7 Ways to Help Your Child (and Yourself) Do Bossy Better

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Do a search for “bossy” and you’ll find banbossy.com which advocates encouraging girls to be assertive leaders. That’s great, but what about the boy or girl who’s impatiently barking out orders, then going off in a huff when others don’t obey? It’s all very well to admire your child’s assertive nature and leadership skills but it’s not good for their confidence and self-esteem if they experience social rejection because of it.

Diverse Perspectives

Bossiness is a complex and sometimes confusing idea, and it means different things in different contexts. It can be a symptom of a deeper problem, a behavior you can help your child manage, or a sign of leadership strengths. When I asked my Facebook friends about their experiences with bossiness, they wrote:

“I remember being mortified when my (neurodiverse) daughter’s preschool teacher gave us a book about little miss bossy. In retrospect, it was a heads up that her way of being differed from her peers.”

“This is a label my oldest, identified as gifted, was called all through school. The school’s failure to meet her needs was scrubbed away by the claim that she was 'bossy', and she became labeled as 'difficult.' Anxiety, depression, and isolation from her peers soon followed. A boy in her class, also identified as gifted, was not treated the same way. His intensity was seen as endearing.”

“My daughter is this way. Though, I consider her a very strong and capable leader who merely needs some guidelines and perspective when it comes to interacting with others.”

Power and Status

In psychologist Adam Grant's Why Girls Get Called Bossy and How to Avoid It, he observed, “We don’t label every girl who issues commands or exercises authority as bossy. To make sense of bossiness, we need to tease apart two fundamental aspects of social hierarchy that are often lumped together—power and status.” Grant defined power as holding a formal position of authority or controlling important resources, such as the power that teachers and parents hold. Status, on the other hand, is about being respected or admired, which is something a child doesn’t naturally have, but can earn.

A child who tries to exercise power without first gaining the respect of others is the one who’s seen as bossy. The problem isn’t usually that the child is being dominant, it’s that they’re seen as overstepping their perceived status. “If we want girls to receive positive reinforcement for early acts of leadership,” Grant wrote, we need to teach them “to engage in behaviors that earn admiration before they assert their authority.”

You don’t want to break your bossy child’s spirit or undermine their leadership abilities or social confidence, but you do want them to learn how to interact successfully with others. Help them realize that a person gains status—and is more likely to be listened to—when they’re giving and generous, when they help others, share credit, and listen to others’ opinions.

Author Carol Tuttle writes about bossiness from a different angle, discussing it as one dimension of a bold nature, where a child insists on being their own authority. Tuttle advises against calling such a child bossy, as it can be deeply shaming, and recommends instead embracing that boldness and helping them manage it. Although Tuttle’s focus is on girls, I can’t see any reason not to use the same reasoning when it comes to bossy boys.

Helpful suggestions

How can we best help our assertive kids? These seven methods may be helpful (italics denotes that the example came from parents on Facebook):

1. Be kind, understanding, and patient. Don’t think of your bossy child as intentionally mean, manipulative, or tyrannical. Instead, realize they may be serious and perfectionistic, believing that (a) they know the best way to proceed, and (b) everyone else wants to know the best way to do things, too.
2. Teach your child to earn respect before making a demand. A child may have great ideas but doesn’t have any natural authority over others. Teach your child to think about others’ interests before they attempt a position of leadership.
3. Respect your child’s boundaries. Don’t mention your child’s bossiness in front of others, but instead wait until you can have a private conversation. Never mock any child, including a child who’s being bossy or otherwise inappropriate.
4. Respect your child’s ideas. “I found the most helpful way to soften her was to make sure she felt understood, and then appeal to her intellect about why she might change tack. Make sure she knows we can see her vision and appreciate it, but suggest a different one.”
5. Share books/movies/other media. Look for stories about bossy kids and how others respond to them. Spend some time discussing what’s happening from the perspectives of different characters, for example, the Mermaid SOS book series by Gillian Shields, and The Recess Queen by Alexis O’Neill.
6. Do some role-playing. “The best thing for a kid is to watch a peer exhibit the same behavior and being really upset about it. Then, parents can gently alert him to his own behavior and a lightbulb comes on.” If your child is a strong critical thinker, good at analysis, and direct in their communication—as so many bossy kids are—they may see themself as just speaking the truth and not realize that they come across to others as harsh, critical, or autocratic. Use role-playing to help them think about things through the eyes of others. Take turns playing different roles in problematic situations they encounter, whether that’s in the real world, or via media or imagination.
7. Suggest an attitude of benevolent leadership. “When Devon is bossy it’s usually because she has a firm vision for how she wants something to play out. I used to try to stop her; now I try to help her be a benevolent leader in those moments when she feels that urgent need to take charge.”

One friend summed it all up beautifully: “The key is to plant a spirit of cooperation without crushing their spirit and natural gifts.”