Questions That Get Results: Innovative Ideas Managers Can Use to Improve Their Teams' Performance

Chapter 13. Questions That Manage Your Relationships with Your Kids

In many cases when we have worked with business owners and high-powered successful executives, many of them are confident they are in control of their careers and business lives. Their family lives, however, are a different story. At home, they can't claim the same outstanding success or balance. One client confided to us that his family life was a shambles: "My wife sometimes says she thinks she married the company instead of me. With my hectic schedule, it feels more and more like we're two strangers sharing a house. I'm away on business so much; my little boy hardly knows me—I even had to miss his fourth birthday party last week because I had fires to put out at work!"

Often, successful professionals who work hard and put innumerable hours into their careers and businesses will profess: "I'm doing this for my family." That's only partially true. They do, of course, work hard to support their families and keep them fed, clothed, safe and secure. The rest of the truth is that these executives are doing it for themselves, as well. For they have powerful personal drives, egos, and competitive natures. They've also achieved a level of success in their business lives that's very hard to replicate in their personal lives.

It may surprise you to realize why this is so for many of us: We simply don't have the kind of control at home that we do at work. That is, we can control, influence, and motivate people on the job, ...