Team Building

I'm thinking of going back to school to be a psychologist like Dr. Phil.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I’m taking some business type courses as well as writing courses. One of the courses is titled, “Building Relationships to Get Better Results" and offers strategies for team building. While I was reading through the lesson, it occurred to me that the three steps for building a stronger team could be used to create stronger personal relationship. If you are contemplating a life of eternal bliss with your one-and-only, the two of you should sit down together and explore the following steps before you invest too much time in establishing a disjointed union.

(1) Identify common goals. How many times have you heard an unhappy couple lament, “We have nothing in common any more.” “We just want different things”? “We were so much in love, I just assumed we wanted the same things.” At least if you know that you want 12 children, but he wants 12 dogs, you can discuss it and reach a compromise before the fights extinguishes all that love or cut your losses early and move on.

(2) Establish each partner’s responsibilities. How many times have you heard “I do all the work, while ol’ lard butt just sits around watching TV.” or “I’m tired of being the only one to balance the checkbook… the only one to do housework… the only one who cooks?” If you know ahead of time that neither one of you does housework, you know you need to hire a maid and if neither of you can afford that, decide if you can live with a messy house or if you need to find someone who cleans. Remember it's the little things that get on your nerves.

(3) Recognize the need to celebrate accomplishments. Being in love is an accomplishment. Cleaning the bathroom is an accomplishment. Sometimes just making it through another day without killing that stupid jerk you love is an accomplishment. Make appointments to celebrate those accomplishments; be specific about what, when, and how you are celebrating. But also, reserve enough time and energy to celebrate spontaneously when the occasion arises and look for those occasions. Knowing that your partner celebrates you, just might keep you from kicking ol’ lard butt’s butt out the door in a few years.