This Book Wasn’t Written for Parents… But It Might Fix Your Relationship With Your Teen

What if your teen isn’t the problem?

Most parenting advice tells you to fix their behavior.
Get them to listen. Change their attitude.

But what if that’s exactly why it’s not working?

In this episode, I sit down with Randon Young, author of Foundations for Business Relationships, to unpack simple but powerful relationship principles that weren’t written for parents… but might be exactly what you need.

We talk about:
 • Why focusing on your teen often creates more disconnection
 • How trying to “fix” them increases pressure and resistance
 • What actually builds trust and connection
 • A simple shift you can start using immediately

If you feel like you’re trying everything and it’s still not working… this episode will challenge how you think about parenting—and show you a better way forward.

Are You Caught in the Parent Trap?

Discover the hidden patterns that are keeping you stuck—and how to break free.

Take this quick (and eye-opening) quiz to uncover which common parenting trap you’re falling into with your teen.
 Get a personalized roadmap to help you parent with more clarity, confidence, and connection—starting today.

https://benpughcoaching.com/parent-trap-quiz

Transcript

Ben 0:00

/I'm Ben Pugh and you're listening to IMPACT! Parenting with Perspective. This podcast is all about helping parents manage the mental and emotional drama that comes with parenting teens so they can focus on what's most important. Building rock solid relationships and having a powerful impact on their teen's life. Join me each week as I dive into real tools to help you and your teen turn struggles into strengths. if you feel your teen is pulling away from you, no matter what you try, you just can't connect, you're not alone. And the truth is most parents. miss this. They think, oh, this is just a teen problem. But the truth is, this is not a teen problem. This is a relationship problem. And today I'm bringing on someone who breaks us down in a really simple, practical way. This is one of my old high school buddies. He wrote a book about building strong relationships for business. But as I read it, I kept thinking. This is exactly what parents are missing with their teens. So today we're going to talk about why connection is breaking down the biggest mistakes that parents make without even realizing it and how to build trust and connection with your teen. this might completely change the way you see your role as a parent. Now Randon I'm just gonna quiz you before I introduce you When do you remember like the first time really meeting each other getting to know each other

Randon Young 1:38

Yeah time Ben I remember is eighth grade football had Coach Peck as our coach He absolutely loved you And from then on as I remember our relationship there could have been something before for sure but eighth grade on is when I remember us coming together

Ben 1:53

Yeah that's what I remember Okay so this introduction starts in Little League Football Eighth grade year in school That was my first year playing football by the way And everyone's like dude you will never make the A team your first year I don't know what happens Somehow I made it and everyone's like Ooh that sucks You will never play Which was true the first few weeks like I just got my Bare minimum allotment of plays cause I wasn't very good our first game my grandpa came and he watched us play and I just got my I don't even know how many plays they had to give us maybe like eight he comes down talks to me after the game He is like Hey really good job Like for your first game That's really good And I'm like oh yeah thanks And he's like do you wanna know how to get better And I was like yes please tell me like what's the secret to getting better And I've actually told this story on my podcast It's kind of cool that you're here to be the person that is about but my grandpa is like that number I can't even remember your number back then But he is like he is the best player by far on your team You need to go against him every practice And I was like That dude will kill me Like he is so good and he told me something I'll never forget He is like Ben if you want to be the best Eventually you're gonna have to beat the best and he is the best player on your team And I don't know if you remember this but other people would get out of line so they wouldn't have to do hitting drills against you And I was that dumb sucker who's like let me inline I gotta go get my butt kicked by Randon Young But that year I just remember going from absolutely terrible to good enough that I had a starting job on the offensive line and it was because my grandpa told me to go get my butt kicked by you every day and towards the end of the season I could almost hold my own against you So ladies and gentlemen the great Randon Young

Randon Young 3:54

Well, Ben, thanks for the introduction, man. Those were some good times back in eighth grade and you put in the work, you made me better at the same time. But that year we had a coach that was special to me. He was someone that showed others that he believed in them. That's what he saw in you. He saw something in you that made him believe in you, and I think that's part of the reason why you improved so much throughout that year and contributed and started on a championship team. So great times. Kind of fun reminiscence. So thanks for the introduction, Ben.

