What is Summer Camp For? with Seth Godin
Get my newsletter every week.
It’s all about kids today
I am stoked to share this conversation with Seth Godin, one of my personal heroes, and someone whose work has deeply shaped the way I think about camp, storytelling, and connection. We dove into some incredible topics, and I couldn’t be more excited for you to hear his insights.
What Is Camp Really For?
Seth kicked things off by reminding us that camp isn’t about the blob, the high ropes, or even the incredible canoeing program. It’s about the growth. Camp is where kids move from being cogs in a system to becoming independent entities, focused on connection, generosity, and growth. Activities? They’re just the excuse. The real goal is to create a safe environment where kids experience apparent risks and learn to navigate transitions—skills that stick with them for life.
Telling a Better Story
This one hit hard for me. Seth pointed out how easy it is to market camp based on features—activities, traditions, shiny programs—but the real magic happens when we talk about the transformation camp provides. And here’s the kicker: it’s not about convincing everyone. It’s about finding the right families who align with your mission and values.
If your camp stands for something, lean into it. Stop trying to be everything for everyone, and instead focus on the unique transformation you offer. Seth’s advice? Be weird. Be specific. Let parents know exactly what your camp is best at, and don’t be afraid to send families elsewhere if it’s not the right fit.
Traditions vs. Growth
We all know camp is steeped in tradition, but Seth made me rethink how we approach it. He described traditions as “sunk costs”—gifts from our former selves that we’re not obligated to keep. If a tradition isn’t serving your mission, it’s time to let it go.
He also challenged camps to eliminate bullying, hazing, and any behavior we justify as “part of the camp experience.” Instead, we should focus on creating safe, growth-oriented cultures that kids and staff will thrive in.
The Power of Apparent Risk
One of Seth’s best points was about apparent risk versus actual risk. Apparent risks—like starring in a play or getting into a canoe—feel risky to kids but are ultimately safe. This is where the magic of camp happens. We’re not allowed to lose a single kid, but we can and should create situations where they stretch themselves and grow.
Consistency Over Authenticity
This one was huge, especially when it comes to staff. Seth argued that authenticity is not what makes a great camp counselor or director—consistency is. Camp staff need to show up as the best version of themselves every day, even when they’re tired or stressed. Authenticity is for friends; consistency is for professionals. And at camp, our job is to create the conditions for growth—not to act on every authentic impulse.
Status Drives Culture
Seth broke down the role of status at camp in a way I’ll be thinking about for a long time. Camps thrive—or struggle—based on who we give status to. If we elevate kindness, leadership, and collaboration, we create a positive culture. But if we inadvertently give status to the bully or the slacker, we risk creating a toxic environment.
The takeaway? Be intentional about who and what you elevate at camp. Status is powerful, and we can use it to build a culture that reflects our values.
Parent Concerns Are Rooted in Fear
When parents push back, it’s rarely about the specifics—it’s about fear. Seth reframed every difficult parent interaction as an opportunity to address their fear and build trust. Whether it’s cabin assignments or wildfires, the key is to focus on their need for control and help them feel secure in the partnership.
The Best Job in the World
This conversation reminded me why I believe being a camp director is the best job on the planet. We get to tell stories all year long, build meaningful connections, and spend two months creating magic in the woods. But Seth’s reminder was clear: don’t let the tasks overwhelm you. Focus on the why—on creating the conditions for kids and staff to grow.
Seth also made a compelling case for charging more if it means freeing up camp directors to focus on their zone of genius. His challenge to camp directors? Charge what you’re worth, tell a better story, and use the extra resources to build something extraordinary.
Amplify the Weirdness
If there’s one thing I’m taking away from this, it’s the importance of amplifying the weirdness of your camp. Lean into what makes your camp special and let families know why it’s the best at what it does. And if you’re not a fit for a family? That’s okay. Point them toward a camp that is.
Thank You, Seth
I can’t thank Seth enough for taking the time to have this conversation. His insights on growth, storytelling, and culture have already changed the way I think about camp. If you’re in the camp world, I hope this fires you up as much as it fired me up.
