What is Relational Team Talk?
RTT draws upon three main evidence-based psychological models to develop relational intelligence in teams. These models are: Polyvagal Theory; Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR); and Cognitive Analytic Therapy (CAT).
Within Us – Polyvagal Theory
To understand what happens within us when we are in a high-pressure work environment, we use Polyvagal Theory, which explains that each of us has a unique way of responding to (and coping with) high-pressure and stress. Polyvagal Theory provides a lens through which we can start to understand how our body and nervous system respond to different environments. This awareness helps bring a sense of predictability to unpredictable workplace systems.
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We help teams learn more about their own and each other's "default" ways of responding to high-pressure situations and provide them with the skills to co-regulate in a way that helps everyone feel safer, calmer, and more connected with themselves and others. This leads to enhanced cohesion, team well-being, productivity, and staff retention.
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We are all affected by how other people are feeling around us, which, in a high-pressure work environment, can lead to a contagion of stress and a team operating mostly in survival mode, leading to conflict and burnout. RTT’s workshops educate participants on how teams can move from being dysregulated, disconnected, and anxiously driven to using the relationships between team members to self-regulate, co-regulate, and build a healthy culture of coping and well-being.
EMDR is a therapeutic model that supports recovery and healing from adverse life experiences and physiological arousal. EMDR is highly effective in a group, using the strength of the team to support collective processing and recovery from shared experiences, including high-pressure work environments. RTT uses Group-EMDR to support individuals in working through what is happening within them in relation to stressful experiences at work, as well as to help teams work through together what they have experienced between them, reducing individual discomfort, enhancing well-being, and strengthening team functioning.
Between Us - EMDR
Around Us –
CAT and Relational Mapping
To understand how we relate to ourselves and each other, we use Cognitive-Analytic Therapy (CAT) and in particular, a technique called Relational Mapping. Relational Mapping is a practical tool that helps us understand relationships, including the way we relate to ourselves and each other within the work context. It also considers broader context, or what is happening around us, including the relational patterns of the system, as we know this influences the emotional climate, culture, wellbeing and overall functioning of a team.
By using relational mapping, we are able to safely explore how systems can impact team functioning, both positively and negatively. This understanding is used to develop a culture that supports noticing, naming and negotiation of team patterns and difficulties to enhance cohesion, connection and performance.