How to Become Better In Any Relationship

I was typing up a summary of the philosophies of the Arbinger Institute, and thought I'd also share it here.
The thing to remember in our relationships is this:

We think other people's bad behavior gives us an excuse for when we are less than our best. I had to get angry, or impatient, or bitter, we say, because of the way they were acting.

But we forget that our actions give them an excuse, too. "I had to act the way I was acting," they say, "because that person was so angry, or impatient, or bitter."

Even if they "went first," we gave them an excuse to keep being bad. "I knew I was right to act that way," they say. "I knew that person would be angry, impatient, or bitter."

And then we use their behavior as our excuse, and the cycle goes on and on, in a hopeless downward spiral that no one can ever win.

And it is not enough to try to break out of it by simply "taking the higher road." Because they will just see our attempts to "be the better person" as being condescending, as talking down to them, as passive-aggressive. They'll just use that as their excuse to keep acting the way they're acting.

So then, where is our hope? If we can't make it better by the low road, or the high road, what is our hope of making it better?

It lies in seeing them as a person again. A person equal in importance to us. No more special, and certainly no less. Walking next to them.

And then recognize that our anger, our impatience, our bitterness made them feel exactly the way we feel. And then in our feeling bad for making another person feel that way.

If it was so bad when they did it to us, it must have been just as bad when we did it to them.

Our ability to empathize with them gives us the hope of reconnecting with them. Our ability to understand them gives us the hope that things can become better.

Even if they were the ones who "started" it.

Because then we stop seeing them as a monster, but as a person. A person like us, who has been hurt, like us. A person who sometimes doesn't quite know how to deal with their hurt, and lashes out at a world before it can have the chance to lash out at them. It doesn't make their actions right, any more than their bad behavior made ours right. But it can make their actions more understandable, and make them people to us again instead of monsters.

And that will change our behavior--because we only felt it was okay to act as we acted toward another human being because we weren't really seeing them as a human being at all.

How To Handle Conflicts (And How NOT To Handle Conflicts)

Some ways of dealing with conflict don't work.

Competition

When we see ourselves as having to struggle against other people to get what we need, it makes us see other people as enemies and work against them. This usually makes them struggle back. It leads them to mistrust us, and us to mistrust them. As was said, "When we see the world as a jungle, it becomes a jungle."

When we think we have to fight against everyone (and by fighting we don't mean punching--it can be arguing, or even passive-aggressive manipulation) it becomes true, because, as often as not, they feel they have to fight back.

People doing this usually believe that if someone else is getting something, that means they're losing out on something themselves.

Capitulation

The other thing that doesn't work is just giving in. We usually do this because we want to keep the relationship good, and are trying to avoid hard feelings. However, when we see how easy it was for the other person to let us give in, it usually results in our getting upset, resentful, and mistrustful of the other person, even though we're the one who gave in! Rather than helping the relationship, it also makes it worse.

And it makes the other person more likely to expect us to back down again the next time--which means it becomes even harder to get what we need.

These people also think they have to give up what they want in order to give someone else what they want.

Compromise

Believe it or not, compromise usually doesn't help either. Combining the worst parts of conflict and capitulation, compromise could be called when, "Both people give up a little of what they want so that nobody ends up happy."

People compromising usually still think that everything someone else gets means something they have to lose, and so every inch of who gets what is struggled over, leading to the same kind of problems for the relationship that Capitulation and Conflict cause.

So if Conflict, Capitulation, and Compromise all don't work, what does work?

Cooperation

This is a fundamental change in attitude about how we see conflict. Instead of thinking, "If I give other people what they want, it means giving up what I want," it says, "I believe that, in most cases, a solution can be reached that can help everyone get what they really want."

Instead of saying, "I just have to think about myself," it says, "The other person here is just as much of a person as I am, and what they need is just as important. I should try as hard to help them get what they want as I would try to get something for myself."