And Seth’s final piece of advice? Instead of buying his book, take that $20 and donate it to a camp scholarship fund. Let’s go make a ruckus.
Get my newsletter every week.
It’s all about kids today
Jack Schott
Summer Camp Evangelist
Transcript:
Jack: We're here with Seth Godin, the best selling author of 21 books, and a personal hero of mine, uh, so excited to meet you, Seth. Um, in 2012, you did a talk called, uh, Stop Stealing Our Dreams, and the question you're posing in the talk is, What is school for? And you and I both are huge lovers of summer camp.
So, uh, And my question for you is, what is CAMP for?
Seth: Yeah. What a great place to start. Uh, thank you for showing up the way you do. It makes a difference and you don't hear about it ever or for decades, but it really makes a difference. What is CAMP for? It's pretty clear to me. I know all the things it's not for, but what it's for is to make a change happen.
And the change we seek to make is to help somebody go from being a cog in a family system to being an independent entity. Who is focused on connection and generosity and growth and that when a young human being is able to learn how to do that and to do it on their own with their peers, it will stick with them forever.
Jack: And how does that fit into so many conflicting and tension filled pieces of parents? about how to help their kids be ready for the world that they're going to enter, that they're, that they are in already, really.
Seth: Well, you know, we spend three years with a piece of protoplasm that couldn't survive without our direct regular aid.
And then after that, we spend a whole bunch of years in a symbiotic relationship with a child who has built their life around us. It's heartbreaking. To have them become an independent entity and thrilling too. Cause if they didn't, if they were 42 years old and you still needed to feed them lunch every day, that would be bad.
It's the transitions that are always the hard part, right? And so camp uses the woods or the windsurfer or the singing in the dining hall as an excuse for the growth. It's not the point, it's the excuse. The point is the growth in a safe place, creating apparent risk. The tension around homesickness is part of the point, that making it go away is a risk.
isn't the answer. It's going through the transition. So as a parent, We have a chance to model for our kids and set them up to have these experiences. And you can do it in a really dramatic way and raise free range kids who walk to town when they're seven years old. But there are ways that you can do it using infrastructures like summer camps.
Where it's way more natural and more likely to work
Jack: and it's so easy For camps and I see this all the time it's so easy to put the blob on the front page of the website and the high ropes course and even the Incredible canoeing program like and to put these activities first and then parents choose Camp based on the activities and what you just told me is that camp is not for the activities It's for the growth.
So how how do we think about Better storytelling camp in a way that resonates with families
Seth: So why does Notre Dame have a football team, right? I mean, the people who play on the team have plenty of places they could play. The tens of thousands of people who crowd into the stadium have no, they've never met any of the players. What does it even mean? The, the football team is a flag, just like the sailboats are a flag.
And we see. Kids growing up and their parents spending a quarter of a million dollars to go to an expensive Famous college instead of a college that's going to do them the service that they need Because we've been trapped by the marketing industrial complex and the college industrial complex and 500 other things to look for features not benefits so What's the answer the answer is what the answer always is if the question is marketing and that's what do your satisfied delighted?
Delighted committed customers tell their friends And if they're not telling their friends, that is what you need to fix. You need to create an experience that people want to talk about and eagerly engage with others in, because when parents tell other parents and when kids tell other kids, that is how the word spreads, not from your website.
Jack: I'm glad you brought up Notre Dame. Notre Dame is steeped in tradition, um, and camp is, as you know, from, you know, your, your time at camp is steeped in tradition. And you, you write, uh, in your new book, This is Strategy, uh, you write, I think it's number 291 is about sunk costs.
Seth: I'm sorry about the background noise, Winston.
No,
Jack: no problem.
Seth: Okay.
Jack: Your, your, your allegory number 291 is about sunk costs and camp struggles to change because the traditions are enormously valuable. They're a huge part of connecting kids to their sense of place to wanting to spend time in the woods. And so how should we think about sunk costs, traditions, connections to place, change?
