Psychologist Ekaterina Gulyanskaya told the Topbrand Magazine about transactional analysis and the features of the Process Communication Model (PCM) by Taibi Kahler.
Transactional Analysis and Its Purpose
Eric Berne introduced transactional analysis in the 1950s. His well-known followers in the world of psychology were Claude Steiner, Stephen Karpman (Karpman’s triangle), and Taibi Kahler.
Transactional analysis studies transactions or communications between people. It is through this method that the concept of the internal ego-states of a person’s personality arose, which includes: parent, adult, and child aspects. It also includes the concepts of life scripts, script beliefs, repetitive communications, transactions, which can go on indefinitely or be interrupted and ended.
“I have been studying transactional analysis for six years. I use this method when working with clients, in the practice of psychological and business consulting. Transactional analysis is a medically endorsed methodology used for psychological counseling and even in clinical cases. It is also one of the popular methods of business consulting in Europe and America. Transactional analysis coaching was created based on it.”
Benefits of Using Transactional Analysis
Transactional analysis is useful not only to psychologists but also to ordinary people in life, business owners, and company employees. We all communicate, and it’s important to understand who is in front of us. To what personality type does our partner, client, boss, or manager belong? How is it easiest to communicate with them and what motivates them best? And also, what kind of activity is best to assign to which personality type?
Sometimes up to 80% of the time is spent clarifying misunderstandings in the work process. By understanding which personality type the boss is dealing with, he can quickly and clearly convey certain information to the subordinate, more easily come to an agreement with them, avoiding conflicts. And how much time and money can HR save if they initially know which candidates to appoint to which positions for the best result? Marketers, knowing the profile, needs, and motivation of the key client of the company, understand better how to present information about the product. And how many marriages and partnerships could be saved if people knew and were able to apply this information in life?!
Process Communication Model
One of Eric Berne’s followers, Taibi Kahler, adapted the transactional analysis model, developing and transforming it into the “Process Communication Model”. By calling complex things by simple language, he made it possible for people far from psychology to master this unique methodology. He gave understandable names to complex terms and also developed testing, with which anyone can determine their personality type.
Taibi Kahler’s Process Communication Model has received worldwide recognition. Kahler has repeatedly tested this methodology, even used it for work at NASA and the White House. He described six personality types and their combinations. Each personality type has a quite observable and predictable set of behavior patterns. Each of them has their strengths and weaknesses, a filter for perceiving information, motivation, and stress factors.
Personality Types According to Taibi Kahler
I have always particularly liked the clear understanding in transactional analysis of six different types of people’s adaptations. They have been detailed and described, their combinations, which explain the endless diversity of people. Using this concept, one can easily determine which personality we are talking to. One can predict behavior, reactions, and understand a person’s needs, and understand how to convey information to them in a language they understand. How easier to communicate with them, what are their leading behavioral drivers, what actions to expect from them, and what puts them into stress.
And also, what actions need to be taken to bring them out of a depressing state.
So, let’s briefly go over each personality type:
Thinker – hardworking, thinking, organized, neat, responsible. They can think logically, like to summarize, classify, learn. Thinkers tend to list facts, live according to a schedule, and can be somewhat pedantic.
Persister – devoted, goal-oriented. For them, their opinion, values, reliability, morality, mission, principles are important. Persistent people adhere to the rules of agreement. Respect is important to them. However, people of this type can be distrustful.
Harmoniser – sensitive, attentive, caring, warm, likable. For these people, a pleasant atmosphere, music, love are important. But they can be overly emotional.
Imaginer – calm, creative people with a rich inner world and imagination. They love to be alone.
Rebel – bright, charismatic, lively, emotional, spontaneous. These people have sparkling eyes full of zest. Rebels love humor, are able to think creatively, come up with non-standard solutions and exits from situations.
Promoter – charming, status-conscious, decisive people. They are full of resources, ready to take risks, know how to be different: flexible, persuasive, as well as firm and resolute. Doers know how to act quickly, see the benefit, and are result-oriented.
Usually, each person has one or two leading personality types. We can also engage in behavior from other personality types. The diversity of people depends on these combinations and proportions.
Method of Reading Personalities
By studying the Process Communication Model, you can practically learn to identify a personality type or its combination in just five minutes. This can be discerned by one’s figure, gestures, posture, clothing. It is very easy to identify a person by the words and phrases they most often use in conversation. This is enough to understand a person’s motivation and their fears, what they like to do in life, in what space and with what people they want to be. Also, from which area to conduct a conversation with them to establish contact faster and find a way to agree. Besides, it immediately becomes clear what can easily put a person under stress, how they will behave and feel under it.
Case of Successful PCM Impelemention
I had a client, a top manager, who worked as the head of the innovation department in a large company. Every time at the board of directors, he was very initiative and put forward his creative ideas. But the CEO did not consider his innovations and did not let them proceed.
In our work, we clarified that according to the PCM personality type, my client was a “Rebel”, and his boss was a “Thinker”. The “Thinker” CEO simply could not perceive and understand his emotional delivery. Therefore, most of the innovations suggested by the client were flatly rejected and dismissed by the boss.
During the consultation, it turned out that my client delivered information to his boss in a way that was unacceptable and incomprehensible to him. As soon as the client began to use fewer emotions in his future presentations and more graphs, numbers, diagrams, tables, accompanied by structured speech, his ideas and decisions finally began to receive a positive response from the Thinker leader and were implemented in practice. Whereas before that, the same boss, listening to him, literally lost interest in his report within a minute or two. Because Thinkers find it hard to perceive information without structure, charts, graphs, conveyed only through emotional text.
Conclusion
For anyone involved in business – the Process Communication Model is very important. Its application allows understanding which people to appoint to which positions, what roles and responsibilities to give.
