“HERE WE GO LOOPTY-LOOP”

It’s time to sit around the kitchen table and hash out a family problem.  The family consists of mom, dad, a son and a daughter.  Let’s view the family as an organization for a moment.  The two executives – mom and dad – have been concerned with the way the family has interacted with mom’s parents.  In the past, relations with dad’s parents have been warm and loving, but with mom’s they have been strained.  This has, in turn, caused guilt feelings and missed opportunities that healthy and positive relations with grandparents can and often provide. 

The problem seems to stem from certain past histories which have resulted in mom, let’s call her Jane, drifting away from her parents.  Why?  There are various reasons, but overall it seems to have begun when she chose to drop out of college and pursue a more spontaneous lifestyle – some might call Bohemian.  But that is all in the past; since then, she has settled down, married, and has her own kids.  She seems well-adjusted to her current life.  But she still does not have that college diploma.  She dreams of getting it someday, but now her life is too busy.  While her parents don’t bring up the lack of a degree, their demeanor communicates disapproval and whatever warmth they express have been aimed at their son-in-law and the kids.  Even there, the ties have been strained and consequently these grandparents are somewhat less favored.  Jane is determined that as part of her rehabilitation to a normal, middle class, family woman, she must fix things with her parents.  She has decided that this is not her challenge alone, but includes her husband, son, and daughter.

The above scene is not all that unique.  Insert other details and I would say that most families have had similar family meetings around the kitchen table.  In our little story, the kitchen table becomes the environment of a change-planning session.  Yes, something must change and this can be considered a case study of organizational change.[1]  Unlike big, well-endowed organizations that can hire change agents and other consultants, this case is homespun.  Be that as it may, several principles of change theory are still in effect. 

Each participant brings to the literal table a bit of baggage and that does not pertain only to Jane.  Over the years, the other members of the family have established their own habits when it comes to interacting with the grandparents in question and vice versa.  As habits, they take on a level of comfort; that is, comfortable in the sense that it’s just the way the two parties interact, but the relationship leaves our family and grandparents feeling a certain level of guilt and sorrow.  Included in these feelings can be issues of how each of the participants self-defines him or herself.  This includes questioning their self-importance.  There might be issues of competence – gramps, due to his overall disappointment, is quick to criticize not only Jane, but the rest of the family members.  This might bring up concerns of esteem and how one is viewed as possibly being incompetent or unfeeling.  The kids at the table have gotten into the habit of ridiculing their grandparents as these particular seniors reflect priorities of another time.  This can be, on the part of the kids, a self-defense mechanism.  Unfortunately, the well has been poisoned many times over.  Jane has quite a challenge ahead of her and would be well-served to become sensitive and knowledgeable about change principles of which she is probably oblivious.

Jane’s espoused theory, what she thinks about what has happened and readily offers to anyone who might ask, is that she is somewhat to blame – she did defy her parents way back when – but not to the extent that she would do any of that differently.  Oh, there was that time she shouldn’t have done so and so, but overall, she had her right to do what she basically believed was right for herself.  She might have dropped out of college, but she learned things most college educated people have not learned and today she is generally pleased with her experiences.  She doesn’t entertain the notion that it would be good for her kids to experience those lessons, but her overall approval of her past is how she believes she feels.  And, on the day of her kitchen meeting, she has at least identified the problem that needs fixing, what a change agent might call the governing variable:  her family’s relationship with her parents.

Actually, her theory-in-use (her understanding of what she is doing) in dealing with her parents has more to do with her uncomfortable, tacit notion that she is not all that smart and she does not want this deficiency exposed to these very talented parents.  Besides all of the short term benefits she perceived back when she dropped out, at a more basic level, she didn’t believe she was academically gifted enough to finish her studies.  Plans were for a liberal arts undergraduate degree that would develop into professional training at the graduate level, perhaps in medicine, law, or some technical field.  Jane’s lack of confidence is a deep-seated fear and just below the conscious level.  So, when it comes time to actually interact with her parents, Jane’s discomfort, mostly un-named, is there to disrupt what otherwise are well-intended efforts to close the gap between her and her parents and this reflects an inability to formulate functional assumptions that make up her theory-in-use. 

