Helping Our Children Develop a Work Ethic

Helping Our Children Develop A Work Ethic, Part One
Fostering a sense of personal responsibility in our children
By ClubMom Kids & Money Expert Eileen Gallo, Ph.D.


Eileen Gallo, Ph.D., is a licensed psychotherapist who works with individuals and families dealing with the psychological and emotional issues related to money, children, and family wealth. An expert on children, families, and money, Dr. Gallo is also a regular columnist for the Journal of Financial Planning. She is a member of the American Association of Marriage and Family Therapy, the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and the Stepfamily Association of America. She has been writing, counseling and lecturing on the psychological and emotional issues of family wealth since 1987 and has served as and educator and presided over committees addressing key family, financial and legal issues.



Kids aren't naturally diligent or naturally lazy. A work ethic is learned behavior, and as a parent you're the one who teaches your kids to acquire it. If you're like most parents, you want your children to work hard and derive meaning and satisfaction from what they do. Unfortunately, you may be sending them another message inadvertently. Though you may insist that your kids do their homework and help around the house, these requirements alone don't guarantee that they will grow up with a sense of accountability and a drive to achieve. As we'll see, financially intelligent parents encourage a work ethic in many different — And in sometimes surprising — ways.

A work ethic's benefits are multi-faceted. Not only does it increase the odds that kids will do well in school and later in their careers, but it fosters a sense of personal responsibility. Kids without a work ethic tend to develop into lazy, unmotivated teenagers and young adults, blaming others for their failures.

Developing a work ethic in your children is a holistic process. It's not as simple as making them pick up their toys before they can play outside or forcing them to get a job at the local fast food restaurant. To help you grasp the diversity of issues involved, answer the following questions based on the ways in which you've raised your children (or based on your beliefs about how you will raise them in the future):

•Do you give them an allowance tied to doing certain chores around the house?

• Do you encourage them to work hard at school but discourage them from getting jobs because they detract from their time to do homework?

• When you give your children a task to do, do they usually take care of it effectively and on time or sloppily and when they feel like it?

• Do you expect nothing less than straight A's and express disappointment at B's?

• If your child works hard in a class but receives a mediocre grade, do you provide him with positive or negative feedback?

• Do you feel it's more important for your child to work during the summer or spend time learning about something he's interested in?

• Do you compliment your kids for a job well done, even if it's something as simple as shoveling snow or raking leaves?

• Are you more likely to complain in front of your kids about work or to express satisfaction about your job and career?

• Would you characterize yourself as lazy and unmotivated when it comes to doing chores; do you often argue with your spouse about this subject?


Just pondering these questions gives you a sense of a work ethic's complexities and variables. Let's start by defining what a work ethic really is. We define a work ethic as the belief that we are personally accountable and responsible for what we accomplish (or fail to accomplish), coupled with the belief that what we are accomplishing is worthwhile.

As a parent, it's important that you model behaviors and have conversations with your children that stress this work ethic. From the time your kids are little, you want to provide them with encouragement and support for their efforts at home, at school and at work. There are positive consequences of instilling a work ethic in your kids — And negative consequences from failing to do so.

Parents who aren't aware of the importance of helping their children develop a work ethic frequently take the easy way out and allow their kids to slide. Specifically, they:

• Permit their kids to get away with not doing their chores because it's too much of a hassle to keep reminding them.

• Avoid talking to their children about their grades when they perform below their abilities in school because they don't want to get into a big fight.

• Find a summer job for their kids rather than allow them to seek work on their own.

To avoid falling into these traps, recognize the dangers of raising an overindulged child. Being overindulged isn't just for the rich. Many middle class parents are either afraid to set rules and enforce them or just aren't paying attention. They are often so focused on their own hectic lives that they don't realize that their child is shirking responsibility or not putting forth a solid effort at school. This can result in a child who is given too much and held accountable for too little. Put another way, kids with a work ethic are developmentally enabled, while overindulged children are developmentally disabled. Let's look at some of the things psychological research has to say about overindulgence:

• Overindulgence produces kids who lack self-assertion, are more dependent, have less concern for others, and are less self-reliant (the more they are overindulged, the more they need to be overindulged). Bredehoft, D.J. et al Perceptions Attributed to Parental Overindulgence during Childhood. 1998, (16).

• Overindulgence is not restricted to giving kids too much. Overindulgence also consists of doing too much for them and having lax rules and no chores. Bredehoft, David et. A. "No Rules, Not Enforcing Rules, No Chores + Lots of Freedom = Overindulgence Too."

