Public Victory - Paradigms of Interdependence
Covey's primer on moving from independence to interdependence.
There is no way to parachute into this terrain. You simply have to travel the road. You can’t be successful with other people if you haven’t paid the price of success with yourself.
Before getting into Habit 4, Covey starts off the new section with this familiar reminder. The foundation of good relationships with others starts with a good relationship with ourselves.
We bring our behaviors into every relationship, and as Covey mentions, “you can’t talk your way out of problems you behave yourself into.”
As we work our way towards Independence (self-mastery and self-discipline) we can keep in mind a metaphor Covey provides for working towards Interdependence.
Emotional Bank Account
An emotional bank account is a metaphor that describes the amount of trust that’s been built up in a relationship.
If I make depostis into an Emotional Bank Account with you through courtesy, kindness, honesty, and keeping my commitments to you, I build up a reserve.
But if I have a habit of showing discourtesy, disrespect, cutting you off, overreacting, ignoring you, becoming arbitrary, betraying your trust, threatening you, or playing little tin god in your life, eventually my Emotional Bank Account is overdrawn.
This metaphor represents the foundations of Interdependence. It is filling the emotional bank accounts of others, and seeking out those who in turn, fill yours.
It is about not seeing things as binary, win/lose, zero-sum. Seeing that we are all in this together, and we all benefit by being able to cooperate.
This is a great continuation to the post yesterday. Stewardship delegation is what everyone should strive for, as opposed to “gofer” delegation. This is done through trust and by allowing an Emotional Bank Account to be built.
By taking part in “gofer” delegation, we are telling the other person, “I don’t trust you enough to give you ownership for the results.” This, in turn, let’s them know, “My Emotional Bank Account has a cap, beyond which, you do not have access.”
Six Major Deposits
Covey outlines 6 major deposits we can all make into the Emotional Bank Accounts of others.
Understanding the individual
You simply don’t know what constitutes a deposit to another person until you understand that individual. What might be a deposit for you might not be perceived by someone else as a deposit at all.
What is important to another person must be as important to you as the other person is to you.
Our tendency is to project out our own autobiographies what we think other people want or need.
Attending to the Little Things
In relationships, the little things are the big things. People are very tender, very sensitive inside. I don’t believe age or experience makes much difference.
Inside, even within the most toughened and calloused exteriors, are the tender feelings and emotions of the heart.
Keeping Commitments
There’s probably not a more massive withdrawal than to make a promise that’s important to someone and then not to come through.
Occasionally, despite all my effort, the unexpected does come up, creating a situation where it would be unwise or impossible to eep a promise I’ve made. But I value that promise. I either keep it anyway, or explain the situation thoroughly to the person involved and ask to be released from the promise.
Clarifying Expectations
The cause of almost all relationship difficulties is rooted in conflicting or ambiguous expectations around roles and goals. That’s why it’s so important whenever you come into a new situation to get all the expectations out on the table.
We create many negative situations by simply assuming that our expectations are self-evident and that they are clearly understood and shared by other people.
Showing Personal Integrity
Lack of integrity can undermine almost any other effort to create high trust accounts. People can seek to understand, remember the little things, keep their promises, clarify and fulfill expectations, and still fail to build reserves of trust if they are inwardly duplicitous.
Be loyal to those who are not present. When you defend those two are absent, you retain the trust of those present.
Apologizing Sincerely When You Make a Withdrawal
It takes a great deal of character strength to apologize quickly out of one’s heart rather than out of pity. A person must possess himself and have a deep sense of security in fundamental principles and values in order to genuinely apologize.
People with little internal security can’t do it. It makes them too vulnerable. They feel it makes them appear soft and weak, and they fear that others will take advantage of their weakness.
The Laws of love and the Laws of Life
In addition to the ways we can make deposits/withdrawals, we also need to consider what Love really means.
As any parent knows, love should be unconditional. By providing unconditional love, the natural growth process can flourish. We provide the foundation for the Laws of Life to develop - cooperation, contribution, self-disciple, integrity.
When we provide conditional love, we send the message to others that they are not safe and secure. They must constantly wonder about their status. We put them in a reactive, defensive position where they feel they have to prove “I matter as a person, independent of you.”
In reality, they aren’t independent. They are counter-dependent, which is another form of dependency and is at the lowest end of the Maturity Continuum.
They become reactive, almost enemy-centered, more concerned about defending their “rights” and producing evidence of their individuality than they are about proactively listening to and honoring their own inner imperatives.
To be truly interdependent, Covey asks us to consider a switch in the way we see problems.
When my son has a problem, I should not view this negatively. If I can see his problems as opportunities to build the relationship, it will help me in understanding and helping my son.
This ties back to the example of the property managers. When they were no longer just another problem for their tenants, when they sought to understand how they could help, everything improved.
Keeping the idea of the Emotional Bank Account in mind, as well as a mentality of seeing problems as opportunities, Covey has given us the framework to move into the Habits of INterdependence.
That starts with Habit 4, Think Win/Win, which we’ll be back with next week.