/employee relationship. If you’re a boss, give your team direction and let them put the pieces together. If you don’t, they’ll always feel the need to get your approval for the smallest of details. You want their expertise. You don’t want a drone. Isn’t that why you hired them anyway? For their experience? Let them work. If they won’t or can’t, they probably need to go somewhere else.
Consider marriage. If you’re a control freak who requires your spouse to follow your instructions (whether it relates to cleaning, landscaping, or cooking) down to each specific detail, don’t get angry when they don’t do things unless you tell them to. “No one ever mows the lawn! I have to do everything!” Maybe they don’t help because they are lazy. Or, maybe every time they do something, you complain that it’s not done up to your standards and then you redo it. You don’t want to live that way.
This is one of the reasons I’m worried about artificial intelligence. If we don’t work to learn answers, will we lose our capacity to thinking critically? I’m not sure. I enjoy using Google to find information quickly, but I also see how beneficial it can be to read a book or a well-written article when I am curious about a topic.
This applies, I think, to the topic of Wisdom—namely, how we develop Wisdom. After studying Wisdom for some time now, I think I’ve landed on a working definition: Wisdom is making the right choice, at the right time, even when there's not a clear moral rule to follow.
To break this down further, Wisdom is cultivating the knowledge, boundaries, and self-control to do what the Bible says. It's also learning from experience and others to know what to do when there is no clear right or wrong decision: where to go to school, whom to date and marry, what job to take, and whether we should buy or sell a home. We aren’t given rules for every decision we must make in life. In fact, I believe it is one of God’s graces that we aren’t. It would stifle us as human beings if, say, the book of Proverbs outlined and dissected every conceivable situation imaginable.
So, it’s up to us to learn and grow, so that we can make wise decisions even when there’s not a playbook (and there’s not always a playbook).
It’s up to us to help our children, family, and co-workers do this, too.
Barry Schwartz and Kenneth Sharpe, Practical Wisdom: The Right Way to Do the Right Thing (New York: Riverhead Books, 2001), 41-42.
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/05/21/gen-z-workers-are-bringing-mom-and-dad-to-job-interviews.html
The firefighter illustration is so good and so helpful
Love that intro. Reminds me of our first kid. We asked the doctor if we were supposed to have a birth plan. She said, do what makes you comfortable, just keep in mind that the more detailed your plan is going in, the more opportunity there is to have to go off plan and that can be its own anxiety.