For their part, Jane’s parents have equally hidden emotional baggage.  While espousing a general acceptance of their daughter, they foresaw a life for her that resembles their success as highly respected professionals.  Their daughter’s “diminished” results are painful.  They love her, but she has disappointed them at a profound level, and for what – some good times and questionable relationships with “lowlifes?”  Unlike their daughter, they are very conscious of their theory-in-use but don’t know how to get over it – it’s simply too painful.  How do these participants get at the real problems?

Obviously, in terms of Jane, at least initially, she needs to spell out as well as she can her espoused theory and think about how that theory matches the quality of her interactions with her parents.  She probably needs to verbally do this review and her husband can help or maybe some good friend can listen and react:  does her values jibe with what they know and feel about the situation?  She has to be open to the idea that her verbalized theory might need changing.  As best she can, she needs to develop a planned, as opposed to a reactive, theory-in-use, one that is congruent to her espoused theory.  Even if this initial effort – the meeting – is less than sufficient or even unproductive, the mere fact that she is aware that a more reflected effort is called for is a good initial step toward effective change.  Her theory-in-use needs to include her husband and children, as apparently it does in the above scenario.  They, too, are part of the problem.  Then she needs to test; that is, implement some aspect of a derived strategy, such as holding a kitchen table meeting, and, when completed, review and make judgements as to how well that part of the theory and corresponding strategy worked.  How did the kids, for example, see the problem and did they express a realization that they need to change their disposition and behavior toward their grandparents?  Does the theory-in-use seem to be appropriate; does her strategy at least seem to be relevant to the problem; and do her assumptions of those things that need to change appear accurate – for example, are those things that she wants to change, changeable?

But what if instead of positive answers to these questions, she faces a string of negative ones?  What if her son, for example, at this meeting gets up and yells, “those old farts can just f*** off”?  Maybe the theory-in-use is simply inadequate (as a matter of fact, such an event might intensify her fear that she just isn’t smart enough).

Let’s take a step back:  there are two modes of evaluating a theory.  One is to apply it and judge whether one has applied it adequately or, perhaps, if it needs minor adjustments.   A reasonable result of testing a theory can indicate that it is working with minor changes to it.  Whether the determination is that the theory can be applied more productively or needs tweaking does not basically challenge it.  What is being judged are the actions taken within the parameters of the theory.  This, by the way, is the type of evaluation we usually conduct, but there is another type. 

The second type is looking at the theory itself.  This is a more profound type and one that can be more uncomfortable.  In our story, I believe that eventually Jane is going to have to account for her lack of confidence regarding her intelligence (or lack of it).  But this will not happen initially – it might never happen – because this element is not recognized in her theory-in-use and demonstrates how a person can have inconsistency between that theory and his/her behavioral world.  But that theory, in our story, is seriously deficient.  Yet this psychological reality which refers to her sense of being insufficiently competent seems too central to her relationship with her parents and it needs to be addressed.

When one is merely evaluating events under the auspices of some theory, one is engaging in what is called single loop learning.  A single loop learning event has been likened to a thermostat judging whether the temperature in a room is too hot or too cold.  The theory of using a thermostat is not being questioned.  But when one evaluates the theory itself, then what one is doing is called double loop learning.  When Jane called the meeting, her action was based on at least one assumption as part of her theory-in-use:  she believed that her family cared enough about their relationship with her folks to be open to a discussion that could lead to a plan for improving that relationship.  If her son demonstrates the level of hostility I just described, perhaps it is time to review her theory-in-use.  If she is as off-target as that emotional outburst would indicate, perhaps she has miscalculated the whole situation, demanding a different theory-in-use.

I will leave this story for now; my next posting will refer to it as I abstract more directly and succinctly the change principles which this narrative illustrates.

Note:  The title of this posting is a take-off on the old popular song, "Here We Go Loopty-Loo."

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[1] The change theory principles in this posting are applied from the ideas expressed in Argyris, C. and Schon, D. A. (1985). Evaluating theories in action. In W. G. Bennis, K. D. Benne, and R. Chin (Eds.), The planning of change, Fourth edition, (pp. 108-117). New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.