and that we use all three to communicate. However, only one is active at any given time. Although we move through all the States all the time, we are not necessarily in the same Ego State as the person we are communicating with. This is often where problems start! We are sometimes in what Berne referred to as ‘complementary’ Ego States. These are Adult to Adult, Parent to Child and Child to Parent, or Child to Child and Parent to Parent.
COMPLEMENTARY EGO STATES
Adult to Adult
When we are operating from the Adult Ego State, we are in the ‘here and now,’ and our interactions are logical, rational, and without contamination from previous experience. The goal of TA is to assist people to spend more time communicating from Adult to Adult. An interaction would look something like this:
Person One (Adult): ‘I’m really struggling with this work. Can you help?’
Person Two (Adult): ‘Yes of course. What would you like me to do?’
Parent to Child and Child to Parent
Figure 2.2: Different Ego States
A different scenario when we are not communicating so effectively occurs when the parties involved are in different Ego States. For example, when a transaction begins with someone operating from the Parent Ego State, which is often received by the recipient as an invitation to respond from the Child Ego State and vice versa. An interaction would probably look something like this.
Parent to Child:
Person One (Parent) angrily says ‘I asked you for that work ages ago. Haven’t you done it yet?’
Person Two (Child) whining ‘I’ve been trying but it’s really hard. Why are you always yelling at me?’
Child to Parent:
Person One (Child) says frustratedly, ‘This is too difficult. I can’t do it’
Person Two (Parent) frustratedly says ‘I have showed you how to do it so many times. What’s wrong with you?’
The above illustrates how we operate from a Parent Ego State, and receive a response from the Child Ego State or vice versa. It is rarely effective communication.
The other two complementary Ego States are Child to Child and Parent to Parent. These types of transaction are also unlikely to encourage mature, appropriate conversations.
Crossed Ego States
At other times we could be communicating in ‘crossed’ Ego States.
Figure 2.3: Crossed Ego States
A crossed Ego State occurs when one person (P1) invites another for an ‘Adult’ response to an ‘Adult’ request. Instead of responding from Adult, the other person (P2) responds from either the Parent or Child Ego State. Then the exchange between two colleagues might look like this:
Colleague one (Adult) ‘Do you know where X file is?’
Colleague two (Parent) replies angrily, ‘For goodness sake, you are always losing it. It is where you left it.’
If you refer back to the diagram, colleague one asked a question from Adult, and invited an Adult response, the location of the file. Instead his colleague responded from a Parent Ego State, so the communication became crossed. Probably at this stage colleague one is likely to respond back from the Child Ego State, and the conversation can continue in an unsatisfactory way until one of them invites the other into an Adult response. This is, of course, where mature, in-the-moment conversations happen.
USING TA AND EGO STATES IN THE WORKPLACE
As previously mentioned, TA was initially a counselling tool, and has only recently been used more widely in the business context, though there are differences in terms of its application in the workplace. Berne originally proposed four separate scenarios for assessing which Ego State an individual is possibly operating in at a particular moment.
The four areas are:
1. Behavioural: observing posture, gestures, language, tone, and tempo of speech.
2. Social assessment: observing an interaction between two people and their behaviour.
3. Historical: when we are in the Child Ego State, we are ‘feeling’ as adults the behaviour, feelings and emotions that we experienced as children. In a work environment, and normally in coaching, we wouldn’t ask!
4. Phenomenological assessment: is not just about feeling a past event, but actually re-experiencing it and would be inappropriate in the coaching environment.
It is only appropriate to use 1. Behavioural and 2. Social assessment whilst coaching in the workplace. TA practitioners have suggested that the Ego States Model should be used in conjunction with a second framework, referred to as the Life Positions quadrant, or, more fondly, as the OK Corral.
Let us look at how the Ego States are further divided, and their associated behaviours. These can be used to provide clients with clues about their own behaviour, thoughts and feelings. Ego States are internal, but they are manifested in our behaviour. By asking questions, we can understand what emotions and feelings accompany these different behaviours. After that, we can take a closer look at the Life Positions OK Corral model.
EGO STATES AND THEIR ASSOCIATED BEHAVIOURS
Figure 2.4: Associated behaviours
Parent State
When we are in the Parent Ego State, we think, feel and behave in ways based on parent and authority figures we observed growing up. This is divided into Critical or Controlling Parent on the left, and Nurturing Parent on the right. Both of these Ego States have positive and negative behaviours, also referred to as OK (positive) and Not OK (negative).
Starting with the left: Critical / Controlling Parent. The behaviours are positive when they come from a place that doesn’t undermine us. An example might be that the parent organises a bedtime at 7 pm in order for the child to get up and be fresh in the morning for school, whereas a negative behaviour is used to undermine us. For example, you are asked to wash up and then you are told, ‘Give me the dish cloth. You can’t do anything right, you are so stupid.’ A Controlling Parent can come from a positive place in terms of giving us social norms to live by, or a negative place when the comment is designed to undermine us.
Let’s take a moment and think about how a Controlling Parent’s behaviour might play out in the office. A boss figure might single out an individual in the team meeting, and make a detrimental comment about a report they have written.
Similarly, a Nurturing Parent can be positive and OK, for example, when they tuck us in at night, and tell a bedtime story. However, if the behaviour
