Relationships by their very nature are based on mutual interaction between two people. We think about the relationship in pairs, such as Parent-Child, Husband -Wife, Teacher-Student. Boss-Worker, Employer-Employee, Leader-Follower, and such. We rarely think about the basic structuring and the power distribution within these paired connections. Intuitively and experientially, we know that one party has more power and the other not so much. Or at least that is how we are conditioned to think, but in reality, everyone in a relationship has the potential for synergy. Relationships cannot exist without some give and take; you have something I need or want and vice versa.

Synergy is defined as “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” Each in the pair has something that the other needs to derive more significant benefit from their relationship. A parent has the power to nurture, whereas the child can provide pure joy. An employer has the power to give money and means for affording a decent life. An employee can make a business idea come alive with their labor, skills, and time. Every relationship has some aspect of transactions that overall provide far greater benefit for the pair because each has a complementary role. Still, we have a faulty perception that only one in the team has more power because we see relationship labels. We accept it at face value as defined by societal, work, or community culture. 

Old societies, religious beliefs, dogmas, and cultures have arbitrarily ascribed more power to one versus the other in the pair, making one feel entitled and leaving the other feel having less say so with unequal advantage. It led to a faulty belief that every relationship has an implicit hierarchy. In reality, though, each person has complementary power. Without the ability to provide that complement, which makes the whole greater than the sum of parts, there would not be any point in establishing the relationship.

Faulty Perception

Because we have a faulty perception, we have a flawed premise on which relationships are often based merely on cursory evaluation without communicating clearly what we want to achieve and how we will work it out. We settle with minimum acceptable standards, without clear communication about common goals and expectations, leading to problems in the future and sometimes irreconcilable differences, enough to a break-up.

The faulty perception leads to assumptions that discount each partner’s contributions by trivializing their intrinsic value. Perhaps, the original concept was based on the division of labor and a simple idea of the relationship of the ‘the haves’ and ‘the have nots.’  The ‘Haves’ were ascribed higher power and deemed as having the ability to make or break the partner’s future. This erroneous thinking manifests in creating hierarchies and dependencies in relationships. Traditionally, a husband brought in money in the household and had the say-so in how and where the funds will be used. A manager or the business owner with money determines the pay of the one who needs to earn and determines the value of work to be performed. The power to fire at will and disrupt the employee’s life entirely rests in the employer’s hands. 

This categorization loses the critical insight that each member in a pair has a different power of equal importance to achieve fruitful results. In reality, only the fusion of various capacities of both the partners results in collaborative co-creation and makes the real relationship thrive. It is not the absolute power but a shared power that adds to the robustness of a relationship.

So why do we refuse to acknowledge the shared power?

• Because it is hard to give up the privileges of entitlement, which is deeply embedded in our social fabric, hence the reluctance to disrupt the status quo. The same mentality that perpetuates, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” But the system is broken and times have moved on, and the society is much different than the earlier days of the empires and industrial revolution. The era of ‘troth’ and “’till the death do us part” are waning fast, as are the institutional loyalties!
• Because our economic system, which is delicately balanced on the imbalance in power, would have to make massive changes in our social, economic, legal, and political systems to accommodate the shared power concepts. For example, in a marital relationship, women would no longer do the labor of love. At a minimum, she could demand a safety net in terms of retirement income and social security of her own.
  
  In the business world, acknowledging the total and actual value of a worker’s contribution would mean changing the compensation system. It would call for higher wages based on intrinsic values rather than on the labor pool’s demand and supply or the ethnic composition of the workforce. The artificial lower value of women’s workplace contribution will have to be redefined, eliminating excuses like women do not have to contribute to the family coffers or stay on the job when they get married and have children. Two incomes are necessary given the inflationary price increases, higher lifestyle expectations, and higher education expenditure. It would also mean discarding erroneous beliefs about people’s races and ethnicity, which have no scientific basis.

• Because there is a vested interest in society’s different factions in maintaining the earlier era‘s zeitgeist, irrespective of the fact that today’s people are not as docile, obedient, or blind followers of mandates coming from above. The power of the so-called powerless comes in rebellion and active or passive resistance. And we see plenty of it all over the world! 

Why bringing in Equity and Equality cannot be ignored anymore?

Times have changed, and there is an urgency to remedy the imbalance because the younger generation’s mindset is different. They are not passively accepting the status quo and are challenging it. Social media and technologies are opening many more options for them, and they are actively changing the culture or demanding the change to bring balance in relationships.

Lifelong relationships based on the “Until death do us part” are passé and have been receding for a few decades as evidenced in higher divorce rates, lower rates of marriages, and a decline in family formations and birth rates in society. 

In commerce and industry, we see the absence of loyalty, shrinking pension plans, shifting more healthcare costs to workers, and higher attrition rates. These upheavals are brought on by the generations’ greater awareness of the lopsided balance of power in relationships. Equality and Equity are not just abstract concepts anymore. They are the calls from a very active and self-aware generation.

Imperative of Bringing the Balance in Relationships

Changing a culture is a long-term proposition, but it will never change unless we all take the first steps. It is high time to understand the factors that trigger the feelings of disempowerment and correct the course. Acknowledge that disparity and disequilibrium exist and implement empowering strategies and policies. Bringing about Equity requires eliminating self-serving leveraging of the natural differences to undermine others. 