Now this may seem hard if you focus on "What" people say they want--This is called their position. For example, a child might want mom to take them to the arcade, but mom might want to go to the gym. Looking at their positions, it seems impossible to do both. At best, they might find a compromise and mom only goes to the gym for half the time, and takes him to the arcade for a couple quick games.

But was there a better solution?

In order to find out, it helps if you focus on "Why" they want it--their fundamental interests. In this case, Mom's been trying to lose weight to win a contest at work, She's gone to the gym every day this week, and she doesn't want to break her streak.

But when she asks the child why he wants to go to the arcade, he says, "You've been gone every night this week. I just want to spend time with you."

So the gym wasn't really about the gym--it was about getting fit. And the arcade wasn't really about the arcade--it was about spending time with Mom.

They decide to go play Frisbee at the park. That way, Mom gets her exercise in, and the child gets to play with Mom--everybody's getting everything they want!

Only this way strengthens relationships instead of hurting them, and helps people get what they want more often than any of the other ways.

To make this work:

1. You have to really want to help the other person find a solution as much as you want a solution for yourself. You can't just want enough for them to get them by. You really have to be as committed to finding them a solution as you are for yourself, otherwise it's too easy to give up too soon, or settle for less for them as long as you're getting what you want.

2. You have to be relatively flexible. Remember the difference between "positions" and "interests" and don't get so caught up in arguing over your "position" that you reject solutions that would meet all of your interests.

3. You have to understand what the other person's interests are as well as you understand your own. Do you really understand what the other person wants? Or have you just made assumptions about what the other person wants? Usually we just assume things, and, most often, we assume the worst. For example, if an employee doesn't want to work late, a manager will usually just "assume" it's because they're lazy or they're trying to see what they can get away with (We do this because, by assuming negative motivations for another person, it becomes easier for us to justify not helping them get what they want and still think of ourselves as nice people). Finding out their real interests is about communication, not assumption.

4. Attack problems, not people. Don't be either defensive or reactive. Try to do and say things that will both strengthen the relationship and help solve the problem. Personal attacks--even if made defensively--only detract and derail discussion. If you're trying to change anybody or make them want something different than what they already want, you're going to be banging your head against a wall.

Conflict Management: Reasons For Employee Conflict

An Observation of a Cycle

Pretty early on in my studies of the principles of management, I came to a realization.

Every conflict between a manager and an employee--in fact, every interpersonal conflict, whether it was in the workplace, the home, sports teams, volunteer groups, or anything else--could be traced to one source.

A lack of trust.

If two people were not getting along, somehow they had come to stop trusting each other. For whatever reason, they now thought the other person was no longer acting with their best interests in mind.

If you think about it, this is always true. Whether it's a husband and wife drifting apart, a parent and a child fighting, or a manager who is in conflict with an employee, at the core of the conflict is the fact that they've become afraid that the other person isn't acting in their best interests any more.

I also noticed the way that lack of trust could begin to perpetuate itself. Because the manager, for example, was now afraid that the employee wasn't acting in the manager or the company's best interests, the manager would be hesitant to accept the employee's requests, complaints, or suggestions.

This hesitancy would cause the employee to further mistrust the manager. If he's not taking my requests, complaints, or suggestions, he must not be taking me seriously, the employee would think. Consequently, the employee would be hesitant to accept assignments, critcisms, and direction from a manager he felt wasn't really concerned about him.

Which leads to increased mistrust from the manager. Which leads to increased mistrust from the employee.

You see the cycle. It was always obvious to me, as an outsider, when I'd see the cycle develop.

The solution, to me, was obvious. Since this cycle was continuous, either one of them could break it. If I could just persuade one of them about the truth of what was going on, we could break the cycle.

A Problem With The Solution

But here was the problem: neither my observation or terminology helped me persuade them at all.

