9 Transactional Analysis Tools that All Project Managers Must Know

Transactional Analysis is no longer as popular and well known as it once was. But it remains one of the supreme toolsets for Project Managers to use. Indeed – for all managers, leaders, and professionals.

I was recently reminded of it by my friend, Jonathan Norman. Jonathan wrote a great article about ‘The Major Projects World‘ for us. He invited me to co-host a webinar on Transactional Analysis for The Major Projects Association.

We spend a pleasant couple of hours planning out what to cover and the event went really well. But the truth is t hat we had to leave out far more content that we were able to include in the time allowed.

This led me to wonder: how many of the Transactional Analysis (TA) tools do I use in my professional life? I am not a therapist. So, I don’t use the whole body of TA work. And neither do I use it with rigor.

But I did quickly list 9 Transactional Analysis tools and models that I use a lot. And I am confident that you can gain huge benefit from any of them.

We’ll start with a simple introduction to TA…

What is Transactional Analysis?

Relationships dominate every aspect of our life – work, social and intimate.  Therefore, when things go wrong, the impact is huge.  So, wouldn’t it be great if we had a comprehensive model to analyze what happens when they do?

That’s the work that Eric Berne began in the 1950s. And he continued with it to his death in 1970.  Others contributed too:

• Franklin Ernst
• Taibi Kahler
• Robert and Mary Goulding
• Claude Steiner
• Stephen Karpman

Transactional Analysis (TA) was best known in the 1960s and continues to thrive and be developed today.

This short video leans heavily on the first two models I’ll discuss below…

Transactional Analysis is a body of models and theories about how we operate in the world. Its origins lie in the world of psychotherapy, but it’s thinking tools are highly accessible to non-experts.

It offers ways to think about:

• How we feel in the moment (Ego States)
• The way that reflects in our communication (Transactions)
• The emotional baggage we carry around and how that affects the way we respond to things (Life Scripts)
• Our perceptions of ourselves and others (Life Positions)
• The way we feel compelled to Act (Drivers)
• How we feel valued by others – and ourselves (Strokes)
• The ways we misroute on what’s really happening (Discounting)
• The familiar patterns of behavior we get caught up in (Games)
• And how we can analyze those repeating patterns easily (The Drama Triangle)

Huge Body of TA Knowledge

There is a lot more to Transactional Analysis than this. I spent three of the most worthwhile days of training* learning about TA and I only scratched the surface!

And my understanding is very much at a practical non-expert level. There’s a good chance that in simplifying the ideas and explaining them as I understand them I am, technically, misrepresenting them. But the mental models and thinking tools I’m going to offer you have served me well in many may situations over 30 years of:

• consulting
• managing projects
• coaching managers and professionals, and
• developing and delivering training

I hope they will serve you equally well.

Ego States: the Core Transactional Analysis Model

At the core of Transactional Analysis are two complementary models of how we operate in the world. One is focused on the why. And since we don’t aim to be therapists, I shall ignore that.

The practical approach looks at how we operate in the world, and suggests that, at any time, we operate from one of three ‘Ego States’. These are ways of being, which we choose consciously or – more often and with possibly damaging consequences – unconsciously.

The ego states determine how we communicate with the people around us.

The Three Ego States

There are three ego states, that use simple metaphors to help us understand how we see the world when we occupy them:

1. Parent State
2. Child State
3. Adult State

The Parent Ego State

The Parent ego state represents a set of attitudes and behaviors conditioned by all that we have learned in life. Often it repeats things that your own true parents or caregivers said as you were growing up. The Parent state can be either

• The Nurturing Parent
  – nurturing, caring, and supportive. The nurturing parent can mother our creativity and deny our ability to think, decide, and act for ourselves.
• The Controlling Parent
  – prejudiced, critical, and controlling. The controlling parent knows ‘the right way’ to do things and can be intolerant and even abusive.

The Child Ego State

The Child state dominates when we allow our emotions to subordinate reason. It’s choices are driven by feelings rather than facts. The Child state can be:

• The Free Child
  – spontaneous, rebellious, and self-centered. It does what it wants and is driven by its feelings. This means it can act emotionally, reacting with petulance, anger, or misery. Yet the Free Child can also be creative and playful. 
• The Adapted Child
  – obedient, compliant, or obliging. The adapted child suppresses its desires so it can get acceptance from, the Parent state.

The Adult Ego State

The Adult state emerges when reason governs our behavior.  From this state, we act rationally and with understanding.  We collaborate, and deal honestly and openly with others.  The Adult strives to evaluate situations objectively and fairly, and achieve an optimal outcome.

The Adult state seeks to achieve the right outcome and does so in a respectful manner.

Analyzing Transactions: The Heart of TA

As we have seen, ehe central concept of TA is the ego state.  Each of us operates from three ego states, or ways of being. 

