How to Give Your Teens Successful Leadership Skills

Your teen can stand out and lead.

The key to helping your teen develop successful leadership skills is to provide rich opportunities for learning and practice. While having natural curiosity and a positive, motivated attitude can pay dividends, the real payoff is hands-on leadership activity. Understanding the complicated communication skills, organizational requirements, and risk-taking nuances of leadership comes best through experience. Actively seek out ways to involve your teens in organizations and experiences that call on them to lead.

Instructions

1. Support involvement in a team, community group, club or other organized activity. Encourage your teen's interest to be involved, and look for opportunities to discuss the leadership skills needed to navigate complicated situations.

2. Help the teen find a job. Work builds character and provides the experience of responsibility, real life group dynamics and an early opportunity to earn rewards for hard work.

3. Teach and model organizational skills. In early leadership development, qualities like being on time, prioritizing tasks and attention to detail can set your teen up for leadership success.

4. Provide your teen with the opportunity to interact with diverse cultures and classes. The world is a constantly diversifying environment, and your teen will need to lead across culture, ability, economics and gender differences.

5. Read a good leadership book together and find time to talk about it. When coupled with experiences where your teen can apply the learning, real leadership skill building can grow rapidly.

6. Locate a leadership skills building workshop and enroll your teen. Many community centers, Boys and Girls Clubs and the YMCA offer workshops that teach leadership skills.

Tips & Warnings

• Role model the skills you want incubated. Your teen is always watching your behavior, so be her mentor.

• Look for volunteer opportunities. Make volunteering a family practice. Teens who understand charity, giving and compassion carry that knowledge into their leadership.

• Developing leaders is best done in a multifaceted way. Combine the examples to get the greatest impact.

• Teens can confuse being a leader with being a tyrant. Help your teen to lead with compassion and integrity.

References

• KSBY.com; Building Leadership Skills in Teens; Monica Quintero; July 2010
• Teens to Teams: Team Building and Leadership Training

Resources

• CIO Insight; 11 Books to Recharge Your Leadership Skills; Dennis McCafferty; June 2011