Usable Insight – “I’m sorry” is not enough
Teenager: “Just let me do it. I’ll take complete responsibility for it.”
Parent: “Do you know that taking complete responsibility means saying your sorry after you mess up, paying back the people your mess up injured or hurt, learning what you will need to do differently to not repeat it in the future and then committing yourself to doing that different thing going forward so you don’t mess up again.”
Teenager: “I didn’t agree to that.”
Parent: “Well what does taking complete responsibility mean to you?”
Teenager: “It means I’ll say, ‘I’m sorry’.”
Do you get the feeling that teenagers are not the only people who need to learn this?
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January 13th, 2010 at 8:53 am
My older brother taught me two very important lessons growing up:
1) If you borrow something from someone, return it to them in BETTER condition than they loaned it to you. Then they’ll know that you’re responsible, can be trusted and will not hesitate to help you out again in the future.
2) If you mess up something, then fix it to BETTER than it was before the damage. Then the other person / party will know that you are accepting responsibility for the foul up, that you truly realize the impact of your actions, that you can be trusted to do the right thing without having to be forced, and they will most likely forgive the incident knowing you’ll exercise equally sound judgement in the future.
January 13th, 2010 at 9:16 am
Andy, I love what your older brother taught you!
January 23rd, 2010 at 9:27 pm
Mark,
I appreciate this scenario and think you have a great point. But I do feel that many parents put way too much emphasis on not messing up and I wonder if this would only contribute to it.
I am a bit young to be a parent. But, when I am I want to encourage my children to take risks understanding the full extent of their mess-ups; I also want them to know that I am there to support and help them learn through it.
Your scenario makes me feel as if that kid is awfully on her own. Why should she even bother testing the water?
Thanks for getting me thinkin!
-Nicky