Formation of the Parent Ego State I

The Parent Ego State is actually a recording of all external influences made before a child is 5 or 6 years old. This is usually mostly the mother and

father and older sibling, simply because these are the people the child most often has contact with. This is also where the child is most emotionally invested, and the recordings from the family have a much greater importance because of this.

Television also plays a part in forming the Parent, but because the survival importance is much lower the influence is much less. The situation is the same with people who are not family members, although here a stranger may present a very real perceived threat and form a strong recording as a result.

Contradictory messages in the Parent Ego, such as being told, “Don’t lie!’ when the parents frequently lies are both faithfully recorded, and serve to have the effect of weakening the Parent Ego and perhaps eliciting a confused response in critical situations, when you fall back on prior programming.

The significance of this for management is that when one encounters a new situation, such as at work, you fall back on prior programming, the Parent-Ego, for an immediate response in the absence of other guidelines. If this succeeds, the response is further strengthened and will be used again under similar circumstances.

This is actually survival based, so if the person survives, the behavior may well be repeated even if it seems unsatisfactory in other respects. This makes training and good mentoring highly important for new recruits, especially those just entering the work force.

Work is seen as a different situation from everyday life, and responses and memory are state-based. If you get a new entrant early enough and have good work practices and attitudes demonstrated by a respected mentor, you can override prior conditioning for the work situation.

Furthermore, the Father (who may actually be a mother or older sibling, but the predominant authority figure in the family) sets an example thru his Parent-, Adult- and Child-Egos as to how the recruit should behave. This can support previous recordings and serve to reinforce them, but it is better to provide an example of reasonable, supportive, thinking management if that is what you want later.

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