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What do you think about the people who are always extremely motivated? Do you think that’s true? Possible? Or they are just show this side of themselves to the external world and the true is that they are miserable, lonely, they hate their jobs and only tell lies about their golden motivation? What if I tell you that being highly motivated through most of your life is possible and achievable? That a lot of people in your closest environment – at work, home, local community is already doing it? What if I tell you that you can do it on your own, just by switching few small things in your life? Here’s another chunk of Transactional Analysis to add to all you’ve already got to know after reading previous pieces of the series. Let’s go with Motivation today. Is Motivation even a real thing? When we think about motivation, we look for a miraculous source of energy, potential or power that’s going to push us to do extraordinary things. It can be true, but we need to remember that there is no source on this planet that is infinite. So what if we operate only on the highest level of optimism and energy, and we don’t do anything when this energy is lower? We succeed only from time to time and it’s not something we should seek for. Motivation is just one aspect of being successful, achieving all those things that you want. But we can be smarter about it, discover what are the real aspects of your work, life, relations or health that motivate you to stay on truck, to do things, to make good decisions. And stick to that to be our best selves most of the time – instead of waiting for the perfect circumstances. Where to start? Let’s start with Susan Fowler. Susan Fowler’s Spectrum of Motivation Susan Fowler is one of the foremost experts on motivation and personal empowerment. She worked with a huge number of individuals, managers, teams and organizations to find out what is the truth about the motivation itself. Susan’s Story Her book “Why Motivating People Doesn’t Work… and What Does” is one of the best books in the field I’ve ever read, I strongly recommend it to anyone, regardless of the age, maturity, years of experience or place of living. There is one story which sticked with me since the first time I’ve heart this during my TA training. One time a manager came to Susan and said: “you know what, my team is so demotivated! What can I do to motivate them?”. She asked him a question in response to it: “do they come to work every day?”. “Yes, they do”. “Oh right, so they are already motivated. The real question is HOW”. It is nobody’s job to keep the other person motivated. External motivators are short-lived, sometimes they address only imaginative needs and what’s the most important – we remember about them only for a couple of minutes (the first moment of euphoria). And that’s it. I would make one step further to what Susan asked this manager about and say this: “how can we find out what are our REAL internal motivators that keep our momentum going?”. Spectrum of Motivation Model To better understand how people think, act, make decisions and keep themselves motivated, here is Susan Fowler’s concept of Spectrum of Motivation. 2 axes make this concept alive. The first one covers psychological needs. Regarding Susan Fowler, psychological needs are described by 3 main things: The second axes is about efficiency – doing things right, but also thinking about it in connection to effectiveness – doing the right things. By structuring those descriptors, it would be easier to understand the whole model, which is divided into 2 spectrums: Suboptimal and Optimal. There are 3 levels of Suboptimal motivation: Those 3 levels are not something we should seek. If you feel that you might be in one or two most of the time, take a closer look on the next part of the model to see what other way the life can be. And 3 levels of Optimal motivation: Use all the things you already know to boost your Motivation Use all the knowledge that you got from this article to answer the following questions: Use those questions, stay curious. Find out what is really underneath the surface, be honest with yourself – it’s the only way to move on and have a better life. If you’re stuck, don’t know what do to, where to start, you can always find a person who can help you. HR, coach, mentor, therapist, but it can also be a friend, a family member or a neighbor. Sometimes it helps just to talk to somebody and say some things out loud. When we say and hear things, especially when they are difficult or hard, bringing us shame or a feeling of guilt, it can have a therapeutical outcome. Try it out, find the source of your true, optimal motivation and improve yourself to stay as long as possible in that area. It’ll influence the quality of your work, relations, sleep, health and balance in overall. Connect the dots, see how they work together and be an owner of your life.

