Oh, to be in the 6th Grade Again!

Last Friday I was invited to speak at Career Day to the 6^th Graders at Bear Creek Intermediate in Keller, Texas.  Of all the speaking gigs I have had recently this one is the “coolest” adventure I’ve had in a while.  Did you know that 6^th graders will ask you ANYTHING?

In preparation for this awesome opportunity I decided that it might be fun to help these young people write their own business plan to better understand what they wanted to be when it came time for them to speak on career day. I took a chapter from our Great Leader’s Series and did a short, Values-Vision-Mission exercise with these young people. Now you might be thinking that this was over their heads! No way… You might want to do the exercise for yourself.  Here’s a link to the simple sheet they filled out.

I had them do the first exercise and then ask them who wanted to share the stuff they really liked.  In uncovering their values or what they valued I asked them what really made them happy.  When you ask a bunch of 6^th graders if they want to share their answers, be prepared for every hand in the room to fly up!  I did not take enough prizes… There were 7 classes with about 20 to 25 students each!

This 20-minute exercise was awesome. These young people are full of vision. I had students who wanted to be Doctors, Professional Athletes, Ninjas, Game Testers, and my personal favorite-“A Turtle Savor”.  That’s how she wrote it. I thought she meant savior but now I believe she meant, one who saves turtles. We talked about how a vision was different than just dreaming because lots of people made wishes or dreamed about being this or that.  Those with a mission-or the “how will I get to be in a position to save turtles” are the people who get to do what they want to do.

I then asked these bright students to guess what I did.  So if you’ve looked at the sheet you can see that I put my title, CEO of TrainerTainment at the bottom.  After about 4 guesses, a student would say, “You are a CEO!”  I love enthusiasm.  Spend some time with 6^th graders and you’ll see plenty of enthusiasm.  They were pretty excited to hear that I got to work at family fun centers.  I was amazed at the questions these guys asked.  Among my favorites were:

• How much do you make? I told them that as the CEO I don’t always get a paycheck. Sound familiar business owners?  I explained that I participated in the profit of the company and had been very lucky in the last six years to grow the business every year.  I told them how much revenue our company had brought in each year and that I got to keep about 28-32% of that money.  The math teacher LOVED that answer and they all went to work on the math.
• That leads me to the next question which was, “How do you use Math in your business?”  Great question; and so I got to talk a little about P&L and they loved figuring the percent of profit.  I thought it was really cool to watch them get excited over understanding how math worked in a “real world” application!
• Another scholarly question was, “Do you use Social Studies in your job?”  Since I had been to Dubai recently I was able to talk to them about Dubai a little. And the fact that I get to travel all over the United States and Canada gives me the opportunity to discover differences in people, food, culture, and many other things.  Honestly it was a fun thing for me to think about in having to answer their question. I’m so glad no one asked me about geography since I ALWAYS have to look at the map to understand where I am!
• A very uncomfortable question came in the last class when a young woman asked, “How many people have you fired?!”  I really had to think about that and couldn’t come up with a number.  I settled on 10; and answered that I didn’t have any positions in the company that were “just a job”.  I hate firing people and it was very disconcerting to stop and think about.

They asked a lot of other great questions.  I think my most favorite moment came when one young man who was guessing what I did raised his hand with great assurance and said, “I know what you do, YOU are an …. “emotional speaker!”  Now he stumbled trying to find the right word – but I believe he meant to say motivational speaker… I think his version was probably more accurate.

I am very emotional about what we do.  I love helping you!  As we move into the summer time I hope you’ll reach out and ask us for anything you need!  And hey, if someone asks you to come speak on Career Day, you should say yes immediately.  It was awesome and you might learn something about your job that you didn’t even know you knew!

What have some of your Career Day moments looked like? Tell us below in the comments section!