Ben 4:24

Yeah, the reason I wanted you to be on my podcast, so I don't know, did you ever get a chance to listen to any of the episodes?

Randon Young 4:31

Yes, I did. I did. And then I've seen how consistent you are moving forward with these podcasts. 'cause I've been seeing it for quite a while now, so. So props to you and it sounds great, man. It's not easy talking electronically or digitally and you do a great job.

Ben 4:47

Oh, well, thank you. Yeah. And everything we talk about is how can we help parents be the best parent they can be and start to improve their relationship with their teen. I saw that you had posted that you had written this book, which is awesome. I would like to write a book someday, but the title caught my attention. My favorite book that I've ever read is called Leadership and Self-Deception. Have you ever read that book?

Randon Young 5:14

You know, I haven't, but I'm gonna write that down and look it up.

Ben 5:17

It is my all time favorite, and it's more of a business book, but that is the number one book that I recommend to parents of teenagers. And when I saw the title Foundation for Business Relationships, I was like, I guarantee you these principles are the exact same principles that could be applied for a mom and her teenage son or a dad who's trying to better connect with, a teenage daughter or a teenage son. And so when I saw that you had written this, I was like, man. I'd be happy to have you on my podcast. Let's do this thing. I would like to write a book. Give me a little bit of background on why you wrote this, how you wrote it, and before you start, I just wanna say I love the layout of the book. Like it was so easy to follow and at the same time, it's almost like it could be used as like a tactical guide. Like, oh, hey, I wanna focus on. This part, and you can just open the book to that part, gimme some of the background on writing this.

Randon Young 6:20

Yeah, I appreciate it, Ben. And that's exactly how I designed it, so that's great feedback. I want it to be used kind of almost like a handbook and the way I've laid it out, you can kind of see it as such. And so hopefully it's an easy reference guide. But throughout my life I've had people ask me. How I create relationships, whether it be coaching business, playing back when I played family, religious, whatever it is. And I've never really given it a lot of thought because it had always come really natural to me. And pretty soon I started to kind of question and asked those questions myself, how do I do this? Why do I do it? And I started reverse engineering the relationships I had on all those different aspects of life. I come up with five different principles and sub principles underneath those. And yes, although this book does apply specifically to business, you're exactly right. Each one of these principles and sub principles applies to all different aspects of life, whether it be with our teenage kids, whether it be with our friends, our family, our spouse, coaching, whatever it is. Principles are translatable to anything in life. And because they create a foundation, right? And a foundation can serve a lot of different purposes where you can build off of that strong foundation. So that's kinda how I got here.

Ben 7:38

If you don't mind, I'd like to talk about some of my favorite concepts here in the book. The first one, your number one principle is connecting with others. That just right off the bat, I was like, well, duh, like that is the most important thing when it comes to parenting, which by the way, that's the number one thing that I see. Deteriorating families. There is a real lack of connection between parents and teenagers. And so your sub principle, like develop a sincere interest in people. So this is 1.1. That's what I see missing a lot of times in parents with their teenagers. And I feel like, like 1.2 is. Want others to succeed. Every parent wants their team to succeed, but they miss that foundational point of developing a sincere interest in your teen. Now, I want you to, you are a father of teens. I want you to kind of take that, develop a sincere interest in people. How can we apply that exact same principle as a parent to developing an interest in our teenager?

Randon Young 8:46

Yeah, great question. As a parent, it's kind of tricky, right? Because we have in our mind a lot of the times what we think our kids should be, and teenagers going through that process of figuring things out for themselves, sometimes what they like or sometimes what they wanna do, didn't match up with what we had envisioned in our own mind and sometimes. What we have envisioned, we never communicate to them. So there's that disconnect. Disconnect there. 'cause we see one thing, they have another thing and we expect those two to come together, which they don't. So as parents, sometimes we gotta take a step back. See things the way that teenager is seeing things so that we know exactly what they want to do, rather than the perception of what we want them to do is what they want them to do, if that's not confusing enough, right? So we gotta see things for the way they are, the way they see things. Then when we're on that same page, when we understand what they wanna accomplish. We can take that interest in delivering value in helping them accomplish what they wanna accomplish because those interests are what they want and we can now help them achieve that.