Seth: Yeah. These are really important things. So, sunk costs. Sunk costs are gifts from your former self, and you don't have to accept them if you don't want to. If you went to law school for three years, you were happy being a lawyer for eight, and now you hate being a lawyer, and it's never going to get better.
That law degree is a gift from the you of a bunch of years ago. You don't have to accept it. My friend Christine, uh, is an indigenous person from Canada and she spends a lot of time visiting summer camps and pointing out that human beings aren't mascots. and talking about the fact that summer camps have done a tremendous disservice to an enormous number of people by objectifying folks who were the victims of genocide.
And camps will push back and say, well, we can't get rid of this or that or the other thing, because then it won't be the same. Well, first, it would be good if it wasn't the same, because the thing it's the same as that part you don't need. But second, you're missing the point again about what it's like around here.
People like us do things like this. So, at Arowan, where I hail from, the, you know, when Joanne took it over, she eradicated bullying. It took five years. There are a lot of camps that say bullying's part of the deal, that wedgies are part of the deal, that losing the baseball tournament and crying is part of the deal.
What deal? Why, why would you do that on purpose? If you have a good reason, say it. And if you don't, say it. Maybe it's time to walk away from it. And what we seek to do, cause the nine year olds and the 11 year olds don't remember what camp was like in 1947. They weren't there. What we seek to do is create a culture of appropriate risk and tension, risk that feels risky, that isn't tension.
That can be relieved. And there are a million ways to do that. And tradition is one thing we can leverage, but we don't have to do it that way. We do it in lots of ways. And the purpose of camp is that the people who run the camp are more organized and more skilled than the parents. Because if the parents could do it without the camp, they should, but they can't.
The camp shows up to create the conditions for your kids to become who they are dreaming of becoming.
Jack: And, I, I couldn't agree more with, with what you're saying, uh, play workers running, uh, adventure playgrounds talk about hazards versus risks, right, as hazards are, are things that you can't see, like you're going into a building that might fall down, that's a hazard, we don't want that.
Risk is, is, you know, climbing, uh, a tree knowing that, you know, it, you might fall because you know what you're, you're engaging in it, and kind of consent. Is the cornerstone of that and at the same time Camper all the cape directors. I know would love for kids to be able to take more risks in so many parts of their lives and Huge numbers of parents Are trying to mitigate risk at every turn and so there's this tension where camp directors who
Seth: I but I think i'm going to interrupt because I think there's a way out and it's the key word that we skipped over Which is apparent risk apparent risk is different than actual risk So it is apparently risky to star In the musical that the junior boys are putting on it is apparently risky to get in a canoe by yourself Because you might fall out right, but that's not actually risky.
It's just apparently You Risky and the magic of camp. We're not allowed to lose one kid ever. Not one. We have, we have to have, you know, better than six sigma, send 10 million kids to camp. We have to send 10 million kids home. So you're not allowed to have actual risk. You can have a parent risk. And there's so many ways to do that.
And parents are smart enough to know the difference if you tell the story properly. And so as the canoeing instructor, if there's an onshore wind, I'm sending everyone out in the boat by themselves because I know that the worst that'll happen is they'll come right back to me, right? If there's an offshore wind and I'm there by myself, I can't send them out on a canoe by themselves because that's actual risk.
So what we get to do is explain to parents our philosophy, our pedagogy of learning, which is school only asks you a question they know the answer to, and school is asymptotically organized to get to you. Camp is about creating situations where kids have no choice but to grow.
Jack: And you, you know, and love clearly some awesome camp directors and some, some awesome camp counselors who, who care about kids and take care of kids and are thoughtful and generous and compassionate. And, uh, and camp doesn't, when, when I talk to people, when I go, when I put on my business costume and, and go talk with corporate executives.
The term camp is silly. They expect me to misspell, uh, words and sing, sing silly songs. And trust me, I'll misspell words and sing silly songs with the best of them. But that's, that's, that's the fun that wraps up the growth, that lets the growth happen, that gets the kids excited to make a choice that they may not have made.
