How To Negotiate With Teenage Children: 5 Fundamental Keys
Adolescence is the stage of life in which rebellion prevails. The rapid hormonal changes, the tireless search for one’s own identity and the frequent frustrations that these rapidly changing situations entail. This means that, very often, adolescents tend not to make commitments and always act on their own
This means that, if you want to find a certain balance in daily domestic and family life, negotiating with these adolescent children is something very necessary. However, this is not an easy task and often trying to reach an agreement can lead to even more conflict and anxiety. But it is not an impossible mission.
The first thing we must keep in mind before approaching a negotiation is that this is a long-term project that requires continued efforts. To believe that having reached an agreement has already enabled the adolescent to enter into the dynamic of reaching agreements and keeping their word is to ignore how people’s behavior works: actions must be converted into habits so that they last and appear spontaneously with little effort.
This means that all the commitment and effort that we save when the teenagers have already assimilated the negotiations must be invested at the beginning of this process, to be withdrawn little by little.
So let’s start with the keys to negotiating with adolescents and young people in the stage of puberty
1. Making the adolescent seek negotiation
Parents and guardians of teenagers have a lot of power over the things that happen in their lives, and using this to improve the degree to which they can accept negotiating situations is completely legitimate.
That means that, if at first these young people do not want to negotiate, we should not force the appearance of pacts because the agreements we can reach are going to be fictitious: they will only exist in our imagination.
So that, When faced with the refusal to take the first steps to accept a negotiation process, it is necessary to act accordingly with the adolescent’s attitude and make one’s own posture inflexible. That simply means that we will set rules unilaterally
Ultimately, if a teenager is not willing to assume a degree of freedom in which he can accept or reject options in a negotiation, then he must follow rules. The message here is that Moving towards a greater degree of independence involves assuming agreements as an adult Negotiating at any price is not an option.
But it is essential that these rules are those that, if breached, we can enforce. If breaking them does not entail consequences, it is as if the rules do not exist That is why we must work on our own assertiveness.
2. Negotiate in an emotionally neutral situation
It is important that the first steps of the negotiation are taken not in the midst of anger and tantrums, but when calm reigns. This will ensure that the other party’s conditions are not interpreted as attacks or provocations and will also help to detect those points that you are not really willing to accept due to their objective characteristics and those others that are not accepted due to what that would mean in the context of a discussion.
Not doing what was previously said to be done is devastating for negotiations with adolescents, even if it only happens once This applies both to those cases in which the adolescent keeps his word but we do not, and to the cases in which it is the adolescent who breaks the agreement and the adult does not act accordingly.
After all, The value of negotiations is based on trust and coherence They serve for eliminate a degree of uncertainty about what will happen if the adolescent behaves in one way or another, and if they do not fulfill that function, they are worthless.
That is why it is necessary to comply with the facts that negotiations have value and can be useful for both parents and adolescents.
4. Returning to previous stages
If we have a streak in which a teenager is willing to negotiate but at some point stops doing so, it is important not to try to continue negotiating by force; As we have seen in point one, that will be like building a fiction in the air, and the pact will not take place.
So that, In these cases you have to do the same thing as said in point number one: do not negotiate and set standards unilaterally. We should not be blinded by the feeling of having made progress or see this as a sign that all previous negotiations have been for nothing. On the contrary, When comparing the return of unilateral rules with the pacts reached in the past, the second option is more attractive
The best thing to do with negotiations is to make adapt to the needs and aspirations of the other party
That means that the effectiveness of negotiation depends on the degree to which we tailor our options to the unique and individual characteristics of the person in front of us. In the case of negotiating with sons and daughters, fathers and mothers can make good use of their knowledge about this person.
