The Agile Business Innovation‘s Podcast

Membership: The Membership Instinct

Where does our need for membership come from? There’s a lot of research about this: from Freud to Edmond to Bowlby. They have all looked at why people become members and the need for attachment.

There are two basic reasons we become members: the first is survival, and the second is to meet basic psychological and biological needs. I want to talk about both because it might help you understand why you need to be a member.

1. Survival needs: We know that babies that are deprived of close human contact actually have higher mortality rates. You just have to read Bowlby and see that humans are predisposed to form close, strong attachments. Partly that's evolutionary. Before 75% of the wild animals were extinct, humans were in the minority in a world of animals and nature. Surviving on your own is much more difficult than surviving in a group. So, membership is based on evolution, we needed groups to be able to survive. That makes sense. Part of that is still in our reptile brain, that we survive more in a group than we do on our own.

Membership: Membership Needs Develop Over Time

How do membership needs develop over time? Erik Erikson talked about development stages. In this vlog I will link his model to the need for group membership. This will help you understand how to manage groups for inclusion of needs.

Stage 1. Trust vs. Mistrust: 0 – 1½ years First stage of development between zero and two years old is of basic trust versus mistrust. One example of learning basic trust could be when a baby sees their mother leave and come back again.

This relates in a way to the adult need for recognition, and to feel safe.

Sometimes I'm called into groups as a consultant, because they've had six different leaders over a period of two years, or they have a leader who is present but absent at the same time. Often the group switches from a basic trust position to a mistrust position, often fight, freeze or flight. In a group, one of the basic needs of membership is safety. When you join a group or when a group has transitioned, you always go back to this need for safety first.

Stage 2. Autonomy vs. Shame: 1½ – 3 years The second stage of development that Eric Erikson describes, is the development of autonomy versus shame and doubt. This relates to the need for autonomy in work and in groups. This need for autonomy in a group has to be balanced with the need for belonging in the relational network. That's always a difficult thing to manage. People struggle in groups and in society, between this need for autonomy and this need for affiliation in a group.

Membership: How Do You Establish Membership?

To be a good leader you need to create good membership. But how do you establish membership?

In his book, Structure and Dynamics of Organisation, Eric Berne talked about how from a member's point of view you join when you feel safe enough to commit to a group, but also if there is a willingness to compromise your independence and accept collective norms.

A team is not only a commercial community, but also a community of cooperation and values. If people embrace the commercial position,. but don't accept the cooperation and values you will remain a group nd never develop into a team.

For example, I work with a lot of engineers. They love being solo experts, but they won't actually start working as a group as long as they insist on their independence. And this is something to watch out for as a leader.

Membership: The structure of membership: I and We

Today I want to talk about membership. It's something that's preoccupying me in these COVID times. I don't know about your countries, but here in Holland, I can see a definite split . On the one hand people who want to keep the COVID rules. And on the other hand, a group of people who are resisting COVID measures. The way I look at it, it's really a very deep division between:

• people who consider themselves individual members of a group focused on their own well being within society

• people who feel they're part of a tribe, where they're actually adapting to whatever measures are good for the tribe. This division between people who think in terms of personal well being and people who think in terms of tribal well being is becoming greater. I call this the division between “personal” versus “society”. “I” versus “we”.

Membership: A network of relationships

We're talking about membership. I talked about the importance of recognising that membership is partly a structure, a relationship and a construct of values and ethics. We talked about the structure, now I want to talk about membership as a relationship.

You can imagine that once you become a member of the structure, you are also in a network of relationships. Partly people become members because they want this relationship. Membership brings belonging and becoming part of a whole. We're born in a team, a family, a system. So we learn membership in that system very early. What kind of relationships are there? Do I accept the hierarchy in this family or not? This early experience reflects on how you later become a member of society.

Membership: Values and Ethics - Are they negotiable?

I'm talking about membership at the moment, because I'm really concerned about the split in society due to COVID, between people who are placing themselves outside of societal membership, and people who are committed to societal membership.

I'm interested in that tension. We talked about membership as being part of structure. We talked about membership as being part of a relational network. But we're also talking about membership at a deeper level, the existential or psychodynamic level, which means that if you become a member of a group, you also have to think, “Am I willing to accept the values and ethics in this group? Am I willing to accept the imago, the image of the group that is fashioned by our unconscious processes?”

Membership: We may see membership differently

I'm talking about membership. We've talked about membership at the structural level, at the relational level, and at the psychodynamic level. I want to talk about the different types of membership because that could explain membership differences at different levels in different societies.

Part of the reason I'm giving these webinars is because I'm really concerned about the split in society among people who are willing to adapt to the COVID measures, and those who are not. We all know wearing a mask is not fun, but if it prevents the spread of disease will you do it? I am interested in membership.

Part of the reason I think that people adapt or don't adapt to measures, both in society and organisations, is because they see membership differently. On the whole, we distinguish three different types of membership and perhaps you can check with yourself, what type of member you are at the moment in your group.

Executive coaching: What is executive coaching?

What is executive coaching is. I've been an executive coach since 1992. So now is the time for me to pass on some of my experience and knowledge on the executive coaching front. Let's start with a simple question. What is coaching? There are so many different definitions around, what do people actually do in coaching?

There are a couple of people who've written about it. Whitmore in 2002, said coaching is about unlocking a person's potential to maximize their performance. Obviously, he worked in business settings, so words like potential and performance are important. Zeus and Skiffington (2004) said, it's a collaborative relationship to bring about sustainable behavioural change and transform the quality of life.

That's much closer to what I do. This idea of collaborative relationship is really important to me in executive coaching. Within executive coaching, you take on a coaching role, and your client has a client role. I'm 50% responsible for what happens and my client is too. We co-create that space and the relationship.

Executive coaching: A Model of Executive Coaching

What steps do you take in executive coaching? There are many models and books about executive coaching. Some of them are good, a lot of them are superficial. Based on my research over the past 30 years, I've synthesised a five step model of executive coaching. The model doesn't imply executive coaching is a linear process. Executive coaching is a deeply human process. And that means it's iterative, repetitive, and hopeful.

What I'm going to present to you is not one dimensional or even two dimensional, it's actually three dimensional. You can think of it as strands of DNA moving in and out, where the process of personal development can be at a different pace than the process of professional development. But in the end, people develop their sense of who they are in their role.

Executive Coaching Step 5: Evaluation

We're talking about executive coaching. We went through a general model, contact, contract, problem definition and interventions. Now we're at the fifth step in this iterative cycle of coaching - evaluation.

Patricia Clarkson, wrote about the kind of criteria you use for your evaluation. We will talk about realisation of contracts, developmental direction and staying in an equal relationship.