The Wojcicki’s TRICK on Raising Successful People

She is indeed estimable. She raised the Wojcicki sisters—YouTube CEO Susan, pediatrics professor Janet, and 23andMe CEO Anne. Esther Wojcicki, a high school journalism teacher, dropped some hints on how to raise successful people, using a methodology – TRICK methodology – she had used on her girls. Updating the methodology, she left some lines in a Fortune interview. Her words: “The only thing we do now is confiscate kids’ phones, which is ridiculous. They don’t learn anything; they just learn that the phone is forbidden fruit”. She thinks we need to guide kids on “how to use your phone ethically, how to use technology for information” over blanket decision that results to raising a “nation of sheep”.

Wojcicki, or “Woj,” as she’s known to the 700 teenagers enrolled in her popular Media Arts Program at Palo Alto High School, came up with her own philosophy after many years of teaching and parenting. She lays out the secrets to cultivating effective and ethical leaders in a new book, How to Raise Successful People: Simple Lessons for Radical Results. Her tried-and-tested formula? It all boils down to TRICK, a catchy acronym that stands for trust, respect, independence, collaboration, and kindness.

These are the components of TRICK – trust, respect, independence, collaboration, and kindness. The full interview is here.

Wojcicki, or “Woj,” as she’s known to the 700 teenagers enrolled in her popular Media Arts Program at Palo Alto High School, came up with her own philosophy after many years of teaching and parenting. She lays out the secrets to cultivating effective and ethical leaders in a new book, How to Raise Successful People: Simple Lessons for Radical Results. Her tried-and-tested formula? It all boils down to TRICK, a catchy acronym that stands for trust, respect, independence, collaboration, and kindness

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“The ultimate goal of TRICK is creating self-responsible people in a self-responsible world,” – to achieve this one could take a lifetime, going by how being responsible has become such a premium.

Some fine insights from her views: raising a nation of rule followers, a real virus that has bedevilled academic institutions and business entities till today.

I am also curious about why there’s no word in the dictionary that directly defines what it means when another person succeeds, without necessarily meeting your own expectation; perhaps because humans are naturally selfish. So we tend to view success only from the perspective of seeing people delivering what we want them to do, not whether they did so well bar your self-interest; something to think and research on…

When we do not allow people under us to try things and possibly make mistakes, creativity dies; and accusing them of not being good enough becomes self-indictment.

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