'Failure Fogle' urges schools to teach confidence

In a Sunday Times feature on April 10th, Education Editor Sian Griffiths interviewed adventurer and broadcaster, Ben Fogle.

In it, Fogle said he was a ‘mummy’s boy’ when he began boarding at the private Bryanston School in Dorset when he was 13.

Not academically gifted, prior to Bryanston he was painfully shy and constantly aware of his scholastic shortcomings, an awareness that left him suffering from a lack of confidence and low self-esteem.

The constant regime of testing and his junior school’s obsession with academic achievement created a sense of hopelessness in the young Ben, whose parents sought to compensate with almost smothering affection.

This ‘over-parenting’ leads to a loss of self-belief and discourages young people from taking on challenges which will develop their character and help them to learn that failure always precedes success.

Belief in one’s own abilities is the starting point but this needs help and encouragement.

In my book, ‘Magic for Malls’, I quote Jessica Lahey whose book ‘The Gift of Failure’ merits reading.

Jessica is a parent and a secondary school teacher who wrote her book after reaching the conclusion that;

‘...today’s overprotective, failure avoiding parenting has undermined the competence, independence and academic potential of an entire generation’.

Strong stuff!

Coming back to Ben Fogle, he described in the article how the experience at Bryanston widened his horizons and allowed him to find the ‘talent’ to identify what he really wanted to do and in which he could excel.

When he left that school, he did so with the confidence to resist expectations that he would embark on a professional career. Instead he developed his talent for outdoor pursuits, which has resulted in a stellar career as a broadcaster and a writer.

He was quoted as concluding; 

‘…The government’s focus on exams and academic achievement was betraying children and I am now calling for confidence classes’.

Many of the entrants to the world of retail display the same symptoms as Ben; poor school results; a lack of self-esteem; low levels of confidence; fear of failure.

We have demonstrated, after sharing it with 30,000 delegates, that our ‘Magic Programme’ can, in just two days, remedy these character issues and can set staff confidently on the road to success in life and at work.

If you’d like to learn more, may I suggest you download, for free, Part 1 of ‘Magic for Malls’, where you will find original research gathered from shoppers and staff, which illuminates the scene and will help you to create incredible customer service.