Helicopter Parents
This video discusses the term “Helicopter Parents” and how it relates to a specific generation. It is one video in the TeamWorx video series Improving Teamwork in Business and at the Workplace. President Wayne Bennett draws a link between Helicopter Parents and the generation that preceded the Millennials, Generation X. Giving perspective to the action and reaction of generations helps us to derive meaning and understanding from concepts and trends like helicopter parents.
In this example, Helicopter parents are shown to have a direct link to “latch key kids”, a term coined to describe Generation X children returning home from school to an empty house. Millennials are a by product of parents form Generation X and Traditionalists. many of the traits found in Millennials derive from experiences Generation X children had with parents who were disenfranchised from their jobs, and disillusioned with the government. Seeing their parents work long hours at the expense of the family and then get fired when the economy went down or a new president “downsized” forges their beliefs in job mobility, friends first, and work/life balance.
Examples of helicopter parents include calling their child’s teacher, principal, or boss for feedback or to check in, shuttling children to multiple activities often in the same day or evening, and/or doing projects for their child. From a September 2015 The Huffington Post article “In one national survey of college students, 38 percent of freshmen and 29 percent of seniors said their parents intervened on their behalves to solve problems either “very often” or “sometimes.” And, from the same article, “The worst examples of helicopter parenting include previously unheard-of behaviors like parents attending their adult children’s job interviews or calling college professors to argue over a grade. Meanwhile, their kids emerge from childhood without basic survival skills like how to cook, clean or do their own laundry.”
One can prognosticate the Millennials will be “hands-off” and the cycle will continue.
TeamWork Training