• Overindulgence is a more important risk factor than peer pressure in terms of the likelihood that children will abuse alcohol and drugs. Wilmes, David. J., Parenting for Prevention: How to Raise a Child to Say No to Alcohol and Other Drugs, Johnson Institute (Revised Edition), 1995.

A work ethic is preventative medicine for overindulgence. To understand how this ethic serves as a preventative, let's take a brief look at a critical study undertaken by Harvard University beginning in 1939. In what is known as the Harvard Study of Adult Development, the lives of 248 Harvard students and 500 young men from working class neighborhoods in Cambridge were literally put under a microscope. They went through a battery of interviews with a psychiatrist and a social worker. The social worker then traveled throughout the country to meet their parents and secure a complete history of their infant and child development. The study tracked their lives for over 40 years. They filled out questionnaires every two years, provided records of physical exams every five years and were re-interviewed about every fifteen years. Their wives and children were also interviewed. Socioeconomically, the group was diverse. Although a third of the Harvard students came from homes in the upper 10% of both wealth and income, almost half were attending Harvard on scholarship or had to work during the academic year to support themselves. While about a third of the men's fathers were professionals, half of all of the fathers had never graduated from college. More than two-thirds of the working class families in Cambridge had been on welfare at some time. These two studies make up the longest prospective studies of physical and mental health in the world.

The results of the Harvard Study are eye-opening, especially for parents. In a 1981 article in the American Journal of Psychiatry, George Valliant, the director of the Study, reported that the single biggest predictor of adult mental health was "the capacity to work learned in childhood" — In other words, the development of a work ethic. Men who Valliant described as "competent and industrious at age 14" — Men who had developed a work ethic during the Industry Stage of development — were twice as likely to have warm relationships (both family and friendships), five times more likely to have well paying jobs and 16 times less likely to have suffered significant unemployment.

Our experience with thousands of families over the years confirms Valliant's conclusions. Time and again, we've seen the positive impact of a work ethic on children's maturity and success and the negative impact when kids lack this work ethic.

If you need any more motivation to help your child develop a work ethic, consider a 50-year study by sociologist J.S. Clausen. He found that children who learned what he called "planful competence" in early adolescence had more stable, satisfying careers and fewer mid-life crises and divorces as adults. Planful competence means being dependable, having self-confidence and using intellect to solve problems. Kids who exhibit a strong work ethic have these qualities in spades. They learn how to do things right and to think before doing. This helps them avoid the impulsive, thoughtless decisions adolescents are prone to make, and it helps them acquire an area of expertise when they're older.

We don't intend to make a work ethic sound like an exact science. Some kids develop it early and some later. Some may go through a prolonged adolescence of underachievement until a specific event catalyzes their desire for fulfilling work and meaningful success. Some may drift from job to job until they hit upon a field that is their true calling.

As a parent, you can't control these factors. What you can control, though, is how you help your children learn about jobs, school and chores. If they learn to value a work ethic, they will probably use it to achieve success and satisfaction sooner or later.

The question then becomes: How and when do you instill this ethic effectively? To answer this question, let's look at the three areas that provide parents with opportunities to teach kids to be industrious and responsible for their work: Chores, School and Jobs.

In Part Two, we'll look at helping our children develop a work ethic through family chores.

Helping Our Children Develop A Work Ethic, Part Three
The role of schoolwork and extracurricular activities
By ClubMom Kids & Money Expert Eileen Gallo, Ph.D.


Eileen Gallo, Ph.D., is a licensed psychotherapist who works with individuals and families dealing with the psychological and emotional issues related to money, children, and family wealth. An expert on children, families, and money, Dr. Gallo is also a regular columnist for the Journal of Financial Planning. She is a member of the American Association of Marriage and Family Therapy, the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, and the Stepfamily Association of America. She has been writing, counseling and lecturing on the psychological and emotional issues of family wealth since 1987 and has served as and educator and presided over committees addressing key family, financial and legal issues.


Schoolwork and extracurricular activities are two of the three basic building blocks that help your children develop a work ethic. The other is family chores. When it comes to schoolwork, let's start off with a surprising truth: Pressuring your children to get straight As does not develop a work ethic. It may increase their stress to off-the-chart levels, but it won't help them gain satisfaction from achievement or become self-motivated. Elisabeth Gurthrie and Kathy Matthews, authors of The Trouble With Perfect, note that children need to take chances and possibly fail if they are going to develop a strong sense of self. When parents turn up the pressure on grades, they encourage their children to play it safe in order to achieve a highly ambitious goal. As a result, they're not willing to write a paper on a topic that really turns them on; they'll choose a topic that they think will turn the teacher on. When kids are obsessive about achieving perfect grades, they not only are less willing to take risks, but they're less creative and spontaneous than other children.