Ben 9:59

Yeah. For your 1.5. That's the discover their interests I mm-hmm. Values by that. In my coaching program, one of the things that I teach to parents is you need to be able to understand your teenager's values. What are the things that drive your teen? What are the things that are most important to your teenager? And my second oldest, he is a. Really good basketball player. He is actually a really good football player too, till he got injured and he is like, sorry, I like basketball better. I'm done with football. But knowing his interests or in my vocabulary, his values, his number one value is his girlfriend. I wish it were basketball, but I don't get to prioritizes values for. Number one is a girlfriend. Number two is being a good basketball player, and number three is just making money. So one of the things that I do to be an impactful parent now that. I have this connection and I have an interest in what he's interested in. When I teach him things, I try and reinforce what I'm teaching him according to his values rather than according to my values. So just an example of what this looks like. I also have a 10-year-old who, my 17-year-old just loves to pick on the 10-year-old, and I'll just ask him things like, Hey dude, if you treated your girlfriend the way you're treating your 10-year-old little brother, what do you think would happen? And I'm just teaching a powerful principle, but I'm reinforcing it with something that he's interested in rather than trying to reinforce it with something I'm interested in. Does that make sense?

Randon Young 11:33

A hundred percent. When we can relate things to that individual, it seems to connect the dots more for them or mean more to them because it's something that they care about and understand.

Ben 11:44

Yeah,

Randon Young 11:45

and that's when we can see their interests, like you mentioned. There's that connection that can take place because there's a common playing field, or at least a common understanding that we can build off of.

Ben 11:55

Yeah. I feel like one of the things that makes me a really good parenting coach is my background in sales, because in sales, like that's one of the biggest things, understand what the other person wants. Then position your product in a way that it's obvious that it helps them get what they want. And as a parent of a teenager, if you can understand what your teen wants and then position what your product is like, look, teen, I want you to make your bed. I want you to do chores. I want you to do well in school. But if you can position it so that look, all these things help you better accomplish what you want, it makes your job easier as a parent. One of the ones, this one I highlighted, you talked about earning trust, and I really like the way that you talked about it, how the best way to earn trust is to give trust. Can you talk to us a little? Well, first I want you to put your. I don't know. Your teenage kids are probably perfect, but there's probably other parents out there that struggle with their teenage, actually. I know they are. I work with them. Put that hat on and talk about giving trust in order to earn trust when it comes to parenting a teenager.

Speaker 13:06

Yeah,

Randon Young 13:06

great question. And it's a little tricky, right? It's a little tricky. 'cause there's that parent dynamic and sometimes it's really hard to be patient. And kind of going back just a little bit, trust is a huge part of relationships, as we know, as you teach. And I wanted to put that as number one on my list. But there can't be trust unless there's that con connection, right? And so I'll always give people the benefit of the doubt, including my kids. And yes, I do have great kids, but I as a parent and them as kids, we're all imperfect. Right. So we're trying to work this out, but if I've realized it's, I go ahead and err on the side of Caution of giving trust or trusting people off the bat, that connection seems to come a little bit easier, which yields trust. And when I, when we come into a situation with our kids and automatically assume the worst. That's a showing, a lack of trust, whether it's said or not, the kid will translate that into, oh, mom or dad does not trust me. But much like you just talked about, if we come into a situation showing them that we have trust and confidence in them, all right, number one, they're gonna see us as an ally rather than an enemy. Someone that's really trying to help them. At least that's the goal, right? And it may take a little bit to get that out, but then they're gonna be more open-minded to talk to us. So giving that trust is gonna help build that foundation to where open dialogue can take place. And they'll take my teachings or my words with value, whether they say it or not. They're gonna internalize that as though, hey. What mom and or dad are saying is valuable because I know that they trust me. If that makes sense, Ben?

Ben 14:57

Yeah, 100%. And the crazy thing is, so I coach a lot of parents and a lot of teenagers all over the world. I've had clients as far away as Australia, Germany. The Swiss Alps.

Randon Young 15:10

Good for you. That's awesome.