You see, my observation didn't change the fact that they were both right. The other person was acting in a way that did not merit trust. No matter which person you were, the fact was the other person was focused entirely on themselves and their own self interests. Their mistrust of you was that you would not do what they wanted. The other person wasn't thinking about your concerns at all.

Nor did my observation that there was a lack of trust. You can't spontaneously generate trust for someone who has honestly been demonstrating over time that they aren't thinking about how avoid injuring you, but has repeatedly demonstrated a willingness to disregard your interests.

Despite my observations, I still felt powerless.

Help From The Arbinger Institute

Then I began reading some of the works of the Arbinger Institute, and found a much more sophisticated, useful view of the cycle I observed. They'd even given a name to it: collusion.

Normally, collusion means two people conspiring for a common goal, but in a twisted sort of way, it perfectly describes the way two people in conflict manage to exactly act in a way that justifies the other person's feelings towards them.

The manger, in his attempt to manage the untrustworthy employee, manages to act in exactly the controlling, resistant way the employee needs in order to tell himself his manager is oppressive and doesn't care about his employees.

And the employee, in an effort to stand up for himself and fight for his rights, acts in exactly the rebellious, resistant way the manager needs in order to tell himself the employee is difficult and doesn't care about the company.

But Arbringer doesn't label the thing flowing so freely back and forth between the two as mistrust. They label the thing flowing back and forth between them as blame.

Now that was a word I could use.

The Problem With Blame

If you asked the manager what the problem was, he would blame the employee. But if you asked the employee who the problem was, he would blame the manager.

But what was the real problem?

The problem was the blame.

The manager was actually reacting negatively to the things the employee was trying to do to "deal" with his oppressive manager. but the employee was only reacting negatively to the things the manager was doing to "deal" with his rebellious employee.

When one of them blames the other, in word or in deed, it provokes defensiveness and blame back. And that returned blame invites more blame and defensiveness.

And, even worse, at that point, they both begin to focus on proving themselves right rather than on solving the problem. In their book, Leadership and Self-Deception, Arbringer writes:

However bitterly I complain about someones poor behavior toward me and about the trouble it causes me, I also find it strangely delicious. It's my proof that others are as blameworthy as I've claimed them to be--and that I'm as innocent as I claim myself to be. The behavior I complain about is the very behavior that justifies me.

The eye-opening revelation is that blame is a divisive force that creates more problems than it solves.

Blame is a recourse for those who are more interested in justifying themselves than in getting results.

Blame is a weapon, but a twisted sort of weapon that seeks to transform the one it hits into an attacker, and the one who fires it into a victim. It is designed to elicit certain feelings towards the one leveling the blame and the one the blame is directed towards.

This is not to say that there are not responsibilities, and that in any given situation, some people may be more responsible than others. It is not to say

Blame is not about solving problems, but is simply about creating perceptions. Imagine if your doctor was more concerned about creating a certain appearance than about finding out what was really wrong with you. He would be inclined to overlook certain obvious symptoms, as he was continually reaching for hard-to-diagnose cases that would make him look like an insightful, knowledgeable doctor. He would be slow to diagnose things that should be easy for him, like simple colds, as he continually reached for diagnoses that were more in line with his own ambitions. His worries about perceptions over problem solving would hinder his diagnosis.

Similarly, let's say there is a person in our department who we want to blame for all the problems in that department. It doesn't matter if the person actually is as big a jerk as we think he is or not. What matters is that our focus on them, and our desire to isolate them as the cause of all our problems. Such a focus will make us as slow to diagnose seemingly simple problems as the doctor was in the example above.

Most particularly, it will render us almost completely impotent to diagnosing any problems in ourselves.

In fact, the blame becomes our proof that we're good, and that the problem is somewhere else. Whatever we do magically becomes okay. Sure, we'll acknowledge our own imperfections, and even work on them some, but we know they're not responsible for any of the big problems. What do our little imperfections matter, when there is such a problem person as so-and-so in my department?

But Isn't It Somebody's Fault?