As I mentioned earlier, our inherent differences are not “good” or “bad”; just different and complementary. Our history and cultures have been so deep-rooted that we accept discriminatory behavior as par for the course. We also assume that discrimination has no impact on overall productivity and goodwill in a relationship. There are no benchmarks to measure the overall effect associated with hierarchical behavior, so much so that we do not recognize the disempowering behavior in our day-to-day dealings with colleagues and cohorts.

So the first step toward balancing is to get rid of the contrived subjective judgments meted out to genders or races.  Doing away with faulty logic and perceptions and replacing those with the proper understanding of the relationships for the current times can help realize synergies’ true potential.

Disempowering Behavior

Let’s recognize the behaviors that feel disempowering ensue from human nature at its weakest. Whether in a social or work relationship, people walk out when the balance of power gets askew. The rate of divorce in private partnerships and the turnover and attrition in commercial arrangements are the proofs. It is an oft-repeated truism that people leave companies because of bad bosses. It is disempowering when you:

• Make your partner feel incompetent by questioning, monitoring every action.
• Need accountability for every single action.
• Need to give direction about everything! It makes the partner feel as if you think they are incapable of thinking, whereas it is more about one partner wanting to control every outcome.
• Throw the partner under the bus instead of standing by or supporting while demanding total loyalty.
• Cheat by taking a license under the guise of, “It’s only human nature” and absolving oneself of responsibility.
• Engage in ghosting with statements like, “But you don’t understand about XYZ situation,” when the partner is quite capable of seeing the situation for what it is.
• Do not acknowledge accomplishments, small or significant, or provide any encouragement with an attitude; “Well, it’s your job, isn’t it?” or worse yet, “I would have told you if something was out of place, but this is par for the course.”
• Gaslight with comments like, “You do not know how to manage budget, you just assumed that you have funds available. Why did you not check beforehand? “
• Hog credits under the impression, “Well, she works for me, so I don’t need to reveal who contributed to this idea.”
• Trespass into the partner’s sphere by doing their job because you do not have the patience to let the partner manage their project.
• Show utter disrespect for the partnership by not allowing time to build and nurture it, not listen actively to the communication’s intent, and usually jump to conclusions on your preconceived bias.

These are only some examples of blatant lousy management or bad relationship but illustrative of how the trust and respect erodes. Sooner or later, the relationship will break because of the power imbalance. 

Bringing Balance in the Relationship

Every human craves a sense of belonging that comes from acceptance and inclusion. Acknowledging their presence as fellow human beings regardless of their status, wealth, titles, or placement in the societal order, age, or looks. They want to fit in, not be ostracized or isolated based on these artificial boundaries. A culture with a lopsided balance is fraught with mistrust, miscommunications, and miscalculations resulting from not accepting people as they are and perpetuates the toxic culture by twisting the natural differences in a self-serving manner. To correct the imbalance of power, we must:

• Establish trust by removing the need to control all outcomes and accepting that it is okay for people to occasionally fail, as long as they are resilient, bounce back, and avail themselves of second chances. Learning from failure is a part of the human’s journey toward perfection or innovation. Rigid rules and inflexibility allow for predictability, but change is a fact of life, as is uncertainty. The ability to be responsive and react quickly to opportunities cannot come with predictability, so be flexible.  Trust is vital in holding the relationship together over the long haul. When trust is present, the need to control, give unasked-for advice, or issuing directives is absent.  Let the partners figure out how they want to manage a project or a situation.
• Communicate with clarity.  Express what you need or want to happen upfront rather than muddling through later on with “You should’ve.” Expectations are a statement; the “Should’ve” have a hint accusation. Equally important, listen when it is time to listen before computing the disadvantages or advantages or formulating counter-arguments with “Buts.” When you listen actively without mental clutter obstructing your understanding, you can comprehend the issues and communicate at a deeper level toward resolutions.
• Respect personal space and boundaries. Even in the best and intimate relationship, there is a need to have privacy. Respect them, ask permission when you need to intervene. Tethering the partner with the wireless and needing frequent feedback and reassurances reeks of a lack of confidence in the partner’s ability to manage the situation and being under constant monitoring. Set up general rules for timely communications but don’t make people feel that they have to account at every step.
• Create a culture of competence, which is self-directed. It leads to confidant collaboration and co-creation by sharing power. Healthy competition comes from focusing on making one’s best effort rather than focus on beating everyone else.  Competition has a place, but do not let it consume you by filtering everything and everyone through comparison, envy, and suspicion. Looking over the shoulders constantly to see if others are gaining on you distracts from giving your all; it is based on other-directed motivation.  Winning should be a byproduct of putting in the best effort (in process or journey) but not be-all, end-all. 
• In a healthy relationship, the mindset is not “Winner takes it all,” which gives rise to a selfish and toxic culture, whether in a family, a company, a community, or a nation. Replace it with “We don’t win unless we all win,” which encourages cooperation and collaboration.

It is high time to hit’ Refresh and Reset’ in relationship for better results!