LM Ep 86
[00:00:00] Ah, summertime popsicles, road trips, family time. But before you know it, it's September back to school. Back to back to back meetings and the realization that there's only one quarter left before [00:01:00] 2024 rings in and you still have so much to do. Did your heart rate just quicken even thinking about it? If so, I have a couple of questions for you.
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Welcome back to Talent Management Truths. I'm your host, Lisa Mitchell. Today I'm bringing you a solo episode about the roles we play in life and at work. Ever hear of the dreaded drama triangle, a concept introduced by psychologist Stephen Cartman? Well, it's about the three roles we all play at different times when we are in difficulty or conflict.
The roles are rescuer, persecutor, and victim. So as we go about our lives and work, we move in and out of these roles, usually without any awareness. And the power of understanding these roles is so that you can choose to shift out of them, because when we stay in them, we're unhappy and stuck and not able to live up to our [00:03:00] potential.
Over the last quarter or so, I've shared this concept and ways to shift with several clients, both individuals and large groups. These clients were falling into the roles and staying there too long. So knowing this framework provides a powerful and practical mental model that can help you become more self-aware and more able to shift out of unhelpful stories and behaviors.
So anyways, because this is been coming up so much, it occurred to me that since my clients love it and so do I, I should share it with you here on the podcast. So let's begin. So, In the dreaded drama triangle, the first role is the rescuer. I see a lot of rescuers myself amongst the people, leaders that I work with.
The rescuer says, let me help you an awful lot. She's constantly trying to save others from harm. Now I have a long history of being a rescuer. I remember as a leader, especially earlier in my career, when I would get stressed, it was almost [00:04:00] like a. I forgot how to delegate. Actually, it wasn't just earlier in my career, it was even later on.
It's just that I got a little better at shifting out of it, but I'm gonna get to that in a little bit. So, you know, when I forgot how to delegate, it was almost like I would almost be projecting my own stress onto my team and, and, and tell myself, convince myself that they couldn't possibly take anything else.
I would justify that I had to do everything myself because I needed to protect them. I'm sure for many of you, this sounds familiar. The second role is the persecutor. The persecutor is the person that the victim. The third role we're gonna talk about blames for their suffering. When we feel wronged by someone, we view them as a persecutor and we get stuck in blame mode.
Now, you may not believe that you've ever played this role, but believe me, you likely have, even if only briefly. For instance, I know that during my divorce, many, many, many years ago, I viewed my ex, who's now a [00:05:00] friend, by the way, as my persecutor. And all the while he was seeing me the same way, even though I didn't think that was the case.
So think about a time when you really felt the need to dig in your heels and, and be right above all else where maybe your behavior ended up having a negative impact, whether temporary or permanent on a relationship. In that case, you may have been viewed as a persecutor by the other party. Okay, let's move to the third.
And most frequently played a role. The victim. The victim says, poor me, I can't do anything about it. It's out of my control. So this is a role that I know I most often fall into and, and it's one that I see most frequently in my coaching practice. We are in victim mode. When we feel powerless, like when a situation feels like it's happening to us and there's nothing we can do about it, we are in victim mode.
When we [00:06:00] forget how to reframe difficulty into opportunity, and when we forget all of the resources we do have, we actually stop problem solving and instead we wallow. For example, last month I mistakenly deleted the audio file for a podcast episode with a guest. And when I realized it and I was up against a deadline to submit my batch of podcasts, I cried in frustration and stomped outta my office.
And I, I swear, I wasted at least 30 minutes just wandering around the kitchen, muttering to myself and complaining about this misfortune. I was probably swearing a little bit if I'm really being honest. Do you know what I mean? Well, of course you do. So now that we've done a high level review of the three drama triangle roles, let's look at the antidote roles and how you can shift into those roles when you notice you're stuck in the drama.
One of the best tools I've discovered in my coaching work and in my own inner work is from a book called [00:07:00] Ted, the Empowerment Dynamic. The author, and I'll put it in the show notes, the author is David Emerald, and the book illustrates the antidote to the dreaded drama triangle through three alternate and empowering roles.
Let me walk you through the empowering roles high level so that you can get the gist. The antidote role for the rescuer is the coach. Okay. Instead of reinforcing the powerlessness of a person who is in a victim role or feeling the need to rescue others and protect them and not delegate, a coach uses the art of inquiry, curiosity, and listening to help people discover what is best for themselves.