I’ve started to talk about drivers in one the previous articles created to address the issue of saying “no” to things in order to get our time back. Just one out of five drivers that are a part of Transactional Analysis was covered then, and today we’ll have all of them to see, what they are about and where you can use the knowledge about it to life a better life. Regarding TA there are 5 Drivers: Be Strong, Be Perfect, Please People, Try Hard and Hurry Up. Each of those has its own characteristics and roots, as well as the ways they can do us harm or support us as a source of potential and skills. Today we are going to dig deeper to get to know how we can use them as allies, instead of treating them as enemies. What are Drivers? Drivers are orders that we give ourselves. These are messages like “you should…”, “you must…” or “you be like…” that often take on a character of a compulsory principle pushing us to do a certain action. Drivers have roots in our childhood, they are mostly based on what we’ve heard from our parents or others who raised us, unconsciously taken as a proper way to behave to get recognition. There are 5 Drivers. Each person can live with all of them, but most of us has 1-2 main ones that become our dominant behavior, a reaction to a certain stimuli, context or situation. Read all 5 short descriptions below and see which one is telling the most truth about yourself. Each driver can be an order that pushes us to do things in a certain way, mostly making a negative outcome. But we can also use drivers as “work styles”. In that case we decide, consciously, how to take advantage of their potential and treat them as a source of talent, strength and skills. To be the owner, not the victim. Driver no. 1: Be Strong Be Strong is when we don’t like to admit that we don’t know something. We rather don’t ask for help or opinion of others, since it might look like we are weak, or not able to deal with something. Be Strong is very critical of yourself and others, often says: “I can handle it”, even when they know it’s not true. They spend a lot of time on finding proper data, answers or information, instead of asking somebody, because of the fear of being judged as incompetent or not good enough. When “Be Strong” is a work style? People with strong “Be Strong” are reliable, trustworthy, very skilled. They are great when working under pressure, they are dealing amazingly well with highly stressful, demanding situations. They are persistent, focused and they don’t give up. These are great qualities when we put them that way. Use them to be a strong, skilled partner, to have a seat at the table. Be Strong can help us to achieve extraordinary things, to grow every day, to look for new solutions or ideas and actually implement them. Be Strong with your goals, plans and things you want to do and learn. Follow this path with persistence and you’ll quickly see the results. Driver no. 2: Be Perfect Be Perfect is when we only accept perfection in actions, results, products regarding ourselves and others as well. When we do something, it’s all or nothing – every different result is not good enough. We constantly strive for perfection, without tolerating the slightest flaws, since those are the signs of weakness. Without careful preparation, we can not start a task at all, and once we do, we will do it for as long as it’s needed to be perfect. Based on that, it’s hard to meet the deadlines for us, so we are not as efficient as we should be at the end of the day. We also have the highest standards so it’s often very hard to delegate tasks, since we don’t believe in other peoples’ capabilities to do it like we would do it – perfect. When “Be Perfect” is a work style? People with strong “Be Perfect” have the highest standards and quality of their work. They predict different scenarios, and they are prepared for the worse. They are focused on delivering the best result possible and they’ll do everything to keep it that way. Use it to be concentrated on what really matters, on not wasting time on things without a certain level of importance or influence. Be the best version of yourself and deliver great value. Add to it a little touch of being Ok-Ok with not finishing everything perfect. Set yourself a goal that you’ll let go 20% of the things that are not super important, and the rest 80% of what you’re doing will be “perfect” (whatever perfect means to you). You can use the Influence Matrix and focus of the top right quadrant. Letting go is an important part of using “Be Perfect” to serve us, not the other way around. Driver no. 3: Please People Please People is when we put the needs of others ahead of our owns. If somebody is asking us for help, we quit what we’re doing at the moment, and we start supporting them. We often cover other peoples’ work, sometimes even without asking if anyone needs it. We want to avoid hurting people by being unhelpful, we are not saying directly when something is not fine with us, we don’t question the necessity or urgency of doing something. We don’t set boundaries to protect ourselves, because we are afraid of stop being likable or supportive as a person. We work long hours, are exhausted, frustrated and tired of being pushed all the time. When “Please People” is a work style? People with strong “Please People” are amazing when it comes to building trust, relations and atmosphere. They have a high credit of social trust, others like being around them, they have

