OD Practitioner

By Cheryl Lieberman

Scenario: You are a consultant on day two of a three-day training program. The program has been proceeding smoothly and everyone seems to be getting a lot out of it.

But suddenly, after the first exercise, a member of the group raises an issue about the clarity of your directions. Another member says he didn't feel the last exercise was very useful at this point. Someone else claims you didn't make a specific direction clear. Another person jumps in and says he feels this whole effort has been a waste of time. Still another person states that the temperature in the room has fluctuated so much that she's very uncomfortable.

You are confused by this barrage of complaints. "What is going on here?" you ask yourself and, perhaps the group. But the response you get is not an answer to your question, but more comments on what's wrong.

All is in chaos. You are in "middles."

The middles phase in a consulting relationship can be the critical turning point in accomplishing your goals. It is at this phase that consulting projects are often terminated, formally or informally, thus severing relationships and leaving results unrealized.

Because of that, this article will focus on what really goes on in middles, why this happens, and how consultants can handle this phase to bring the project and process to a successful conclusion.

RELATIONSHIP CYCLES

All relationships go through cycles with beginnings, middles, and endings, and with each cycle the possibility of deepening a relationship exists. Middles occur when working with an individual, a group or an entire organization. For the purposes of this article, the discussion will focus on a group situation. To best understand the middle phase, let's first take a look at the cycles which come before and after middles.

Beginnings are a time for both the client and consulting to test, wait, and sort out information. The client wonders if the consultant can truly help him accomplish the task at hand. And the consultant wonders if the client can - or wants to be - helped. Trust is an issue on both sides. And the client may not always reveal how he or she truly feels. Because managers have been conditioned to behave in a sure fashion ("I am expected to have all the answers and I am going to behave that way!"), they often appear certain when they actually feel tentative. Therefore, clients may ask superficial questions and reveal very little about the real problems they face. They wonder whether the benefits of the consulting effort will outweigh the cost of their confessions. For example, if they admit to uncertainty, will others perceive them as weak?

Therefore, true feelings and hard issues often don't surface until middles. It is the transition from the tentative beginnings phase to the "let it all hang out" middle phase that makes dealing with middles tricky.

At the ending phase, clients tend to repeat their beginning phase behaviors. In endings, people return to hope and excitement. The client may also start to worry about the consultant's imminent departure. Often unwittingly, clients will manifest some of the dependent behavior they showed at the beginning. Wanting the consultant to leave, but not really wanting the consultant to leave. Wanting to fly with their own wings, but not sure they can.

Also, if a client is faced with a crisis during the ending phase, old - and not necessarily helpful - behaviors may reappear, requiring a period of readjustment. For example, if a client has started to make decisions in a more mature and flexible way, toward the ending phase he or she may revert to making poor decisions in a rigid manner.

It is important to understand that in the relationship cycle we are talking about an ending phase, not an ending moment. Because it is a phase, the consultant can guide the client through it.

If the beginning and middle phases have been worked through well, a consultant/client relationship at the ending phase is more mature. Conflicts can be resolved more quickly with a minimal expenditure of energy.

MIDDLES

If you work through middles well, clients can place their feelings where they really belong and acknowledge their own accountability. Real "secrets" are shared and important work starts. If middles are not dealt with appropriately, tension continues and forward movement is almost impossible.

The biggest clue that the middle phase has started is that the client starts directing a lot of anger and hostility toward the consultant. But it is important to separate the kind of anger and hostility that occurs during the middles phase from real anger and hostility toward something the consultant has done or not done.

The difference is that during middles these feelings are usually not grounded in what is really happening but instead have the quality of nitpicking; it's confusing. A consultant knows that the relationship is in the middles phase when nothing going on makes any sense. It may, however, make excellent sense to the people who are conveying these negative feelings. As the consultant, you must then step back, sort out whether the feelings are real or misplaced, and proceed in a constructive - not defensive - way.

For example, take the opening scene of this article. Faced with this barrage of complaints, you must first determine which are grounded in reality and which are not. To do this, take each issue, one by one, restate and acknowledge the complaint, then ask for comments from the group. Are others confused? Are others uncomfortable? How can we alleviate these problems? By doing this, you would have shown that you do care about individuals' feelings and realize that they should be addressed.

However, at this point (assuming that some of the complaints are not well-founded and indeed we are in middles) it is important that the consultant begin to draw out the real, underlying reasons for the complaints. Here, then, you might move off the content and begin a discussion about the anger in the room, suggesting we stop and talk about it for a few minutes.

Another clue that the middle phase is beginning comes when the client drops certain facades. There is no longer a general compliance to move forward in the direction that you, the consultant, want to move. The politeness of the beginning phase shifts and masks come off.

