How to Have a Highly-Productive and Happy Home: An Exclusive Interview with Kathy Peel
In her engaging and entertaining style, she delivers helpful advice and smart solutions on how to create happy homes, conquer clutter and get organized, simplify busy schedules and build a strong family team. Best of You Today was given the unique opportunity to have an exclusive interview with Kathy about her techniques for organizing homes.
BOYT: What inspired you to write the book “Busy Mom's Guide to a Busy, Organized Home”?
Kathy Peel: It is the book that I wanted to read when my children were young. I really wanted a book like this because there are so many things I didn’t know. They were the kind of things I felt like I should know but I just didn’t; like how much allowance to give, how to get finicky kids to eat or things about child discipline or how to save money on different things. The Busy Mom’s Guide is more of a reference book. It’s not something you sit and read; it’s more of a reference for when things come up like ideas for a creative birthday party or creating a good homework routine or ways to get your family to help around the house without nagging them.
BOYT: We know you’re known as “America’s Family Manager.” What exactly is a “family manager”?
Kathy Peel: A family manager is in charge of overseeing all of the operations of a home. Somebody in the home needs to be designated as a family manager. In some homes, moms are the family manager but in other home it makes more sense for dad to be the family manager. It’s just a matter of what the smartest thing is, but somebody in every family has to be the family manager. You can have co-managers. It’s just very important to know who is responsible for what. The family manager system has saved my sanity. There are seven departments that need to be run. Those departments are home and property, you have to take care of all your stuff and maintaining things; food, someone has to oversee meals; family and friends, this is kind of like the HR department; finances; special events, somebody has to organize the birthday parties, holidays and vacations; time and scheduling, you have to get the right people to the right places at the right time and the last department is self management. If you don’t take care of yourself, there’s no way you can manage the rest of this stuff by yourself. It’s a huge stress saver in a family to sit down and say who is going to do what. I hear a lot of conscious moms say they do everything and their husbands and kids don’t understand. As a family manager you have to know that part of managing is educating your team members. If you want to have a family team that works together, you’ve got to empower that team and educate that team.
BOYT: What is a fun way to get everyone pitching in to help without nagging?
Kathy Peel: I always tell people to start with a family meeting. I tell conscious moms to do it at the table, put food in the middle of it and look at each person and say, “I really want our home to be a great place to be. I want to be a good mom and a good wife. I really want to stop nagging.” Family members need to know what’s in it for them, so you need to look them in the eye and say, “Hey, you know what? What would make home a good place to be for you?” You just go around the table and listen to each one of them answer the question. You just keep your mouth shut and listen to them talk. It’s going to be very valuable because they need to know that you care about what they think. The next thing you need to do is take your turn to talk. Print out the “Who is responsible for what list” and give them a list of things that has to go on in the home in order for it to operate. You obviously can’t delegate many things to a three-year-old but he or she can help with clean-up time or even put a sock on their hand and tell them to wipe off baseboards. They aren’t going to help you much but it will help them feel like a part of the family team.
Another strategy could be that somewhere between dinner and bed time, you turn off all electronics and have a “seven minute sprint” where everyone runs around and see’s how much they can get done in seven minutes. You’d be surprised how much can get done. If you do that every night together as a team, you can make it a fun thing and it really helps you keep up with things. We have a lot of strategies like that.
BOYT: What should parents do with defiant children who don’t want to help?
Kathy Peel: I have a lot of parents say they delegated chores to their kids and teens and they just won’t cooperate, so they have to be firm. I ask them if their kids play any computer games, watch TV, have a cell phone or go out with their friends. The answer is always yes, so I have to remind parents that these things are not rights and they are doing their kids a disservice if they let them have these privileges without having any responsibility. What’s going to happen when they grow up and get out in the real world? You and I know that if you don’t fulfill your responsibilities you don’t have the privilege of getting a paycheck. So, it’s best to teach them these things at home. If you walk in and your daughter hasn’t done her chores and she’s watching television, say, “I’m sorry but you may not watch TV. I’m doing this because I love you.” That’s part of parenting.
BOYT: What are some house rules for the most happy and efficient houses that you see?
Kathy Peel: You need to decide what you want to do to make your home a good place for everybody. The deal is that mom and dad have to abide by these rules too. Every family has got to come up with their own rules.
BOYT: Would you mind sharing about your family management coaching and how it works?
Kathy Peel: I get a lot of requests of people who read my book or read my interviews and they tell me, “Gosh, I wish you could come to my house.” I just love helping people but I can’t help everybody. I have people who want to be family management coaches so they can help a lot of these people that ask for help and they can help them in person. They’ll go over and help with what might just be a task of helping someone just catch up and plan. We have this amazing assessment that the coaches give clients and it’s online. It identifies key areas of stress in your home in the seven departments and then it prints out a customized action plan for the family. Maybe your house is spotless, but your family is not eating dinner together and you know you’ve read the data that kids who eat dinner with their families are much less likely to be involved in bad behaviors and more likely to do well in school. So you think, “Man, I’ve got to get this dinner time under control.” Nobody is doing well in all of those departments so what our coaches do is give assessments and then help people get back under control, get their home running and get families working as a team.
BOYT: Can you give some parenting tips for families to share?
Kathy Peel: First of all, using the daily hit list to decide what you’re going to do and then what you can delegate every day. That’s a huge way to manage your time. Secondly, a few busy moms have large blocks of time to tackle big tasks. Maybe your refrigerator’s got things growing in it or maybe the kitchen cabinets needs cleaning out. You have these tasks that take up a huge block of time. If you’ve got five minutes here or there, while the water’s boiling or while you’re waiting for somebody to be picked up, you can accomplish many things five-minute blocks. This is the way I run my life because I don’t have really large blocks of time, and that’s a huge deal that will help you accomplish more. I really do believe in multi-tasking. There are many tasks in life that you really should do with full focus, but there are also some tasks that don’t require your full attention. If you’re going to spend 30 minutes a day watching television, you can brush the dog or fold some laundry simultaneously.
About Kathy Peel
Kathy Peel is called “America’s Family Manager” by journalists and millions of readers. She has written 21 books (over 2 million sold), including Desperate Households, Family for Life, Be Your Best, The Family Manager’s Guide to Summer Survival, Discover Your Destiny, The Busy Mom's Guide to a Happy, Organized Home(2009 winner of the prestigious Mom's Choice Award and 2009 NAPPA honoree) and her latest -- The Busy Couple's Guide to Sharing the Work & the Joy. Kathy writes for AOL's ParentDish and serves as AOL's Family and Kids' Coach. She is a popular speaker at conferences, corporate events, and churches. She writes regularly for HomeLife and American Profile, and is frequently interviewed as an expert on home and family management, women's health and well-being, marriage, parenting, holidays, family traditions, family travel and fun/frugal family living.
To read more about Kathy or to find out more about becoming a family manager, visit her website here.