When we communicate, our message will come from one of these states, and be received by one of the three ego states of the other person.  Their reply will likewise come from, and be addressed to, an ego state. 

The effectiveness of the transaction depends on which ego states are engaged.

Adult-Adult Transactions

In workplace situations, we will aim mostly for Adult-Adult transactions.  These are motivated by a positive intent, and are mediated by an effective process.  

However, these are not the only transactions you will encounter on your projects. So, an understanding of the range of alternative transactions and how they manifest will help you diagnose what is going on, and provide you with insight, and therefore choice.

For example, delegating to a team-member will feel best if it is an Adult-Adult transaction.  

Alternate Transactions

If you delegate from Parent state, the feeling that you are either patronizing them (nurturing parent) or commanding them (critical parent) will feel uncomfortable.  

Alternatively, if you have recently been promoted and you do not yet feel confident of your authority, you may find yourself delegating from Child state. You may, at an unconscious level, feel apologetic (Adapted Child) or find yourself demanding compliance, because you fear insubordination (Free Child).

If you start from a Child State, it is likely to result in your colleague responding from Parent state; either patronizing you (‘of course I’ll do that for you’) or chastising you (‘who are you to tell me what to do’).

These are just illustrative examples, of course.

Complementary Transactions

Parent-Child Transactions work to communicate but, in the wrong context, will feel uncomfortable. This is an example of a Complementary Transaction.

So too, is a Parent-Parent interaction. Typical examples are gossip and moaning to one another. These are based on your learned experience of the world – rather than necessarily the true facts. They are important social rituals, but not a lot of use in a professional environment.

Brainstorming is a great example of a productive Child-Child transaction that harnesses the creativity of Free child ego states. But larking around is where those Free child states become disruptive. Competing to please your boss is the Adapted Child states interacting in a way that can quickly turn from productive to toxic.

Crossed Transactions

If the complementary transaction doesn’t feel right to both of you, one or the other of you may swap ego state. The problem is that the other may not. And now you could have, for example, your boss talking down to you from Critical Parent State, hoping to access your Adapted Child State.

But, if you recognise that this is disrespectful and consciously choose to respond from your Adult State to their Adult State, you have a new problem. When transactions are crossed like this, you hear each other but do not communicate.

Can you see how powerful Transactional Analysis can be in understanding basic workplace and project communication?

Ulterior and Hidden transactions

This is not the place to go into the topic in more depth. But, suffice to say, there is much more to this aspect of Transactional Analysis.

Because we often say one thing out loud but, underneath, our intent is very different. The surface transaction may be of one form, but the true, psychological, hidden transaction can be very different. And that’s the one that will most likely trigger an ego state to respond.

Life Scripts: How Transactional Analysis Predicts our Responses

The other really fundamental model within Transactional Analysis is the concept of Life Scripts. These are the stories that play out again and again.

There is much debate (which I’ll happily ignore here) in the TA community about when these scripts get written.

I’ll simply say that they get started at the earliest days of our lives and get modified by all our experiences.

But its implications nations can affect every day of your life. If you were once let down badly, maybe your script will say ‘I can’t trust the people around me’. Or perhaps you struggled with maths at school, and your character, therefore, doesn’t understand equations.

The Effects of Your Life Script

The consequences of your script can be profound. As an adult, you treat all your childhood experiences as if they were permanent, pervasive, and personal. That is:

• Personal
  It’s fundamentally about you and therefore your fault
• Pervasive
  It happens again and again in every situation
• Permanent
  And there is nothing you can do to change it

Quite simply, these things are wrong and wrong and wrong. Once you start to recognise elements of your life script, you can see that most-often they arise from:

• other people
• in specific contexts, and
• can be changed if you make new decisions

Life Positions: OK and Not-OK

Perhaps the best-known model from the body of Transactional Analysis work is that of life positions and the ‘OK Corral’. We can summarise the four life positions as:

• I’m OK; You’re OK
  The healthy life position where you get on with people
• I’m OK; You’re not OK
  The ‘one-up’ position can come across as arrogant, blaming, and domineering
• I’m not OK; You’re OK
  The one-down position is submissive and apologetic, thinking other people are better than them
• I’m not OK; You’re not OK
  The two down position sees everything as futile. They can trust neither the people around them nor themselves.

As with Ego States, we can understand this both as a deep psychological model that explains how people are. But, more useful for us as Project managers, we can also see this as a way to understand why perfectly healthy people sometimes behave in less resourceful ways.

Getting into Position

Most of the people you will work with are perfectly healthy, mentally, and emotionally. Our default life position is I’m OK; You’re OK. But that doesn’t mean people won’t have bad days, from time to time.

And that’s when they can easily move into another Life Position. It won’t be for the rest of their lives – but maybe it will be a day or two. Recognizing that they have moved into their ‘script place’ will help you assess the best way to work with them, to help them make a speedy return to their I’m OK; You’re OK position.

