Extra! Relationship Stages

This is (un)leaderly extras, where something from a previous episode sparks a few more thoughts but not a full episode. In this extra: how Team Development Stages apply to Personal Relationships as well. 

Welcome to (un)leaderly, the podcast that looks at the world through an atypical leadership perspective. Host Barbara Iverson tells stories from her life and looks at the world through an atypical leadership perspective. Every week she offers a challenge or task for listeners, to prompt reflection or growth. This podcast is the perfect listen for someone who feels like they don't quite fit to the typical leadership profile. 

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This is Unleaderly Extras. The add-ons to the podcast where it's not quite a full episode, but it's something related to a topic we've already covered and something I just felt later I needed to add on, but it didn't maybe exactly fit into the podcast itself. I'm your host, Barbara Iverson, and today I want to talk briefly about something related to the team development stages. So we did a whole podcast about forming, storming, norming, and performing. And as I was editing that, I liked where it was, but I thought there was an additional piece to it that I thought was worth talking about. And that is this doesn't only relate to teams and companies. And many of you probably were thinking this as you were listening, but this is also how relationships work. Relationships have that forming phase, which is often called the honeymoon period, when everything's happy, everything's beautiful, your partner has no faults, nothing is wrong at all. It's just, isn't this wonderful? And that can last a week, that can last a month, it can last a year, but it occurs for everyone. It's before you really get to know each other and everything is wonderful. But then you get to storming, where you somebody starts to complain about something. Maybe you've moved in together and you really have to start figuring out, okay, what is it? What are their habits? What does this look like for me? Do I like this? Do I not? Is this changeable? Is it not? And then you start giving each other feedback. It doesn't only have to be if you've moved in together. I will say if you've moved in with someone, that storming phase is going to come up at you far faster than if you haven't. But you still have this element of at some point, you start noticing the things that either bother you or your partner has said something to you that you don't like or has hurt your feelings. And you need to talk about it. And that storming stage, then in a relationship, is really about starting to communicate on a deeper level, to say, I'm not okay with this for whatever reason. Like I said, discomfort, hurt your feelings, whatever it was. But you start opening up a little more. And at that point, that storming and saying this doesn't work for me is where relationships either fail or they keep going and they actually get deeper. Because a relationship that then goes through the norming stage to performing, these names start to really not be as helpful because I mean, I guess you could say it like as a couple, you're performing, but that's to me, that's weird. But what you are doing is you're building trust that when one person says to the other, this hurt my feelings, instead of getting defensive or saying this wasn't my intention or whatever it is, when you've given that feedback and the and your partner receives it well and either is empathetic to your hurt feelings or wants to find a solution with you, then you've built some trust and you can keep going. And it's that process of storming and then norming, so storming like bringing up discomfort and then seeing what your partner does. Do they take a step toward you? Do they take a step back from you? What happens when you say the uncomfortable thing? Does it make them angry? Does it make them feel closer to you or appreciate the fact that you were honest? What is happening? Are they taking a step toward you? Are they taking a step back? Because if they're taking a step for towards you, it becomes easier and easier to say those things, the uncomfortable things, because you know that you're gonna get through to the other side, and that other side feels even better. Like forming that honeymoon phase of a relationship is wonderful. It's fun, it's exciting, but it's not that deep stuff. When I think about this, I I think about friends. And when Chandler and Monica got together, and then they went on this weekend away, and it was disastrous. They pissed each other off. And when they got home, Chandler was like, Okay, well, I guess that's all. I'll write you a check, and then I guess we're done. This has been nice. Thanks, bye. And she's like, What? Uh no. And then the penny drops for her, and she realizes, oh, this is why your relationships have never gotten any further. You broke up after the first fight. And that is how a lot of relationships end. Like I said, the storming can break, it can essentially make or break you because it can either you get to the other side and you're much closer, you've built trust, or you go, oh, this honeymoon phase, it's over. So I guess the whole relationship is over. All right, bye. And you move on to the next one. And this is what teenagers do. This is why a lot of teenage relationships don't go the distance. They don't go very far, which is fine. It's a great thing, in my opinion. You're learning, you're developing, you're testing the waters. But it is the sign of an adult relationship that you can have these fights, you can have disagreements, you can say the uncomfortable thing, and the result is you take steps closer to each other instead of breaking up or taking steps back. That's the sign of an adult relationship. And those relationships can keep going and the trust gets deeper and deeper, and the love develops more and more as well. Take from that that this whole team development thing, it's not just about teams, it is also about personal relationships. And it can be friendships, it can be romantic relationships, it can be any relationship of any kind because as humans, this is the way that we go. It's new and exciting at the beginning. You have this moment where it gets tougher, and we either take steps toward each other or away from each other. If we take steps toward each other, the relationship gets deeper, the trust develops. If we take steps back, then maybe the relationship ends, or we step back into that honeymoon or tiptoeing around or not really knowing each other very well. You can stay, just like a company, you can stay informing for a very, very, very long time. But it's pretty superficial. You can still enjoy each other, you can still have a lot of fun together, but it's pretty shallow. And if that's what you want, it's fine. But if you want something deeper, you have to be brave and give that feedback or say the uncomfortable thing that's gonna get you into storming and then into that norming phase where you can build trust and have more depth. So it's up to you, it's your choice. Thanks for listening. Nice to have a quick little extra. I hope that you took something from this and have a great day. As always, big thanks to Lilia Keys for our intro and outro music.