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Relationships are hard. Relationships are especially hard when they involve business. How do you nurture business relationships? Are they the same as regular relationships? The answer varies, but, for the most part, yes.
According to Hon and Grunig, relationships can be assessed using six key concepts. For the purposes of this blog, I will use my own employer, Arkansas Coding Academy, to illustrate these concepts.
The first concept is control mutuality. in theory, this means that all parties agree on who gets to have influence and when. For ArCA, this means that students, teachers and staff all have to be on the same page about who is controlling the situation. In the classroom, the instructors are typically the ones exerting influence, but on graduation day, for example, the students get to exert influence by presenting their capstone projects and working alongside staff to network with potential employers.
Trust is a big one and is vital to any relationship, whether its personal or professional. At ArCA, for example, instructors and students have to build a rapport and work with the staff to build a culture of trust in order for the students’ educational (and with it the organization’s) endeavors to be successful.
Satisfaction is simply what it sounds like. In order for all parties to be satisfied, everyone’s individual needs should be met accordingly. In the case of ArCA, students must be equipped by the staff and instructors to be successful, and their successes reflect back to the organization.
Commitment is what drives relationships and ultimately determines how dedicated each party is to making the relationship a successful one. If ArCA students weren’t committed to their studies, the program would only leverage a minuscule threshold of success. Likewise, if the instructors and staff weren’t committed to the students, they would have a harder time being successful as well.
The final two concepts are exchange relationship and communal relationship. In an exchange relationship, there is a trade-off with some expectation of a mutually beneficial return in the future. For example, ArCA students invest in the programs with the expectation that the staff and instructors will provide them with the best education possible. Likewise, staff and instructors equip students with the tools to be successful while having the expectation that students will also take ownership of their successes and failures. In a communal relationship, both parties are concerned for each other without regard for their own benefits. ArCA demonstrates this through its rich alumni relationships. Although the program has only existed for a few years, it has a large network of “success stories” who continues to give back to the program even after completing it themselves. Likewise, ArCA continues to support and cheer on its graduates, even when this has no immediate benefit to them.
So, you see, business relationships are a lot like personal ones. You have to put time into them and work to make them grow and thrive. What are some ways your own business and professional relationships follow Hon’s and Grunig’s concepts?
Alexandra Taylor 