Parent, adult or child?

By Jamie MorleyMarch 30, 2022

Ok. You’re an adult, right? How are you behaving though. Is it really adult behaviour?

The concept of parent, adult and child behaviour was developed by the psychologist Eric Berne in the late 1950s. It essentially states that in different interactions as adults our ego is operating either as a child, an adult or a parent. I believe this is a really useful concept to consider as a leader on multiple fronts…

Firstly, what you want is adult to adult behaviour throughout your team. Sometimes this is not the case. A classic example that is often bought up is where a team member of yours, let’s say a nurse, comes to you as the principal dentist complaining about the behaviour of another nurse. What behaviour is this? This is child like behaviour. They are going to the parent (you) to complain about one of their other colleagues. This other colleague may also come to you to complain about them, also acting as a child. If you then speak to the other person to try and resolve this, which is important to do, you are unfortunately exacerbating the problem by acting like the parent and solving the bickering between the two people. What is critical in these situations is to encourage adult behaviour, which is for them to speak to each other directly and to engage in an adult to adult discussion without you being there. I find that a good way of doing this when somebody says something about a colleague is simply to ask... 'have you spoken to him or her directly about this?' They may go quiet and realise that this is not the correct way of behaving and may even be a bit embarrassed about it. Some may then drop the issue and realise that it is not a big deal or they might still want to have the conversation with the other person. In which case you can then offer assistance in helping them to prepare for the conversation and how to go about doing it. You can ask the person if they need any support in having the conversation. It is tempting to act as the parent but this only further encourages the child like behaviour. We want the issues resolved, so we need to encourage the person to speak to the other person and give them support in how to do this.

Secondly, in order to have an adult to adult environment, you as the leader need to act as an adult, not as a parent. I find this is typically what leaders default to. What do parents do? They tell their children what to do, they tell them off when they don’t do it, they give them strict rules and direction, they sometimes do it for them. Why do parents do this? They do this because actual children are not capable of doing many of the tasks and they are not capable of learning or thinking for themselves. They are mentally and physically not developed to be able to do this. This is not the case when a normally developed person passes the age of 18! What I am saying is beware of treating your team members like children through behaving like a parent. If you treat your team members like children, how will they respond? Like children! You have to interrupt these behaviours and act like an adult. If you act like an adult you will likely get an adult response back. When you have some concerns about how somebody is behaving. Rather than ‘telling them off’ as per the parent, you want to simply describe the issue and your concerns to them, understand their perspective and come to a resolution as to how to move forward. When you are telling people what to do, do you need to tell them exactly how it has to be done? (Parent) or can you give them corridors in which to operate with an end goal and ask them how they might go about doing it? (Adult) When people ask for help do you end up doing it for them? (Parent) You may think you are helping, but actually this person then starts to become dependent on you, as per a child, rather than being able to think and act for themselves and contribute to the practice or business. (Adult)

Thirdly, when somebody else is acting either in a child like manner or in the parent ego, it is your role as a leader to interrupt this. As previously mentioned, when somebody is complaining to you about somebody else, ask them to speak to each other directly. When you see one of your leaders telling people what to do without any freedom, give them the appropriate feedback to make them aware of it and articulate the impact of it. When you see one of your leaders avoiding a difficult conversation with somebody, help them to have that conversation. When you notice that people are not speaking up and being honest because they are afraid, do everything to encourage them to voice their opinion.

Notice how you are behaving during any one day. Are you behaving like a parent? Maybe a child? Strive to be an adult and to help others to behave like an adult as well.