You're trying to get an How do camp directors earn the trust? To tell, to tell a story like you're describing, that is, uh, a parent risk has these opportunities, uh, how do they earn that?
Seth: To tell the story to who?
Jack: To, to families, to, to, to parents, to help the kids opt in to, to our care.
Seth: So, so we, we must begin with that.
We're not telling the story. to Satya Nadella at Microsoft. And I had to take summer camp off my resume early in my career because it wasn't helping me. That's not what, uh, what you're talking about. You're saying, how does a camp director help parents get this? And in my, uh, experience, it's this. You only have room in your camp, if it's run well, for 20 new kids this summer, 100 new kids this summer at the most.
And there's a million possible kids. So, pick your parents, pick your future. If a parent doesn't get the joke, walk out, right? That scarcity is on your side, not theirs. You are looking, you are auditioning parents, they're not auditioning you. And so, you have to have a camp that has enough going for it, that you can walk out of any room happily saying, yeah, this isn't for you, please call these people instead.
I'm not here to persuade you. Because that's a waste of both of our time. I'm here to find somebody who's ready. Now, one way we can filter that is for camp directors to do a much better job of publishing. All year round, you know the way Joanne wrote articles about bullying if someone's interested in bullying They found her and if they found her they wanted to know more and then they were in the funnel, right?
what do you stand for if your camp slogan is Uh, you can pick anyone and we're anyone you're going to struggle if your camp slogan is Uh, you'll pay a lot but you get more than you pay for You're racing to the top. It could also be, you have to apply to get in. Your kid has to be interviewed to get in.
Do you want your kid to go to a camp where every other kid was interviewed? Or do you want your kid to go to a camp where we take whoever comes? You,
Jack: you talk about strategy as a combination of time, games, empathy, and systems. And, uh, uh, how, how do you think about letting kids in on seeing the systems? As, as being a part of the system of camp or school or their family or, or what have you?
Seth: Yeah, this is great. What a great question. Because make believe is a fascinating concept.
Uh, how old is a kid before you tell them that the tooth fairy isn't real? Or that, uh, you know, Santa Claus may or may not show up in real life. People want the fantasy, and the fantasy is part of the system, but also, it's thrilling. to be on the tech crew and to be behind the scenes. So one of the examples, um, was fantasy night.
The way fantasy night would work is you get the 13 and 14 year old kids to stay in camp while the 10 and 11 year old kids have to go out for some made up reason. And while those kids are out all day, the slightly older kids secretly build an entire amusement park out of wood and paint. Then at two o'clock in the morning, you go and you wake up all the 10 and 11 year olds with candles and flashlights and you drag them into the woods to see this fantasy land.
So the question is, who gets more out of it? The kids who wake up in the morning with a dream about some fantasy land or the kids who wake up in the morning, remembering they got to spend up all night. fooling the kids by putting on the show, right? Everybody wins from that because you built the system, you executed on the system.
Some people got to experience it one way. Some people got to experience the other way. It creates more lore and it's nothing like what happens in the city.
Jack: What you're describing to me too is, is, is what the staff do. Every day. I can't write. Yeah. Uh, there's a lot of hate for Gen Z, but there was a lot of hate for millennials. And there was probably a lot of hate for Gen X. I wasn't there. Uh, but we used to be the worst. I'm 36. I can tell you
Seth: we were the worst and I'm 64.
We were the worst. There's no question.
Jack: And so Gen Z is the worst and Gen Alpha will be the worst and Gen whatever will be the worst after that. And then we go to camp and it's just so clearly couldn't be further from the truth. 18 year olds are living up to being the most responsible, thoughtful, caring, compassionate, hardworking people.
I have to, it was true 20 years ago. I have to imagine it was true 50 years ago. And I believe it'll be true a hundred years from now that at camp, 18 year olds, 19 year olds are some of the best humans on the planet because people are good. And when they're in a space where they're expected to do great things, they do great things.