The biggest reason to internally rebel against this idea is obvious: But what if it really is his fault? Or, perhaps, But it really is his fault.

And the answer to that is, it can be his fault without any need for the kind of bitter, vindictive blame I'm talking about.

What do I mean by that?

Chances are, you've been corrected once or twice in your life. You've made mistakes, and other people have seen fit to tell you about them.

I want you to think of two times you've been corrected.

For the first time, I want you to think of a time you've been corrected that provoked you to feel some type of emotion. The correction made you angry, or rebellious. This is a time when someone was blaming you.

Now, think of a second time. Think of a time when someone let you know something that you could do better. This time, think about when the correction was a good experience. You felt, if anything, grateful, or at the very least, none of the hostility you felt the first time.

If you think about the differences between the two times, chances are the difference wasn't in the correction. Chances are the difference was in how you thought the person who was talking to you felt about you.

In the first example, the person making the correction may have been trying to make themselves look smart (and, you felt, trying to make you look stupid to help them look smarter). They might have been trying to make you look bad (because they were trying to blame you for something). They might have been someone you saw as constantly butting in, because they didn't feel you were capable of figuring things out on your own.

Whatever the reason, chances are it was the person's attitude towards you that caused you to see the correction as being something you needed to resist.

Same thing in reverse in the second example. Chances are, you saw the second person as either willing or able to help you. You either didn't know them, and therefore didn't have any reason to believe they'd need to hurt you, or you did know them, and you knew they did care about you, and did want you to do well.

See how it works?

The problem is not in offering correction where correction is necessary. The problem is where we feel the correction is coming from.

The solution to eliminating harmful blame is not to eliminate accountability. People need to be held accountable. However, it is possible to hold someone responsible for something and work towards a solution without wanting harm, shame, or blame to fall on the person responsible.

No Need For A Bad Guy

If I asked you to beat Tiger Woods at golf, chances are you couldn't do it.

If I spent a lot of time training you, working with you, and coaching you, chances are you still couldn't do it.

No matter how important beating Tiger Woods was to me, or how naturally good at golf you are, or how good a coach I am, chances are we'll never get you to a point that you could beat Tiger Woods.

So whose fault is it? Who's to blame? You? Me? Woods?

Hopefully, the answer is obvious: It's nobody's fault. It's just not something that's within your power to achieve or my power to teach. He's got more natural ability, and he's been in the game longer.

Blaming would be useless here. There is no bad guy.

Now, remove Tiger Woods from the equation. Isn't there still a limit to how far your abilities and my coaching can take us? Once that limit was hit, would it really be anybody's fault?

Not at all. No amount of me blaming you or you blaming me would help. We've both tried our best, and both reached our limits.

There is no bad guy.

However, I might harbor an unspoken fear that I was the bad guy. Or you might harbor an unspoken fear that you were the bad guy. And in an effort to prove that wrong, we'd start gathering all the evidence we could against each other. We'd starting looking for every proof we could that the other guy hadn't tried hard enough, or put in enough hours, or did his best. We would want the other guy to be the bad guy, so that we didn't have to be.

And here's the sad irony: At this point, the only thing that would help is if I start to improve my ability as a coach, or if you start to improve your ability as a trainer. By spending all our time focusing on the other person, and ignoring ourselves, we have turned away from the only thing that can actually help improve the situation--working on ourselves. Until I start learning better coaching techniques, or more about play, or you start getting better conditioned or develop a better work schedule, nothing will change.

But as long as you're focused on my problems, and I'm focused on your problems, that will never happen.

Either one of us can break the cycle. If either one of us begins to think about what we can contribute to the relationship instead of what the other person is costing the relationship, our contribution will automatically begin to improve things.

However, this only works if our efforts, if our our contributions are sincere. The second example you imagined above, the one that you didn't feel the desire to resist, wasn't someone who was "working" you, or "giving so that you would give," or "practicing good people skills."

It was someone who cared.

Period.