Ben 15:12

the thing that I hear all the time is parents being like, well, I wish I could trust my teens. And then I am uniquely positioned because I coach both parents and teens and I hear teens all the time saying, I wish my parents would trust me. And the truth is. When it comes to trust, the quickest way to build trust is to first give trust. And I think, I don't know if it's due to like social media or TV or I think part of it is like our roots in the LDS church, there's kind of this lack of trust. Like, oh no, you're gonna screw up your life, you're gonna do it wrong. And one of the concepts that I teach that I think is super powerful. When it comes to trust, a lot of our trust with our teens is a fundamental lack of trust in their resilience or their ability to just make things turn out, right? Mm-hmm. And one of the things that I teach like. When your kid gets in trouble or they get bad grades or something isn't going right, if you as a parent catastrophize and you're like, oh crap. Well, you just ruined your whole life. You'll never be able to recover. That is not only a lack of trust, but you communicate that lack of trust to your teen who now adopts that like. Crap, I just ruined my life. Like I'll never be able to recover. And the, this is really hard for parents to do, but if you are a parent who's struggling with trust in your teen, I would encourage you find ways that you can give them more trust and then start building a structure where you both know what you're looking for them to be able to earn more of your trust. So,

Randon Young 16:56

hundred percent.

Ben 16:57

How many kids do you have by the way?

Randon Young 16:59

So we have four. So we have four. Yeah. Our oldest just got home from a mission for the church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. He's playing football at Weber State now. And then we have a 19-year-old, a 16-year-old, and then a little surprise baby that's in fourth grade. So, hey. And then been something else I was gonna say on that as parents, and I find myself in this situation all the time too. We think that if they fail or if things go wrong or make a bad decision, it reflects back on us. And so it's like, we don't wanna own that, but hey, learning and saline and getting back up is part of the process.

Ben 17:38

Yeah,

Randon Young 17:38

so I think that goes back to trust too. We gotta trust that if they make a wrong decision, hey they're gonna rebound and we gotta be there to pick 'em up.

Ben 17:44

Yeah, I love that. one of the ones in this same section, principle number two, earn trust. 2.3 is be accountable. And One of the things I was thinking as I was reading that I like to talk about being the change that you want to see. I feel like one of the biggest issues in parenting today is that there is a lack of accountability from the top. So one of the things that I see all the time is that parents will be like, Hey, teenager, I don't like how much time you are on your phone. And then the teen looks over and mom and dad are on their phone constantly. One of the, like that principle of being accountable. One of the things that I tell parents all the time is that your teens are not listening to you. We wish they were, and sometimes they'll listen, but the thing that they are doing is they are watching everything you do. And if you want to have accountability where your teen is better accountable, which goes hand in hand with trust, that's why it's the same thing. But the biggest thing that you can do as a parent is. Find ways to be accountable, be the change that you wanna see, and hold yourself accountable. If you say you're gonna do it, if you want your team to behave a certain way, model that behavior, lead through example. Anything you'd like to add to that one?

Randon Young 19:08

Yeah. Number one. Great thoughts there. The one thing I would add is when we make a mistake. Own up to it, make it right and move on, because that's setting the example for our kids in life, that we don't need to hide our mistakes. Right? Yeah. We need to be accountable. Make it right, and then move on. You look out in the world today, and there's zero accountability. Well, I shouldn't say zero, but it appears that there's zero accountability, and so we want our kids to be the change, all right? Where we can be accountable in lives. So the best example from them to learn from would be us. And Hey, it didn't go the way I planned. I apologized. Let's make it right and let's move on.

Ben 19:51

Yeah, I love that. And then the other principle in there, that principle number two was probably my favorite actually. I just really like all of them. But that 2.5, that sub principle be someone others want to be around. The thing I just wrote for like parents, be fun. Mm-hmm. I can't tell you how many parents are like, man, my kids don't like spending time with me. And I'm like, well, what do you do? That's like nothing. I just sit on my phone all day and scroll. Okay. They don't say that, but when they reflect they're like, mm-hmm. I'm not fun. The beauty of this book is like there are, let's see, so there's a five principles and a handful of sub principles in each one.

Speaker 20:31

Yeah.