How, how do we help the world? see that if people like you and I have taken camp off of our resume to be taken more seriously in non camp spaces.
Seth: But we don't care about the world. Like who do we need to see this? Right? We definitely need privileged parents in Toronto to see it so that they let their kids go one more summer as opposed to being an intern at a law firm for sure.
But not all the privileged parents, just enough of them. And so again, the far part of the reason the 18 and 19 year olds do so well is that a camp creates the conditions for them to get to where they're going anyway. You don't have to persuade them to work harder, to put more things in more boxes. They never wanted to do that.
What they wanted to do is this, and you created the conditions for them to do this. But again, back to this idea that there's a smallest viable audience. What the camp director needs to do is nurture a community. Not disappear for five months a year, but keep connecting back to the community and creating that circle of achievement.
What happens when the 22 year old needs that community to get into the graduate school of their choice. Well, if that community is all set and ready to go, it's going to happen. Right. And so this isn't a two month job. This is a 25 year job. And that's part of the cool part of it.
Jack: I think being a camp director is the best job on the planet.
You get to, you get to tell stories for 10 months. To your audience, to, to try to, to, to bring one more awesome person in, you know, whether it's about, uh, radical empathy or inspiring wish, wonder and awe, or, uh, the, the value of connecting with nature, you just need one more family to, to join in one more family to join in one more family to join in.
And, and then for the other two months, you get to play in the woods, making that come true, telling and listening to stories in all kinds of different ways. It's the best job on the planet. It
Seth: is, unless you let the tasks overwhelm you, because many camps, after they lose the rush of initial enthusiasm or the generations shift, switch to task mode.
So, You know, the summer that, uh, I was running the camp with Joanne, one of my tasks was putting the chlorine into the water purification. Like, if I screw that up, all these people are gonna get. I didn't sign up for that. And when the tasks continue and it's three o'clock in the morning and you're doing another task, it's really easy to burn out because you're not doing what you wanted to do.
And so part of what I'm arguing for, if I'm talking to a camp director, is you're probably not charging enough for camp. And if you told a better story, with more consistency and urgency, you could charge more. And if you charge more, you could spend every one of those pennies to hire professionals to do tasks.
And so you're not going to make any more money. But you're going to make a bigger difference because you get to do the thing you're great at by being paid fairly to do that.
Jack: That works for me. Uh, uh, you, you talk a lot about the race of the bottom and the race of the top and, um, in the service of kids, that really works in two categories. I see how that works in two categories really well. The, the wealthiest families. Let's charge 20, 000 for, for, for a summer camp. Come on out.
Incredible. For, uh, families who have the least, let's tell that story in a really compelling way to some people that have the most to make the fundraising happen so that we can run nonprofits in that way.
Seth: Or not even the fundraising. I mean, I'm, I am not being elitist here. I think every kid who has parents that can support it should be able to go to camp.
And, you know, if we look at. Some of the famous colleges in the U. S. that are noxious in many other ways, their ability to give a free ride to people who can't afford it is astonishing. But the only way they can do that is by charging the people who can't afford it a ridiculous amount of money. So if you're charging 20, 000 a year for camp, I sure hope Several kids in every cabin are there for a free ride or close to it.
We don't have to make a big deal out of it, but we have to do the work to make sure that the people in that community feel welcome and included and part of it, not as some sort of signal, but because that's why we're here because kids are kids and diversity in all forms is a moral obligation and it also makes camp better.
Jack: I, I thank you for saying that. I was lucky enough to hear you. speak at, at, uh, the American camp association tri state conference a million years ago. Most people haven't heard that. Can you tell us a little bit about why you personally love camp? Like why, why did you want to be on this call instead of the thousand other ways that you could spend your 45 minutes?
Seth: Last summer was my 43rd or 44th summer up there. Um, It's interesting. The question, love camp. A big part of what I love is who I became when I was there. And like they had the 90th reunion two weeks ago and I didn't go, I didn't even think of going. It never occurred to me to go. I would have hated every moment of it.
