7 Principles That Make Strategic Relationships Work

I recently benchmarked relationship experts and came across a book entitled The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work by John M. Gottman. As I read the principles described in this book, I began to see undeniable parallels between the principles that make marital relationships and strategic partnerships work.

I will share those parallels in hopes that it might serve a two-fold purpose:

1. To potentially enhance your personal relationships.
2. To give you insights into how to strengthen your strategic business relationships.

Principle #1: Enhance Your Love Maps. Gottman’s in-depth research on successful marriages found that knowledge of each other is a strength and a primary indicator of a strong marriage.

In his research, the more a couple knew about each other’s likes and dislikes, the more successful their marriage was. This includes intentionality around new learnings and staying in touch with each other over time. Appealing to the likes and preferences of the partner strengthened the marriage.

This principle is highly relevant in 3PL/shipper relationships starting in the courting phase. It might be more appropriate to call it Enhance Your Relationship Practices. When both parties conduct adequate diligence in getting to know each other with an eye for attributes that matter to them, the more they set the relationship up for success.

Given the nature of these relationships, both sides are responsible for ensuring this desire to know more never dies. The 3PL especially holds the responsibility to create systems and practices to ensure knowledge of their strategic customer’s organization and their end customers.

Principle #2: Nurturing Your Fondness and Admiration. Gottman’s work unearthed the fact that couples who intentionally and genuinely pay attention and nurture areas of fondness and admiration for each other, stay together and their marriages do well.

I might call this principle Nurture the Positive Relationship Attributes. In other words, they had to remember why they liked each other and consider those traits worthy of honor and respect.

If shippers and 3PLs have done a good job with the first principle and they know each other and why there is mutual value, it helps them get through the stormy phases of the relationship.

This principle needs to be visited especially when things aren’t going well in a relationship but mastered as a normal practice as people change in both organizations.

There should be a relationship system in place, and both parties should spend time in business reviews, one-on-one sessions, and strategic meetings nurturing the positive performance factors and recognizing team excellence.

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When shippers and 3PLs know each other and why
there is mutual value, it helps them get through
the stormy phases of the relationship.

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Principle #3: Turn Toward Each Other Instead of Away. This principle is all about making connections with your partner; specifically, listening to your partner’s bid for a connection and responding with positive affirmations. Gottman found this to be very meaningful to the health of a relationship to the point of building a bank account.

Likewise, in strategic partnerships, when both parties listen and therefore turn toward rather than away from the partner, the relationship becomes healthier.

A good example is when a shipper talks about continuous improvement focus or major issues the 3PL can assist with, or when a 3PL is transparent about the economics of their relationship when scope changes occur.

Rather than turning away and risking significant disconnects, each party should become good listeners and lean into the other’s bid for connections.

Principle #4: Let Your Partner Influence You. As you might expect, men are not as likely to allow wives to influence their thinking on particular topics. In cases when men allowed their wives to influence them on key decisions, the healthier the marriage became, Gottman found.

This principle has real application when considering shipper/3PL relationships. The shipper typically takes the more dominant role and is therefore less likely to allow the 3PL to influence them. Greater success lies in allowing the 3PL to influence the direction of the partnership.

In other words, learning from each other sets up the relationship to flourish and both parties work toward mutual success.

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Both shippers and 3PLs should spend time in business reviews,
one-on-one sessions, and strategic meetings to nurture positive
performance factors and recognize team excellence.

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Principle #5: Solve Your Solvable Problems. Gottman’s therapeutic suggestion as it relates to solving solvable problems is to treat your spouse with the same respect you offer to guests. We can all relate to how we treat respected outsiders compared to how we respond to our spouse in certain moments.

Gottman shares the following five steps for resolving conflict in a loving relationship:

1. Soften your start-up.
2. Learn to make and receive repair attempts.
3. Soothe yourself and each other.
4. Compromise.
5. Process any grievances so that they don’t linger.

Each one of these steps deserves a more detailed explanation, but when considering strategic shipper/3PL relationships this one requires humility. Egos should be locked up in a room, or better still, flushed down the toilet, never to rise again. There can be significant cost to organizations when parties are unable to solve solvable problems.

Principle #6: Overcome Gridlock. Gottman declares that you can avoid gridlock by becoming highly competent with the other six principles.

While he lays out four symptoms to help you recognize gridlock, most involve being out of touch with your partner’s dreams and aspirations. When partners are out of touch with each other’s dreams and aspirations, unintentional disrespect can occur in the relationship.

In 3PL/shipper relationships, this might manifest itself in a lack of knowledge of both parties’ strategic direction and thus create gridlock in the engagement. This kind of misalignment can be avoided by deploying relationship systems to facilitate alignment.

Principle #7: Action to Create Shared Meaning. The relationship expert breaks down shared meaning into four pillars:

1. Rituals of connection
2. Support of each other’s roles
3. Shared goals
4. Shared values and symbols

These are fairly straightforward for creating shared meaning in a marriage. For a shipper/3PL relationship, creating shared meaning might be more like leveraging cultural synergies; specifically, to call out similar values and culture points as well as common goals that create synergy in the partnership.

When priority is placed on leveraging the factors that make you strong together, each partners’ objectives can be realized.

Given how supply chains are evolving and the ripple effect when there are hiccups, the importance of the strength of strategic partnerships cannot be overstated. Gottman’s research is distinguished by his time interviewing and working with couples over years of counseling. He could predict divorce early on in marital relationships based on couples’ ability or inability to embrace these principles. What he has given us is a roadmap to challenge ourselves to approach our relationships with proven methods to flourish.

While times of disruption and uncertainty may occur, we have a playbook to optimize strategic relationships, therefore strengthening supply chains and perhaps creating more honeymoon moments.