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FORTUNE.COM // MAY.1.19
FORTUNE: Why did you write the book and
why now?
ESTHER WOJCICKI: So many people were
asking me what I did with my daughters and
what I did with my students. I thought, Well,
if everyone really wants to know how I did
it, perhaps it would be easier if I just wrote a
book. I’ve spent a lifetime collecting this in-
formation, and I thought I would share it with
the world. This is my legacy—I’m trying to
make sure that people understand the power
of giving children control of their learning.
What can employers learn from TRICK?
If you treat employees the same way, if you
believe in them and give them an opportunity
to perform, then they believe in themselves.
It is really crazy, but when someone believes
in you, you’re willing to take more risks and
willing to be more creative.
Just imagine if you have an employer who
thinks poorly of you; the only way you’re go-
ing to be able to perform is by following their
directions exactly. And where is the creativity
in that? All these employers want people who
are creative and willing to take a risk, and all
the people coming out of college are trained
not to take a risk. They’re trained to follow
instructions. If you don’t follow instructions,
you don’t get a good grade. We’re producing a
nation of rule followers—a nation of sheep.
If you just look at Google [parent company of
YouTube], the main thing they do is give their
employees a sense of freedom by saying, if you
want to work on a 20% project [a policy allow-
ing employees to devote themselves to whatever
they want for 20% of the time], you have the
right to do that. Google turned out to be one of
the most creative companies on the planet.
What does the college admissions scandal say
about the state of education and parenting?
Students are not engaged enough, and their
parents—who are a nation of “snowplow
parents”—are clearing the way and giving
students tutors who basically cheat for them.
The parents were all going crazy trying to get
kids to pass tests that are completely irrel-
evant to the real world. The work world is not
a series of tests. The work world is a series of
projects and people collaborating together.
We are not training students the right way.
The business world is complaining that they
aren’t getting students who are properly
STHER WOJCICKI DIDN’T set out to raise CEOs. But she
knew she wanted her children—and students—to
have an upbringing vastly different from the one she
had endured. “If I didn’t behave, I was beaten,” says
the longtime educator and matriarch of one of the most
well-known families in Silicon Valley. “My father’s
philosophy was ‘Spare the rod, spoil the child.’ ”
Wojcicki, or “Woj,” as she’s known to the 700 teen-
agers enrolled in her popular Media Arts Program at
Palo Alto High School, came up with her own phi-
losophy 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.
If Wojcicki’s offspring are any indication, her method works.
Her firstborn, Susan Wojcicki, is the CEO of YouTube. Janet
Wojcicki is a professor of pediatrics at the University of Califor-
nia at San Francisco. And Anne Wojcicki, the baby of the family,
is the founder and CEO of genetic testing company 23andMe.
“Our parents taught us to believe in ourselves and our ability to
make decisions,” the three write in the book’s foreword. “We don’t
remember ever having our ideas or thoughts dismissed because
we were children.”
Wojcicki’s guide to raising successful people weaves together sto-
ries of her own harsh childhood (in addition to being beaten by her
father, she says, her formative years were defined by the loss of her
baby brother, who died after accidentally swallowing a handful of
pills) with actionable takeaways based on TRICK. One of her keys
to instilling trust, for example, is to give teenagers a budget and let
them shop for needed items on their own. Financial literacy skills
can be taught early on, says Wojcicki. She showed her daughters a
compound interest chart when they were still in grade school, and
growing up, the three sisters sold so many lemons from their neigh-
bor’s yard that they became known as the “lemon girls.”
The TRICK philosophy can be of value to employers too, says
Wojcicki. In her book, she notes that CEOs like John Mackey of
Whole Foods and other leaders known for “employee empower-
ment” are interested in her methods. “The ultimate goal of TRICK
is creating self-responsible people in a self-responsible world,” she
writes. “This is what we’re doing as parents, teachers, and employ-
ers—not just raising children or managing classrooms and board-
rooms, but building the foundation of the future of humankind.”
While Wojcicki’s book may be the latest in a long list of litera-
ture focused on fostering success, rarely does this genre get writ-
ten from the perspective of a mother. Fortune caught up with the
78-year-old matriarch in her Palo Alto home, where she sat sur-
rounded by family photos, to talk about raising leaders, the recent
college admissions scandal, and the thorny issue of technology’s
dark side. That last point is a hot topic in the Wojcicki family,
she says—no surprise given that two of her three daughters run
sometimes-controversial tech companies. An edited transcript of
the interview follows.
RAISING SUPERWOMEN