I want to spend no time, none with the people who I was around when I was 15. I was annoying. They were even more annoying. Who knows who they became, but I don't want to relive that. That's not the point. The point is, there are places in our world, in our lives, where you can put on a show and make a difference.
And once I realized in 1990 I couldn't run a summer camp, I've been running a summer camp in the real world, right? That the Alt MBA, the Akimbo workshops, the people who've been in my organizations and my companies, I'm running it like a summer camp. Because what I am hooked on, is growth. My growth a little bit, other people's growth a lot.
And so what draws me to this institution in general is people want that. And some of them aren't getting it. And if I can turn on a light, that's a fine contribution for me to make.
Jack: You, you did, you did a podcast recently and you talk about, uh, authenticity and, uh, and consistency.
Seth: Yeah.
Jack: And. Can you, can you tell us a little bit about that?
Uh, and, and specifically what I'm interested in is why does that matter for the 18 year old camp counselor? And why does that matter for the, it doesn't matter how old you are, camp director?
Seth: Oh, well, let's start with the camp director. Um, and then we'll get to the 18 year old because it's much harder for the 18 year old to understand this.
Authenticity is not professional. Authenticity is for friends. Yeah. Authenticity is what you whisper to somebody. Consistency is for professionals, for surgeons, for camp directors, for people who make a promise. So if you show up a week into camp and you have a cold and a hangover and you're grouchy because you're authentically grouchy, that's incompetence.
You're not allowed to do that. You have to be consistently the best version of what they expect from you as a camp counselor, as a camp director. 18 year olds, particularly those who've had a cell phone in their hands for 14 years, they think authenticity is everything. And as a parent, I do not want an authentic 18 year old anywhere near my kids, because that's not their job and they're not going to, it's not going to end well, right?
That their job is not to share with a 12 year old, the trauma of breaking up with their girlfriend, because they're staff, right? Their job is to be the best version Of the story that they're there to tell and that's why it's a job and not a hobby
Jack: And how do you navigate that the tension that is? uh Camp is about growth and it's about connection and it's about mentorship and the young people that are in the care of the other young people that we call camp counselors are uh are searching for that connection with someone that they can look up to and There is a story that many people tell that authenticity is connection And, and then there's a, a, a version of, of, of inauthenticness that is sort of a fake, uh, How do we help 18 year olds connect in a real way that is also professional and they're also living in a bunk?
You know, it's a very strange, very
Seth: tricky, you know, so authenticity is a cheap hack for connection. It works. If you were talking to somebody who's sort of a stranger and they start crying, you have instant connection to them. The problem is it's an unreliable hack that doesn't scale. It's unreliable because.
You don't know when to stop. It's unreliable because it might backfire and trigger something that goes in the wrong direction. That the reason we want the professionals in our lives to be consistent is so that we can have predictable outcomes. So what the summer camp does is not that different than what Disney does.
So there was a ride at Disney years ago. I'm just going to announce that I'm pretty sure it's not like this anymore. Uh, 1999. I'm on the ride with little kid. And it's one of those rides with the boats that goes zig zag, zig zag, and there's little robots. And the robots in the gangster part of the ride come to life and taking their guns, jump on the boat and take the boat hostage.
This breaking of the fourth wall in 1995 was thrilling and scary, but there's no way you could do that today. Because, unfortunately, we live in a world where they might be real guns, right? So we don't want the robots to come to life and freak everybody out. We want the ride to be well designed, because if you design the ride well, the people on the ride will be transformed in the way you hope.
And so back to this idea of apparent risk. The problem with authenticity is it can lead to actual risk, because you're asking 18 year olds to make life and death judgments on their own, without boundaries. Because they're authentically drunk or they're authentically having a knife throwing contest or whatever, it's not okay.
Right? That the B, if we don't have boundaries at camp, camp breaks. And for me, the boundary is simple. It's not, camp is for the camper. 'cause camp is also for the staff. It's the way the staff gets joy is by creating the conditions for the kids to change in an appropriate way. They do not get joy by going off the script and imagining what happens when they go into territory that no one's ever been before
Jack: You uh, you you have a such a way of uh,
Seth: i'm forceful sometimes.
