Your Kid is Suspended While You’re at Work: Now What?

You’re at work and things are going well.

You get a call from your wife who is apparently driving somewhere because you hear the all too familiar sounds of traffic and wind in the background. She does not open her conversation with her normal pleasantry of, “Hi honey, how’s your day going?” Instead she comes right out and says in a rapid fire, high anxiety tone, that your son has been suspended from school for smoking pot.

That answers the question of the urgency in her voice and where she’s driving to.

The words suspended, son, and pot are words that do not belong together. Like those IQ tests you took in college asking which word did not belong in that group of words.

None of them did.

And just then your secretary buzzes you that your one o’clock board meeting is starting in five minutes. You press the intercom button and acknowledge her.

Your attention shifts back to your call with your wife. There’s a long pause on the phone. She undoubtedly heard the buzz and your secretary’s voice in the background.

With the urgency of these two worlds colliding, the silence between you and your wife on the phone becomes pronounced. You can feel the stress she is under and what she is about to say.

“John, I cannot do this by myself, I need you there.”

As you listen to her words filter through your cell phone you hear the murmur of conversations outside your door as the board members begin shuffling into the boardroom. It feels uncannily like restless cattle that all have something important to say about today’s vote on a key financial issue.

You quickly glance at your watch, the irony of the Rolex crown in the background suddenly seems out of place.

You think of your son and your heart sinks.

Freeze frame.

John is a client of mine.

And there’s a good chance it might be a snapshot of you as well.

I have been consulting businesses for over forty years. Each time I go into a business to help, there are the usual revenue problems, sales problems, or staff issues. However, in each of these areas I always find a personal situation that is plaguing a key player. Could be the CEO. Could be a top sales executive. Or it could be a top technical guy or gal who is just not on his or her game.

So, what gets in the way of an Executive or key player not completely on his or her game? A tough client? Internal company politics? A sluggish sales process?

Those aren’t problems. That’s just the normal business landscape.

What is the real source of John’s stress? The imminent vote in the boardroom?

He’ll live. It’s his boardroom.

And if John’s son has been suspended for smoking pot, is this just chalked up to, “This is what teens do,” and “I’ll get to it later.”

Ummmm...if John’s son is smoking pot, later has already arrived. It took John’s son getting suspended to sound the fire alarm resulting in his wife’s phone call as to how late.

And I can guarantee you that his son has been smoking pot for some time leading up to this. John probably has suspected this or possibly had a run in with it already. The late night father-and-son chit chat in the kitchen was supposed to have closed that door.

Well, now his son is out the door at school.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzt.

That’s your secretary buzzing you.

Decision time, John.  

My cell phone rings. It’s John’s wife.

She is crying and apologizing for interrupting my day.

Funny. I never found helping a teen in trouble an interruption.

Someone should have interrupted a long, long time ago.

If you are facing an issue with a young adult in your life, don’t assign it to some “phase they’re going through.”  

They’re not the moon.

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