So take my stress reaction earlier and how I would stop delegating and take on the world instead. I learned the hard way that when I did that, you know, by not delegating and only trying to shield my team by taking on too much myself, I was in effect training my [00:08:00] team to be unable to make decisions or to think on their own.
I was also ensuring by doing that, that they had no practice with time management, negotiating timelines. I see this a lot with clients too. Yet when you shift from rescuer to coach mode, You avoid making any assumptions and you'll be transparent about what needs to be done. Then you'll ask your teammates to talk through what they need in order to make this happen.
You ask them what might get in their way. You inquire about their ideas for reprioritizing. Essentially, you help them think out loud and come up with their own solutions. So, The antidote role for the persecutor is the challenger. So while the Persecutor lays blame, a challenger consciously asks thoughtful questions, encouraging people to learn and grow.
They're catalysts for learning and are willing to stand for the vision even when others do not. They're sometimes called truth tellers, but they [00:09:00] don't cast aspersions and labeling. They state facts plainly for everyone's benefit. In a nutshell, they help others get to the best thinking is the way I like to consider it.
You know, I remember with my divorce that when I was able and wasn't always the case, but when I was able to shift into asking thoughtful questions versus making accusatory statements, the whole process went more smoothly and quickly. You know, here's another example. This is from years ago when I worked for a leader who's highly assertive and incredibly intelligent.
I interpreted her assertiveness at the beginning as aggression and, and so did my team. She would lob these very challenging pointed questions at us in meetings, and I often felt attacked. Rightly or wrongly. That was how I felt. And you know, I even went so far as to fantasize about leaving my job and just quitting just like that.
But then I decided that there had to be a chance we could work something out. After a few [00:10:00] courageous conversations, I learned that she didn't realize the impact of her style fully, and she was only trying to get to the best thinking, literally. And often she did help us get there by asking questions that challenged our thinking.
So she learned over time to soften her approach a little and provide some context upfront before the challenging questions, and I learned to take things less personally. I no longer saw this person as a persecutor, but as a challenger. Okay, the antidote role for the victim, this is the biggie, is creator.
So remember how I accidentally deleted that podcast recording and wasted all this time sulking. Well, when I shifted out of victim and into creator mode, I was able to start, you know, asking questions and problem solving in order to figure out a way to restore the darn file. I moved from literally wanting to call my husband and cry and complain.
I probably did send a text or two. I moved from that [00:11:00] to sitting down and, and you know, asking Mr. Google, well, how do I recover files on a MacBook? And you know what? I got the file back. It cost me $65 on a piece of software I'll never use again, but I did get it back. Essentially, the creator takes ownership of their circumstances and trusts that they can and will figure things out.
So how can you learn to shift more readily from the roles of the dreaded drama triangle to the antidote or empowering roles of Ted? Well, it starts with awareness and a willingness to change. When we catch ourselves slipping into victimhood, blame or rescuing, we can consciously choose to adopt the roles of creator, challenger, and coach.
It takes practice and intentional effort. So to help you practice, I'd like to offer some great questions that will help you make the shift possible. So if we look [00:12:00] at shifting from persecutor to challenger, if I think about my shift trying to see my former leader as a challenger instead of a persecutor, some great questions are, well, what assumptions am I making?
What is that person's best intention likely to be? And I love this one. Am I awfulizing? Okay, so then we, we look at shifting from victim to creator. So think about when I deleted the podcast. Here are some great questions that I'm sure you can apply to your situation. What is within my control? What resources do I have a available to help me?
And a real good one? What am I meant to learn from this experience? What has it meant to teach me? And then thirdly, moving from rescuer to coach with your team or with anybody. It could be with your child at home. What does this person or this team really need? How can I help them discover the answer [00:13:00] that is right for them?
And finally, I'm going to leave you with a quote from Maryanne Williamson that I think sums up the idea of these empowerment roles really, really well. We can always choose to perceive things differently. We can focus on what's wrong in our life, or we can focus on what's right. I hope this, this episode's been helpful.
I do encourage you to read the book for a more thorough understanding. You can see the show notes for the full title and details. Thank you so much for listening. [00:14:00]