Jack: I know I I appreciate the forcefulness but what I love is the is the uh, You you speak in parables in in a in a you you give us a compass and not a map I think i've heard you say and uh Trying to catch up on, in my own head, how do I, uh, how do I operationalize this and make it special for, for the camp directors that I know are gonna be listening, that care so much about their campers and staff, and and believe in, in connection, and often we all, I think myself included, have used authenticity as a Um, as a hack like you're describing, um, and I know that I've heard from so many young people that what they love about camp is that they can be their authentic self, that they can, uh, both young people that work at camp and young people that go to camp.
And, and so it's, it's a jarring.
Seth: Well, let me just, let's just put some boundaries on this, right? What I am trying to describe is this. If you're sitting around the campfire. And you're 19 years old and you're talking to a 14 year old. And that 14 year old is talking about their fears and dreams. You as a 19 year old included in the boundaries is you should talk about your fears and dreams.
If they are appropriate in the sense that you could talk about them in front of this person's parents, right? That that vulnerability and authenticity is required. What is not allowed is for you to act out. inappropriately in a way that harms the journey of the kid. And you need to be able to find boundaries as an 18 or 19 year old to do that.
The best way I know to find those boundaries is to teach people what it is to be a professional. And that means surgeons wear those gloves and they hold their hands like this. They do that because it reminds them they're not just cutting the lawn, they're cutting somebody open. Right? And so what we say is You're going to have to have an interaction with these kids and know when there's a, a wall and you have to stop.
And you can't date a 15 year old and you can't do all sorts of other things that you might authentically want to do because that's not why you're here. We have to keep coming back to why you're here and then just to go sideways and I'm happy to come back to this if you want. So one of the first things that Joanne and I did, uh, our one is eight weeks and there were six visiting days.
We canceled all of them. And we said to parents, we're not canceling visiting visiting days because we hate them because we do. We're canceling visiting days because it hurts your kids. And if you don't want to send your kid to a camp that doesn't have visiting day, we totally get it, but we're just telling you as people who have been with kids our whole lives, it's not good for the kids, so take it or leave it.
Right. And we can say to staff, there are all sorts of privileges. Associated with being here. And we will create more and more of them for you, including ways for you to spend your time away from kids that are fully authentic, and you can go completely nuts, but, and the heart of why we are here is not to get the kid part over with so we can go have fun.
The reason we are here is there is a method. To dealing with kids and that's thrilling and if you get that joke We want you here forever. And if you don't get that joke, we got other people who can take this slot
Jack: I love the way you think about uh status How do you? Think about helping young people get excited about the thrill of being at camp for, for taking care of kids and growing and growth and, and these other, these other exciting parts of being a camp, uh, and let the status, uh, become a virtuous cycle as opposed to a brace to the bottom that is we deal with kids for a few hours so that we can get drunk on the weekend.
Seth: Okay. So we could decode status forever, but we've got to start wrapping up soon, but status isn't money or grades. Status is much more subtle than it's who eat lunch, who eats lunch first. It's who gets the glance around the campfire. It's all these cues that have been built into humanity for a million years.
So if you show me a camp with a bullying problem, it will take me less than five minutes to show you how you have given some bully status. Which is why there's a bullying problem. That if you're having issues in the way your hierarchy works and that people who don't care a lot persisted not caring a lot, I will show you an issue with status where those people are seen as cool or get the benefit of the doubt or have other things around them, soft tissue that encourages them to keep doing what they're doing.
And in 1977, that was the heart of my summer camp experience, that the 10 worst people had the most status. And fixing that is really hard, but you can do it with intent. And that is why we invented the SAT. The SAT standardized test was invented because at scale we didn't have an easy way to dispense status and giving it in, in two, three digit numbers was this great shortcut, right?
