Here is the second part of my summary of Virginia Satir's model of interpersonal decision making:
The three options we identified before--Disagree, Agree, or Change the Subject--are inherently based on game-like assumptions about winning and losing:
When I use disagreement, I'm trying to win, and to make you lose.
When I use agreement, I'm letting you win, and am willing to lose (while hoping for approval from you, etc.)
When I change the subject away from a decision, I'm willing to make us both lose, as long as we avoid conflict and unpleasantness.
Sometimes people think of compromise as a better alternative. We settle for half of what we want, but neither you nor I get what we want, or need. This is also a lose-lose option. We can see too many examples of this approach in political and legislative processes. Compromise, and its inevitable ineffectiveness for solving human or social problems, only makes people decide to fight harder next time. In this sense, compromise has a polarizing effect.
So what are we to do?
Satir pointed out that it's possible to shift from win-lose, game-playing approches, to win-win authentic interactions. This is not the same as compromise. Instead of working out how we'll split a small pie, we work together to bake a bigger one. The effect is to transform a limiting decision-making interaction into a constructive problem-solving conversation. Instead of competing for limited resources, we collaborate on creating new options that effectively respond to our respective or shared needs.
But how the heck do we actually do this? For most of us, it calls for new and unfamiliar behaviors. Satir found that it's important to be willing to put one's cards on the table, and to be the first to do so. Instead of "What would you like to do, dear?" (which is an agreement ploy), one has to be the first to take a chance and state one's preferences, needs, priorities, etc. And one has to disclose the underlying values, needs, or personal considerations. "Let me say what I've been thinking about this, and what about it is important to me."
One then has to inquire about the other's preferences, needs, and priorities, giving them equal importance and attention. Honest, active listening is crucial here, to understand the other's experience and point of view.
And one has to continually affirm the relationship in the conversation, by stating how the integrity of the relationship is more important than whatever gets decided.
This approach makes for a very different kind of interaction. Instead of game-like positioning to achieve one-sided goals, there is open, explicit consideration of both persons' perspectives. Given the superordinate goal to protect and affirm the relationship, it's possible to shift away from either/or decision-making. Instead, we can engage in creative problem-solving, no longer limited by initially-defined options, but working together to generate new options that increasingly respond to both persons' needs and priorities.
How often do you see or engage in this kind of win-win interaction? It is certainly not what we generally see in politics, or in schools, or organizations. It is thus counter-cultural. So engaging in win-win interaction requires continual learning, as well as perseverance, and courage.
I look forward to your comments!
6 comments:
Hi Saul, I've enjoyed these last two posts. It seems to me that figuring out how to make a bigger pie is essentially a group creative process. Observing the interaction from this perspective opens up other frames of reference and useful skills for the participants. For instance, Schön's description of creative process as reflection-in-action.
Scaling up from a one-on-one, interpersonal interaction, I particularly like Karasek's notion of a jazz economy, a model of social exchange rather than marketplace trade. I love the way Karasek contrasts the behaviors of Bentham’s 1789 neoclassical ‘economic man,' who seems aligned with the win-loss interactions in Satir's model and is described as a “computationally-exact, interactively repressed, omniscient data gatherer with preordained tastes,” with New Orleans in the early 1900‘s at the birth of jazz:
"a diverse amalgamation of people with all types of backgrounds who had to relate to each other on the basis of equality - French, Spanish, and Mexican. They all included their music in a polyphonic improvisation of blues, ragtime, and street - with everyone coming in playing differently. It was harmony through conflict - but conflict with a strong collective purpose and with mutual respect. This appears to be a good historical example to illuminate the creative coordination behaviors needed in the conducive economy." (based on Wynton Marsalis description)
On reflection then, I completely agree that the relationship is more important than the decision, but would perhaps expand the concept of relationship to include the expectation of something unexpected and magical flowing from it, and that until it does the decision-making interaction isn't complete and the pie hasn't gotten any bigger.
Gordon
Thanks for this great comment, Gordon! The emergence of jazz as a creative exploration of musical dialogue among traditions that were different is a perfect example of the abundance that collaboration can create.