Pushing kids too much is a universal problem. An editorial in the Korea Times discusses how graduates of Seoul University burn out from the intense pressure to achieve at school. The editorial writer advises parents not to "force your children to study too much too fast. Let them go at their own pace. Nobody pushed Einstein, and he turned out all right."

While you want to encourage your kids to work hard at school, your focus should be on motivating them to do their best rather than be the best. Consider the following pairs of be-the-best (B) and do-your-best (D) parental advice:

B: I know math isn't your top subject, but if you study an extra hour each night, you can get an A.

D: I know math isn't your top subject, but pay attention in class, ask questions if you don't understand, do all the homework, and you'll be fine.


B: Your're not going to get into one of the elite colleges unless you quit spending all your time playing music and focus exclusively on your school work.

D: You need to find a balance between playing music and doing your homework.


B: We're spending a lot of money sending you to private school, so we expect your grades to demonstrate you're grateful for this opportunity.

D: We hope you'll take advantage of the opportunities to enroll in classes and do the type of projects that are unavailable at public school.


B: It's good that you received a 97 on your fifth grade English test, but with a little more effort, you could have received 100.

D: 97 is a terrific score; tell us what you wrote about


B: To be the top student in Mrs. Jones' class, you need to talk to her, figure out what she's looking for, and give it to her.

D: If Mrs. Jones' expects you to do projects a certain way but you feel strongly that there's a better way to do it, that's O.K. with us but we suggest that you talk to her about your plans.


Beyond distinguishing between these two types of advice in your school-related discussions, you can do a number of other things to facilitate a work ethic. Specifically:

• Communicate through your actions that you believe it's important to make a solid effort at school. It's not just saying that you believe it's important, but taking actions that reinforce what you say. To that end, make sure you create a quiet environment for your child to do his homework-set rules regarding interruptions such as phone calls and online communication. You should also provide your child with resources for doing well at school-dictionaries, encyclopedias, online access for research purposes. Attend school open houses, parent-teacher conferences and your child's school-related activities (sports, plays, music).

• Involve yourself (as opposed to just observing) in her schoolwork. This doesn't mean do the work for her, hover over her while she does homework or correct every mistake on every paper she brings home. It does mean making yourself available when she asks for your help. Assist with drills and help her learn to prioritize assignments. Don't just talk about homework but also ask if graded papers or projects were handed back, what tests and class projects are coming up and so on. Double check with the teachers on a periodic basis to make sure that your child is handing in all homework and what grades have been handed back recently.
Some parents believe that their children don't want them involved in the school process. Don't believe it! Jacquelynne Eccles, a Professor of Psychology at the School of Education of the University of Michigan, has studied programs designed to foster parental involvement in their children's schools. Her research discloses that children want their parents to be involved.

•Initiate conversations about school-related ideas. Too often, parent-child discussions about school revolve around grades. Instead, focus on ideas raised in school. Talk about the subject of an essay your child wrote; or what motivated him to do a particular drawing; or his feeling that he should be allowed to do an assignment his way. Your willingness to listen to him as well as respond with your own ideas will demonstrate that you admire the passion and energy he brings to his schoolwork.

•Encourage them to participate in extracurricular activities that excite them. Some kids aren't particularly excited by their academic classes but exhibit great interest and aptitude in other areas: music, art, computers, sports, ecology clubs and so on. Developing a work ethic around subjects that truly interest and involve kids is important. Certainly, they also need to learn how to work diligently when subjects aren't interesting (such as mundane chores), but extracurricular activities offer an avenue to work hard at and take pride in something they relish. When they do participate, be careful not to dismiss or devalue their efforts. Don't say things like, "I'm glad you enjoy band, but you're probably not going to make your living as a musician, so get your priorities straight." Even if your child doesn't become a musician, his experiences in band will show him how hard work pays off in greater proficiency at an instrument, and he'll take pride in his accomplishments. This is what a work ethic is all about.

Eileen Gallo, Ph.D. and Jon Gallo are the authors of Silver Spoon Kids: How Successful Parents Raise Responsible Children (McGraw-Hill/Contemporary 2001) and The Financially Intelligent Parent: 8 Steps To Raising Successful, Generous, Responsible Children (Penguin USA/New American Library 2005). Their website is www.fiparent.com. Portions of this material have been adapted from The Financially Intelligent Parent.