We all know physical hunger. Because it is one of the basic human needs, when we are hungry, we can’t think straight, we are less efficient, we can’t focus on what other people say to us. It’s natural from evolutionary point of view, since what all our ancestors needed centuries ago was to survive and get food – to feed that kind of hungers. But we can also be psychologically hungry. It’s different type of hunger, sometimes we don’t even realize it until we name it, because it sits somewhere deep in our brain and body, whispering to our inner selves from time to time. Continuing our path on Transactional Analysis’ tools and parts of the framework, today I would like to introduce to you a concept of Eric Berne’s Hungers that all of us have. We are going to answer the question what these hungers are, how to feed them and what happens to us when we are “hungry”. Let’s go and find out what it is all about. What are Eric Berne’s Hungers? Eric Berne, as a father of Transactional Analysis, thought about three hungers that all people have, regardless of their background, age, color of skin, country they live or company they work for at the moment: Recognition, Structure and Stimulus. Recognition Hunger. As human beings we need to be seen and acknowledge as important parts of the ecosystem we live and work in. It builds our sense of identity as we know that our existence matters and gives value to other people. A mindful “Thank you” can be the easiest way to show somebody that she/he is noticed. Structure Hunger. We all know that we have a certain amount of time to live our lives and we want it to be meaningful. We find comfort in the regularity of the events, of celebration days from birthdays to New Year’s. We worry about wasting time and worry about not having enough time. We plan and want to know what is going to happen, and when. We also want to have space in which we can be relaxed and less ordered, though we often still want to organize this space. Stimulus Hunger. Stimulation can be physical or intellectual, it really depends on our needs and the way our individual nervous system is built, hence how we should or want to be stimulated. Stimulus Hunger is about having something new, experiencing and feeling a thing that affects us, and it really can be anything. Starting from a new task, job, hobby or habit, going through an interesting book or workshop, to inspiring conversation with another person. What is really important that all those 3 hungers always make 100%. It depends on a person how strong a certain need is, based on individual preferences. One person can have a ratio 30%-30%-40% (recognition-structure-stimulus), another 10%-60%-30% (recognition-structure-stimulus) and that’s perfectly fine. There is no questionnaire to measure it (maybe it should be one though), we need to estimate for ourselves how this ratio looks like for us. It is a first step to build self-awareness and doing something to improve our live. What’s happening when we are “hungry”? There is a term connected to this topic named “frustrated hungers” (it starts to look like those hungers are actual human beings). Frustrated hungers are when we know that we have a strong hunger for structure (for instance), and we work in a company when there is a huge mess. Or when we have a strong hunger for stimulus, and we live with a person who wants to go on vacation to the same place every single year. When we are “hungry” we cannot focus, we miss opportunities that live gives us, we cannot concentrate on a single thing. We are less efficient, less innovative, sometimes we don’t have an energy to get up from bed, because “WHAT’S THE POINT? My life suck anyways, so I don’t need to bother cleaning my teeth”. We can get depressed, push people away, we don’t work well. Or we can get angry, mad on the world that is around us or certain people who (in our opinion) are responsible for the current situation. Both ways, it’s not healthy (physically or psychologically), it has a huge negative impact on our general well-being and on how we use our potential. With frustrated hungers our potential is blocked, asleep somewhere under all those emotions and thoughts. We waste time that we can spend on something meaningful, creative or what gives value to other people. What can we do to “feed the hungers”? First thing that we need to do is to define what is the source of our frustration. Which of those hungers we need to feed? Can we do it at work or at home? Or somewhere else? The next thing is answering the question: “Who can support me in this?”. Can I do anything on my own to improve the situation? If not, who is around and have an influence on the current state of things? What can we do together to decrease the frustration? If it’s recognition area, maybe I can get more feedback from my manager or people in my team? Maybe I don’t have enough “thank you” for my hard work? I can tell my manager about it, let’s see what we can do together to change that. If it’s structure area, maybe I struggle with getting organized? What can I do to structure my day better? Do I schedule “deep work” time to cover the most important things without interruption? Maybe the processes in my organization don’t work very well – do I have any influence on that? Whom can I talk to for providing some ideas to change it? If it’s a stimulus area, maybe I have monotonous days, every single one is 90% the same as the one before. What can I do to change it? Maybe I can take some new responsibilities at work, a work with new people in a different