Drivers: The Transactional Analysis Model of Personality Styles

Another really useful Transactional Analysis model is that of Drivers. Taibi Kahler identified five drivers that manifest very much like personality traits.

They work very much like compulsions that make us feel ‘OK if…’

The five drivers are to:

1. Be Perfect
   Organized, self-critical, and detail-focused.
2. Be Strong
   Calm in a crisis, hides their feelings, and hates attention.
3. Please Others
   Caring and nurturing, and focused on others. They often put their own needs aside.
4. Try Hard
   A starter, not a finisher. Needs stimulation and is easily bored.
5. Hurry up
   Rush-rush, busy-busy, gets lots done, but not so good at pausing to think, reflect, or listen.

Once you have learned about these drivers, you can see them in peoples manner, their words, and actions. Most of us have one or two dominant drivers.

Strokes: The Way We Feel Valued

Hey there!

Thank you for reading this far.

I appreciate you.

If you ignore this advice, it’ll be a mistake.

You’ve lots to learn.

These are, respectively:

• A neutral stroke
• a conditional positive stroke
• an unconditional positive stroke
• a conditional negative stroke
• an unconditional negative stroke

Strokes are units of recognition that can be positive, negative, or neutral. And they can be either unconditional or conditional upon some action, choice, or words.

Without any strokes, we suffer emotionally. Outside of the world of Transactional Analysis, Marcial Losada and Emily Heaphy discovered that workplaces with far more positive strokes will really flourish.

Discounting: TA Shows us How we Sabotage our Success

Our life scripts not only dictate how we interpret the world, they also lead us to not notice things that are there. Or even to notice them but treat them as untrue.

I say ‘thank you for your help.’

If your life script includes ‘people are always trying to manipulate me’ then that has consequences. in this case, you will read my sincere thanks as attempted manipulation and you will discount it.

Have you ever noticed people acting as if something didn’t really happen? That’s discounting.

Games: Transactional Analysis Applied to those Familiar Patterns of Behavior

Have you ever experienced the same sequence of transactions between yourself and another person. And at the end, one or both of you feel bad. And, more to the point, you’ve accomplished nothing other than getting nowhere and making each other feel bad.

Chance are you’ve been playing what Eric Berne described as a ‘Game’.

Now, he actually articulated a whole hierarchy of ways we use our time (‘Time Structuring’). These have evocative labels:

• Withdrawal
• Rituals
• Pastimes
• Activities
• Games
• Intimacy

Each has a deeper psychological connection than the last. Games became famous in the 1970s as a result of Berne’s best-selling book, ‘Games People Play’.

Games is perhaps the most fascinating way to understand what’s going on when you observe or participate in pointless or destructive cycles with another person.

But the problem is that there are loads of games and it is far more useful to analyse what is going on, from first principles. And, for that, I really like…

The Drama Triangle: My own Favourite Transactional Analysis Tool

Stephen Karpman switched the metaphor of games for one of drama. He gave us a super easy, hyper-powerful tool to analyze what’s going on. It’s the Drama Triangle.

He saw three roles we can each play. And, thanks to our scripts, we like one more than the others!

1. Persecutor
   Plays an attacking role – often to avoid facing up to their own issues. This is a role for when your script says ‘I’m superior’.
2. Victim
   Discounts their own ability to help themselves and prefers to feel like their problems are caused by their persecutor.
3. Rescuer
   Likes to take care of others to make themself feel good. But in doing so, they cast the victim as weak and unable to take care of themself.

How the Drama Triangle works

The drama starts when two people take different positions. However, since no position is a function of the adult state, they all feel psychologically uncomfortable:

• Persecutor feels bullying (one up)
• Victim feels helpless (one down)
• Rescuer feels they are competing with the persecutor and robbing the victim of agency (also one up)

So, to feel better, they need a pay off. And one will make a change to swap position and take either the empty place or supplant the other person from their position. For example:

• Victim seizing Persecutor role feels a buzz of power
• Persecutor becoming Rescuer feels like a savior
• Rescuer becoming Victim feels like it’s not their fault
• …and so on

Each switch has an emotional pay-off. But no position is comfortable. So there will be another switch… and another. And it will keep going until the players in the drama have returned to their original positions. Then, either they will try a difference sequence or just endlessly repeat.

Resolution…

There is no real resolution until both players agree to step off the triangle and enter into an Adult-Adult dialogue.

Because all three positions on the Drama Triangle are held in a Parent or Child State. And so, we are back to where we started in our exploration of 9 Transactional Analysis tools.

What is Your Perception of Transactional Analysis?

I’d love to know about how you see TA. Is this new to you, or have you heard about it before? Do you see Transactional Analysis as a valuable tool for Project Managers, as I do? Or do you not? What are your reasons? And are there other tools from Transactional Analysis that you use and would recommend to our readers?

Do share your thoughts in the comments below and I promise I will respond to every contribution. #PleaseOthers