Stop the Drama and Do the Work (Management, Leadership & Coaching No. 15)

Hi! I’m “Edward Muzio”, CEO of Group Harmonics.

I’m going to talk about “Stop the Dram and Do the Work”.

Is there too much drama in your workplace?

In the late 1960 a psychologist named “Stephen Karpman” defined what he called “The Drama Triangle”.

“The Drama Triangle” is a set of three interrelated scripted roles that tell us how to behave to create drama.

Outstart come here with the persecutor.

The persecutor is the mean nasty person who draws with horns here in a pitchfork who takes advantage.

Here she is evil, abuses people, abuses resources.

When over here we have the poor sad victim.

The victim who hears getting hit by a hammer is helpless to prevent any trouble of happening and is taking advantage by the persecutor.

Finaly up here we have our hero that’s rest here comes in communicate with a big smile on his face his heroic and he saves the day.

The rescuer stops the persecutor from taking advantage of the victim who asked the rescuer for help.

You can start anywhere the Tiangle and it dosen’t matter.

Now we know the scripted roles well.

We know them very well. Think about it!

When you read about the “Little Red Riding Hood” the big bad wolf, do you ever stop to ask why the big bad wolf chased after the “Little Red Riding Hood”

Now, that’s what the persecutor do, that’s what victim do.

You know how the story goes, you don’t need any more information.

That’s the problem with scripted roles in the workplace.

Scripted roles are not equal to information transfer.

In fact scripted roles are the opposite information transfer.

We work in new information age.

Information transfer is equal to work.

In other words, when we’re having drama with the scripted roles we’re not doing the work.

Let’s take an example for this.

What say your manager and you have to employ.

What are your employee comes to you and says: “I need you, help”.

The other employee, employee 2 won’t get me the numbers, the data, I needs on time every week.

I can’t do my job. I tried asking for help and he was mean and rude.

What’s happening here? basically the employee wanna say: “I’m helpless. Employee 2 responsible here for me or you help me”.

As the manager naturalistic might be said: “Sure! I help you, I’ll talk the employee 2 for you. Where’re you ago?”

You’re gonna be the rescuer. The stage is set for drama.

Now what happens?

Well! you probably call employee 2 into your office. You’re the manager and you say to employee 2: “You better shape up, you better start to do you need to do or they’re gonna be consequences”.

Next thing you know, you frame employee 2 as a victim and you as a manager have become the persecutor.

What happens next? Employee 2 leaves the room then while employee 2 may turn back to employee 1 and say? “You need to help me, You cause trouble neither me with the manager, neither to rescue me”.

Or employee 2 might say employee 1: “You thought you had problems before. Now you’re really gonna have problems and become even stronger persecutor”.

It dosen’t matter we can move the tickets around all over the board all day along.

The point is we have scripted roles, we’re doing drama, we’re not doing work.

So how do we get out of this?

The trick is when you notice any of these roles come up, you wanna immediately start to think, act and speak, as if the role isn’t real.

How’s that working on that stuation? Member we had, employee 2 as a persecutor who was not giving the data the employee 1 when needed and you as a manager or gonna a rescuer … how do we do this? … The role isn’t real.

Let’s start with employee 1. What if employee 1 is not helpless. Employee 1 could get the data somewhere else, look for different data, ask in a different way for the information, ask a different time … what options appear?

What if employee 2 is not evil? What if employee 2 dosen’t have the data, dosen’t know have a go it? Dosen’t know how important is it? … has 2 any other priorities is needed too busy. What options is that suggest?

Finally, you as the manager, What if you as the manager are not heroic? What If you’re not going to be only person who comes and saves the day? Who else might get involved? Is there somebody save also different information? Can you accurate to work out amongst themselves? What other options do you have?

Notice what’s happening here. We’re talking now about options, alternatives for problem solving to get the work done. We’ve moved away for a scripted roles and away from drama.

So the next time you or someone you work with is starting to act like a persecutor, act like a victim or act like a rescuer, as quickly as you can, start to think and act as if the role isn’t real. See what options act themselves.

When you do, they’ll be more likely to solve the problem more likely to do work, more likely to stop the drama.