Here, the consultant must not get defensive, but see this behavior as a sign of middles that must be worked through. Again, it is necessary to acknowledge and validate the client's feelings and statements to show you respect his viewpoint. Then find out what the underlying cause of the behavior is, and deal with that.

In one situation, a group which had been open to the consultant's suggestions throughout the beginning phase, suddenly begins to quibble with your advice, suggesting that perhaps you are not experienced enough in their field to help them. This complete turnaround should set off a bell in your head: middles. With careful probing, you might find that group members had been talking outside the group meeting and felt that the initial assessment of their department was unfairly negative. That you'd also noted many positive comments made no difference to them, all they could see were the negative ones. When this comes out, you will be able to clear the air and work progressively toward the acceptance of feedback as a starting discussion point to examine what in the department worked well and what could work better.

In middles, the client also wants more influence over what's happening. Certain issues become important, such as how things are to be done, how decisions will be made and by whom, how much freedom and control will participants have. Instead of looking at an argument in terms of data, the discussion becomes a testing ground for personal influence and expertise.

Additionally, while in the beginning phase, people make statements about who they are in order to be recognized as a special individual entity within the group. During middles they strive to show that what they think and how they feel has an influence on the group. They want to show they have an impact, not just a presence.

At this juncture, if the consultant focuses on process and not content (maintaining a professional discipline that doesn't push back in a hostile, confrontive way), a shift begins to take place. Clients start to take some individual responsibility and accountability for what has been and is happening. In a group, at some point the members recognize that confrontation alone is self-defeating and working together is more productive. The initiative of one or more people usually makes this happen. If not, it's just the general working through of the middle phase that brings on this process. The confrontation in a group situation usually manifests itself as group members speaking directly to other group members, often saying things they've never said before.

A pitfall of this stage of middles is that instead of anger and overt resistance that had occurred previously, issues may be over-discussed. Decisions become difficult to make. A consultant needs to watch that this doesn't occur too frequently.

Additionally, it's important that you not let the discussion deteriorate into something like an encounter group. These people must continue to work together after the consultant leaves. Therefore, the fine line between confrontation and "therapy" should never be crossed. The general tone should be one of confrontation interspersed with responsibility and accountability, not a no-holds-barred argument.

If dealt with correctly, this influence-seeking staged of middles is followed by a spoken or unspoken agreement that we are in this together and we are going to find the answers. Collaboration is more readily sought and competitiveness is played down. The client makes a genuine effort to look at issues, discover appropriate resources, and avoid the personalizing of issues that occurred earlier.

But the atmosphere does not become completely serious and "businesslike." On the contrary, joking and laughter are not uncommon at this time. While people may laugh during beginnings, it tends to be uncomfortable laughter. The levity you experience at the middles phase is usually the kind that draws people together.

As the middle phase winds down, the client moves to a period of reflection on goals and performance, means and ends. Roles, decision-making procedures, and leadership and communication patterns are likely to come under close scrutiny. The consultant/client relationship has moved from the beginning phase of secrecy and tentativeness to the middle phase of reduced competition, greater informality, and increased familiarity. You are now able to build true progress on this foundation. This is a time when the client is most open to making changes about leadership style, decision-making procedures, and so on.

Often during middles the client is ready to share more information. Because information is power, clients often don't readily give over all information during beginnings. But if middles are proceeding as they should, clients will feel the trust that allows them to realize that they need to disclose all that is pertinent to the task at hand, in order for both of you to make appropriate decisions.

Additionally, greater participation through the division of labor becomes essential. With it, accountability and personal responsibility are spread throughout the group. Accountability and personal responsibility are spread throughout the group. Accountability is crucial here, as it suggests that individuals know what is expected of them and that this is to some degree measurable.

As trust develops - as the client realizes that they are keeping their agreements and moving forward together in a productive manner - more openness and genuine communication occur.

What had been missing from the relationship was a means of legitimizing feelings that were not positive and the freedom to communicate sharp feelings and ideas that might create conflict of force consideration of alternative approaches. Now real feelings can be discussed without fear of reprisal.

CONCLUSION

While working through middles can be trying - calling on every bit of professional discipline and skill a consultant can muster - it is often the place where significant turning points in the relationship occur. The client shares "secrets" with the consultant, and real work begins. But only if the consultant/client relationship is a good one in the beginning phase will middles happen. If the phase, with all its troublesome warning signs, doesn't develop, it usually means that trust doesn't develop, it usually means that trust doesn't exist, or the consulting relationship has ended prematurely. Middles are a positive sign that real progress is occurring and genuine opportunities for significant work is possible.

Thus, the burden of managing middles is on the consultant. This crucial phase demands a level of skill that is not apparent to the client, one that takes years of professional work, training and experience to develop. Still, it is a worthwhile investment of time and energy, for such skills result in consultant/client relationships that have an effective impact on people and their organizations.