So we're not going to do that at camp. But we are going to figure out who is earning the approval of who else, because it's not just the director, because the director anoints other people. And it might be someone, the director doesn't even like who's dispensing status to other people. And when we give the class clown or the troll too much of a microphone, they become a status dispenser.
And now you've given up the future of your camp.
Jack: I could ask you 10, 000 questions and I know we're running short on time. How do you think about helping? A parent decide which camp, they've already decided they want to go to camp, which camp is a, is a great camp for them.
Seth: So if you're not regularly sending kids and their parents to other camps, you're not serious about your camp standing for something.
And If you go to a Ferrari dealership and say, I got eight kids and, uh, I'm looking at a way to take carpool. They're not going to try to talk you into getting an Enzo. They're just not. They're gonna say my brother works at the Volvo dealership. Here's his number. So you don't identify your camp as better than all other camps in all ways.
You come up with the axes. What are you the best at? And what are other camps the best at? If you're looking for X, they have X. If you're looking for Y, we have Y. So. That means that your programming, your ethos, all of it has to follow. So, being pretty good at being a sports camp, pretty good at being a theater camp, pretty good at being a whole kid camp, pre, blah, blah, blah.
You don't stand for anything, right? So, stop doing intramural baseball. Just stop. Let that, the kid who wants to do nothing but baseball go to a different camp, right? Focus on the kind of change you are here to make. Who are you here to make it for? You are here to make it for. And then it's really easy to say to a parent, this is who we are.
That's who they are. And I think one of the things to do in January and February is go find five other camp directors and go visit parents as a group, because the parents are more likely to show up if there's a group of you saying, we don't care which camp you go to, just go to one of them. And now you can each talk about why you're different for different kids.
Jack: I, I love that. I think that there's a lot of opportunities to make that possible virtually too. And I'm excited about that idea. I love being able to amplify the weirdnesses of camp. The parts that make your camp special are why you should come to my camp or someone else's camp. It's not because we're the best, but because we're the best at this.
And come and join us. Um, so before we wrap, what is something that you wish more camp directors knew that I haven't asked you about?
Seth: When a parent is giving you a hard time, it is almost always only one thing, fear, their fear. They want to deal with their fear by exerting control. And if you push back on the exerting control part, you will amplify their fear. If you can find the fear part, you can make them into an ally. And so, you know, when there were the wildfires a few years ago and the parents were all calling, what are you going to do?
Are you going to build a giant dome over the camp? So there's nothing but clean air in there. It's very tempting to just have a debate about breathing, but what's really happening is you're They feel powerless. They can't protect somebody in the face of something they don't understand. And so the conversation shifted to what's it like to feel powerless over something you can't.
How do we help together navigate this? Because the fact is, if you want to take your kid back to Toronto, it's fine with me, but the air in Toronto is exactly the same as the air here. So how is that going to help? Let's work our way through this. What would you need to know on an ongoing basis that would help you feel the sense of control you have when your kids are at home?
And. We can multiply that by, I don't like the fact that you put my kid in cabin 12 if she belongs in cabin 8. Well, let's not have a debate about cabin 8 versus cabin 12. Let's talk about what they're actually afraid of.
Jack: Seth, I am unbelievably grateful for you taking the time to, to, to chat today and for all the work that you've done showing up writing every day for 20 years, it is not an exaggeration to say that stomping around the camp that I helped start does not exist. And certainly is not as interesting without the encouragement and the way that you have helped us think about the world.
So from the bottom of my heart, thank you for anyone that's listening. Uh, go, go buy one of Seth's books, This is Strategy is, is awesome. Leave it on your desk, uh, start meetings by letting the rest of your team read it and then pick one of the, the, the categories to talk about for, for a few minutes. It's unbelievable.
It's awesome. Thank you, Seth.
Seth: You're very kind. Here's what you should do instead. Take the 20 bucks you're going to spend on the book and send it to Stomping Ground so another kid can go to camp.
Jack: Thank you. Seth, thank you so much.
Seth: Thanks. Go make a ruckus.