Ben 20:32

You don't need every single one of these. Like you could pick one and be like, like the one on communicate where you have be a good listener. Like I can't tell you how much that would help a lot of parents if they just practice the skill of being curious.

Randon Young 20:48

Mm-hmm.

Ben 20:48

So Randon what I'd like to ask you, like as a parent, which of these principles or sub principles do you feel like has either. I don't know, been reinforced by your parenting or has helped you the most as you've parented your kids?

Randon Young 21:05

Yeah. You know, I could take bits and pieces of all of them, but as I kind of look and reflect on that, communication may be one of the principles that is most underappreciated. It's principle number four. Communicate. Going back to what we talked about connecting with our kids. Like I said, sometimes we have up made in our mind what we feel they should be, and they may be going on a different path where they feel they should be, but there's that lack of communication, so we never come on the same page. Trust is earned through communication a lot of the times, or when we gotta express some hard things to our kids in a good way. We gotta be able to communicate and deliver that in a way where, hey, this isn't gonna blow up. It's gonna be, we're gonna meet our objectives of bringing this topic up to begin with. So I would just say communicate as far as an underappreciated principle. But like I said, I could take bits and pieces from all of them.

Ben 22:01

Yeah. Let me ask you this, if. My listeners wanted to go read this book, which if you're listening or watching on YouTube, go get this book. Foundations for Business Relationships. I love it. Where can people learn more about the book? Where could they go order this?

Randon Young 22:19

Well, Ben, I appreciate that. The simple way would be go to www.createelevatelead.com. My Instagram handle is at Create Elevate Lead, and there'll be links on Amazon to buy the book. That's probably the easiest way to get there. Awesome,

Ben 22:37

and I will put all of those in the show notes. So if you, I don't even remember what episode this is. If you go to benpughcoaching.com You can find all the links in the show notes. I just, I gotta Thank you for being willing to do this. I have. Passively, like Facebook is amazing. Like we can just stand in the background, observe what all of our friends are doing, and as I watch you, like I'm proud, like I am proud of you for how you show up as a man, a father, a football coach, and even a. Horseback aren't you? Into cutting and

Randon Young 23:15

Yeah. I train my own horses for fun. For raiding. Yeah.

Ben 23:18

Yeah. That's awesome. And I just, the one thing that I remember about you from like our little league days and knowing you throughout high school, I feel like anything you do with. Everything that you have, like, you don't hold back, you just go all in. And I really admire that about you, and I just wanna thank you for being an example of that in my life.

Randon Young 23:42

Well, Ben, that's very kind of you. And you know, I've looked at you in the same way, and the consistency you've had in running your business and showing up isn't easy. It's super hard. And that consistency you showed and continue to show. Back to parenting as well. We as parents can be consistent in our approach in what we do and our principles. We try to implement, Hey, that, going back to that question you asked me, that's one of my sub principles is consistency. That may be one of the things that will help us most as parents.

Ben 24:15

Well, thank you very much. I Well, if you are listening to this podcast and you're like, oh my goodness, I need to go get foundations for business relationships, I would just, you have my permission. Randon might not give this to you. Just cross out where it says business and put like family relationships, and then just as you read it, just interpret or just ask yourself, how could I apply this to me and my teen? These are sound principles and. I'll put all the links to where you can go get this book. Anything else you want to add before we head out?

Randon Young 24:49

You know what, once again, appreciate the opportunity, but to all the parents out there, as difficult as parenting is, and there's no handbook other than Ben's a great teachings, we can do this as parents. We're not just doing this for our kids, but there's a snowball effect. In the world that the world needs, that those things we do in the home are gonna make a difference. And our kids can go do wonderful, amazing things. And us as parents, we just gotta help guide them and get them there and help them believe. So keep it up, Ben.

Ben 25:21

Awesome. Thank you very much. Alright, well that is everything that we have for you today. If you would like to help other parents. Like this podcast, go leave a five star review. Believe it or not, that helps other parents find the help that they're looking for. And if you are looking to improve the relationships in your home, go check out Randon's Book Foundation for Business Relationships. All right, Randon, thank you for being here and we'll have to do this again sometime.

Randon Young 25:51

Would love it. Thank you, Ben.