As a huge advocate of Transactional Analysis (TA) as a concept, I am going to start sharing tools or elements from it in an easy and understandable way, since I believe that every person can use it. And you don’t have to necessarily be a psychologist to use it, especially for using contracting, which is a subject of today’s article. TA as a theory was developed by Eric Berne in 1950s. It was purely a method of psychotherapy back then, but really quickly people realized that it can be used in educational and organizational context as well. I use it for my personal development, but also in the organizations that I support, while I teach mostly managers how to be smarter, understand their people better and to know more about why and when employees react in a certain way. The first tool that I found particularly useful was contracting. I teach it while I can and to whom I can because I see how much it can change relations, ways of communication or the way we are working within a team, when we are more mindful about the structure of how we talk to each other. It prevents people from guessing, wasting time on finding the right person or the right information and playing psychological games. In this article I’ll give you basics about the tool and I’ll answer on a question WHY you should use it. Let’s get started then. What is contracting regarding Eric Berne? Levels of contract Contracting is a tool. It can have different value for every person that uses it, since all of us have different needs, thinking preferences, personality and environment that we grew in or live and work in right now. A contract is an agreement between two (or more) sides, in which each party agrees to do a specific thing. Pretty similar to a regular definition of a contract, i.e. while we are signing a contract of employment, we agree to do a certain task list and the organization agrees to pay us a certain amount of money in exchange for it. But contracting regarding Berne is something more than just a transaction. It has more layers, there are more details underneath the surface which will have an influence on a person in the future. Berne says there are 3 basic layers of a good contract: administrative, professional and psychological. All 3 need to be covered if we want to talk about a proper contract. Let’s use the example of a new employee in the team to make it clearer. On an administrative level we are going to give new employee a contract of employment, information about payroll cycle, bonus system, benefits, working hours, procedures that are valid in this particular organization. Basically, all details that a new employee should know to start a job. On a professional level we are going to give this new employee ways of working, scope of responsibilities and decision making that she/he can do on their own on their position. Goals, objectives and KPIs, ways and tools of communication, ways and frequency of reporting, as well as 1:1 and team meetings. On a psychological level we are going to talk about expectations of both sides, needs, past experiences (good or bad) with a decision what to keep, and what to cut from current cooperation. This is the space where we talk about motivation, values and all the thigs that are important while thinking about comfort and efficiency of work. First two layers are quite simple, intuitive and most of us cover them, more or less. The last one might seem the most difficult, since we need more insight, coaching skills, we need to listen and be open to other person to do it properly. It can be hard, sometimes people don’t want to talk about it, but it is crucial to take it into consideration. Without that we will be relying on guesses and beliefs, instead of facts and real needs that this new person has. What are the rules of a good contract? When we think about contracting, there are few elements that we need to take care of every time. If we cover all of those, the contract will be fully transparent, have a good intention and an aim to create a value for engaged parties and/or for somebody else as a result of common work. Where can I use contracting? Contracts can be used practically everywhere, that’s the magic of them. This is a really universal tool, and it depends on our individual needs where we want to start trying them out. The areas of usage can be either personal or professional, here are few examples: As you can see there are many opportunities, in endless contexts where we can use contracting. The essence of it (besides the elements that were already covered) is: This is a tool for us, not we are here for the tool. It should support us with having clear, transparent communication and structure around what we do, how and when. The bottom line I don’t like to waste my time. I think that it’s too valuable and I don’t have a luxury to spend it on the things that can be done better, faster, simpler or with less energy. Contracting is a tool that can help us to have better, more clear and transparent communication, prevent us from playing psychological games, privately and professionally. It is here for us to stop guessing and start mindfully talk to each other and set together what needs to be done. It is a life changer. Try it and teach others to do the same. The world is going to be a better place thanks to that. Do you want to know more about TA? Stay tuned for more articles here, visit my Instagram or check out official TA Association.