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Using Transactional Analysis in the Workplace

Dr Eric Berne, a Canadian born psychologist who lived most of his adlt life in the U!, designed Transactional

Analysis, or TA as it is often known today, as a system that seeks to provide gidance on the interactions of people

and to help improve the hman social environment" #is work was mainly focsed on the operation of one$to$one

relationships and was initially tili%ed as a direct therapetic approach" #owever, Berne&s body of work has been

sed e'tensively in the workplace over the past () years or so and in this brief article we will look at his overall theory

and two particlar aspects of it which seem to have high resonance in the working world"

TA needs to be considered careflly as a way of helping s to better nderstand people&s learned behaviors" We

shold note that it assmes*

People are OK?

Everyone has the capacity to think

People decide their own destiny (and these decisions can be changed)

All of the different parts of Berne&s theory +and there are several can be seen in this diagram below" This diagram

holistically shows that each part of the TA theory relates to another part, bilding from the more covert -Ego !tates.

theory at the base of the diagram to the more overt or visible behaviors sch as the way we strctre or time and

engage in relationship games at the top"

Berne made comple' interpersonal transactions nderstandable when he recogni%ed that people can interact from

one of three -Ego !tates. / 0arent, Adlt or Child / and that these interactions can occr at overt and covert levels"

These are the base of the diamond shaped diagram here becase they are not readily seen ntil yo have trained

yorself to start doing so" Althogh all of Berne&s theories relate to one another, the two ma1or ones that have had

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most se in organi%ational terms are -Ego !tates. and the so$called -23 Corral." 4et&s therefore look at each of these

one by one"

Ego !tates

According to Berne all individals have three very discrete parts to their personality or what he terms the inner -Ego.

+in the same way that 5red talked abot or Ego" 5or Berne these aspects of or personality are filters throgh

which we see the world +and all have been learned over time sally very early on in or childhood, for most people"

Berne called these personality filters -states." Every individal therefore commnicates predominantly throgh one of

the three -Ego !tates., allowing s to analy%e the different Ego !tate commnication -transactions. or scripts that can

occr" Berne drew these -0AC. states +as he called them for short in diagrammatic form and this is shown below*

These three -Ego !tates. operate as follows*

PARENT EGO STATES (Taught)

This state contains the attitdes, feelings and behavior incorporated from e'ternal sorces, primarily parents" 6n

otward behavior it is divided into two parts*

nurturing parent: concerned with caring, loving, helping

controlling parent: criticizing, cenoring, punihing

When a person is in his or her parent state, he7she responds atomatically, almost as if the individal has a memory

recording playing in his or her head" Everyone has 0arent memory recordings / some are helpfl / they enable s to

carry ot rotine tasks atomatically withot having to think too mch abot them" 2ther memory recordings can

create problems / if a 0arent memory is triggered atomatically in an inappropriate sitation"A!"#T EGO STATES (Thought)

A person&s Adlt Ego !tate is his or her thoghts, feelings and behavior in the here and now that is calmly appropriate

to the e'ternal stimls being e'perienced at any one time" The state has nothing to do with the person&s age" 6t

contains those behaviors concerned with collecting information, organi%ing and analy%ing" 6t operates dispassionately

and withot emotion"

$%! EGO STATES ('elt)

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This state contains all the implses that come natrally to an infant" Bt 1st as the 0arent has different aspects or

characteristics which relate to this state, so does the Child state" The Child develops into two parts / the 8atral or

5ree Child and the Adapted Child

The Natural'ree $hild: Is spontaneous, energetic, curious, loving and uninhibited, the part

of you that feels free and loves pleasure !any adults repress their natural child and e"aggerate the

parent

The Adapted $hild:#our $dapted %hild developed when you learned to change (adapt) your

feelings and behavior in response to the world around you &earned feelings of guilt, fear, depression,

an"iety, envy and pride are all characteristic of the $dapted %hild 'he $dapted %hild can becoe the

ost troublesoe part of our personality

Each one of the Ego !tates is a system of commnication with its own langage and fnction9 the 0arent&s is a

langage of vales, the Adlt&s is a langage of logic and rationality and the Child&s is a langage of emotions"

According to Berne, effective fnctioning in the world depends on the availability of all three intact Ego !tates

+althogh the Adlt !tate is ideally the -access door. to the other two"

2ne of the manifestations of the Ego !tate transactions that we receive as individals +and the :ames that we

engage in is that in the long term we become -driven. in certain ways and conse;ently seek particlar kinds of what

Berne called -strokes. from other people" 6n combination, this leads s to one of for -4ife 0ositions. or types of

behavior that can be plotted on what Berne called the -23 Corral. or :rid as can be seen below*

6n infancy, and often pre$verbally, Berne sggested that an individal will eventally +often in his or her late teens

make a decision on how they will generally relate to others and themselves" Berne called this their E'istential 4ife

0osition and once decided pon, the 4ife 0osition inflences how the person thinks, feels and behaves +althogh

throgh greater awareness it can change over time" ? of people fall into the three ;adrants other than the one at the bottom left" @ost of s do not

consistently act from a single life position and or positions can change from sitation to sitation" #owever, we may

adopt a single life position with a particlar person every time that we meet them ntil sch time as the parties

deliberately decide to change the relationship"

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Application to Workplace life

Althogh other theories in Berne&s work have been sed, his -Ego !tates. and -23 Corral. theory have been sed

more in organi%ations of all si%es and types than any other" Ego states theory has been sed e'tensively to help

better nderstand commnication between individals with different Ego states +where we want to avoid 0arental and

Child state conversations in particlar, where it is inappropriate" And the 23 corral theory has been applied in the

areas of cstomer service and more e'tensively in the realm of leadership development" 6n the latter, the aim is to get

individals to operate as mch as possible from an -6&m 23, yo&re 23. stand$point when leading individals and

teams" This allows them to avoid over$doing the parental role +which many leaders natral slip into and the child ego

state, where the leader over$does the peer friend role and fails to stand back from the team enogh in order to give

firm direction and lead strong when necessary to do so"

6n smmary, Eric Berne&s psychological theory provides some interesting ideas on how adlts relate to one another

which have plenty of applicability to workplace sitations" -Ego !tates. and -23 corral. theory have been sed

e'tensively bt shold be researched more thoroghly before being applied widely" This applies to other related

theories developed by Berne, which are not often easily accessible bt have several interesting insights to offer