And mutual respect and appreciation can lead to surprising outcomes. Just when you think the ride is over, a friend comes along and hands you a roll of nickels!
Saul
Dear Saul, I also have really enjoyed and learned a lot from these posts. I like what Gordon says about how "figuring out how to make a bigger pie is essentially a group creative process" as that kind of imaginative invention would seem to necessitate the wider view gained from different vantage points, each contributing honestly and listening fully.
My clinic group (we are independent practitioners, engaged in a joint venture) has learned this almost accidentally. After more than 10 years thinking that we were operating by consensus (a set-up inherited from one of our late founders) we have come to realize that what we really have been doing is always aiming for unamity, and often afraid to hurt each others' feelings. Whereas true consensus as I am beginning to understand it, seems as if it ideally based on Satir's guidelines of each person clearly offering their needs and priorities to a group that's connected through respectful relationships and common purpose, and then applying their creative imagination to generate something that no one person had thought of on their own. I really like Gordon's quoted jazz example, "conflict with a strong collective purpose and with mutual respect"
After being very stuck for months around some big decisions, one of us needed something different at least temporarily and said so, and we surprised ourselves by how quickly we were able to create a new solution. As we have gotten into the habit more and more of stating our needs and priorities, things have started moving and changing quite quickly. The "continual learning, as well as perseverance, and courage" you describe have definitely been my practice edges!
love, Christy
Saul,
I have recently discovered the OD masters program at SSU. From there is where I came across your blog and let me say I am fascinated.
Lately, I have been speaking with my director explaining how management needs to emphasize the importance of their teammates, i mean "employees." Satir's approach is crucial for a cohesive and effective relationship because it puts the importance on the relationship most. Which is what i have noticed to be a problem with many organizations. I feel as if employees in many organizations and work places are often made to feel replaceable, voiceless, and almost as if just a portion of an assembly line. With this attitude it makes a business/organization impossible to see a healthy, successful growth.
I will be forwarding your post on. I have enjoyed reading the posts you have made and hope you continue to share.
-Stephanie Iacobacci
Thanks, Christy and Stephanie for your insightful comments; and I sincerely apologize for my delay in responding to you. The joy in writing this blog is greatly about engaging with respondents and working together to extend and deepen our shared understanding.
Christy, your group's experience with "consensus" is painfully familiar to me. So many groups, with the best intentions, try to make decisions together and are influenced by the widespread misunderstanding of consensus as unanimity--just as you describe. This is a terrible waste of time and energy, and worse. Participants become discouraged and disenchanted with collaborative practices. Your group's breakthrough in getting the difference, and practicing true collaborative decision making, are so encouraging and validating!
Stephanie, I'm glad you've discovered the MA in OD at Sonoma State. It's an excellent program. And I agree that it's sad and tragic that most organizations mistakenly behave as if efficient operations must be built on mechanistic ways of working with others. It is our human capabilities--and preferences--for interactive creativity and shared goals that create the highest performance for the organization as a whole.
Again, thank you both for your comments. I hope you'll continue commenting on these posts!
Love,
Saul
It strikes me that developing a win-win mentality requires a shift in premise. In the win-lose game, the premise is that we each have differing needs/opinions and that the work before us is to resolve this difference. It looks like "I know a truth, and your opposition is a problem." With that premise, Satir's first three behaviors are required.
To initiate a different game, we cannot just look to the outcome of the game as different (win-win vs. win-lose); the object of the game must be examined. As you say, it is not about how to split up a pie and both go a bit hungry. It is about a bigger pie.
In that case, the opening premise is that we each have something to contribute and we need the other's helpful perspective to explore the issue fully. It looks more like, "I don't know the answer, but I have some initial ideas about strategy. I'd like to share those and then hear your ideas so we can create something worthwhile together." This is a substantial shift in game premise. It means we do not have a side, a stance, a philosophical territory to defend. It requires the view that we are all on the same side and the understanding that our differing needs/views do not separate us from one another but make us indispensable to one another.
Post a Comment