The AERIS Model

Managing one-on-one relationships at work is often complex and tricky. You have a higher chance of having better relationships at work if you have a nuanced and holistic understanding of the person and what they’re going through. This is where the AERIS model shines.

What is the AERIS model?

The AERIS model is a model to think about managing one-on-one relationships with stakeholders, especially ones that you interact with regularly. It is designed to provide a comprehensive understanding of your stakeholders, enabling you to build stronger relationships. It encompasses three key perspectives:

• Ask Explicitly (AE): Things you should explicitly ask them instead of determining yourself.
• Reflect Internally (RI): Things which you should reflect internally instead of explicitly asking them.
• Synthesize (S): Things where you do both (ask them explicitly + reflect internally) and then synthesize that knowledge for insights.

Ask Explicitly

There are some things in a relationship, especially a work relationship, where it’s better to simply ask the other person explicitly. The aim is to purely get their perspective, without mixing it with your own. This involves asking specific questions, such as:

• How are they doing?
• What’s going on in their life outside of work?
• What are their career goals?
• How are they finding the new job onboarding?

The goal here is to explicitly get their thoughts and feelings. There is not much point to make assumptions about these things on your own. The answer to such questions exclusively needs to come only from them. The goal is to truly and actively listen to them and their thoughts.

By seeking explicit input from them, you gain valuable context for their decisions and actions. Context is very important to place what they feel, what decisions they have made, and what they are planning to do next.

It also helps to remove yourself from these questions and exclusively listen to their perspective. It helps build empathy and understanding for their perspectives.

The goal is to truly listen to them, without mixing your thoughts or judgements here. In that aspect, it shares with the nonviolent communication approach of observation without evaluation/judgement.

Reflect Internally

This is on the opposite end of the spectrum from the “Ask Explicitly” category. Here you ponder questions that may not yield useful responses if asked directly. These are inquiries you should contemplate on your own, based on observations and insights from interactions with the stakeholder. Some examples of these include:

• How’s their morale?
• Do they need to be challenged on something?
• How are others finding working with them?

Let’s take the third question: How are others finding working with them. If you ask a person explicitly about how others are finding working with them, most will give you some versions of “mostly fine”. It’s rare to find someone admit that they are a nightmare to work with.

Instead of asking them head-on, it would be better to reflect upon it yourself, based on your recent interactions with them, and any feedback from their peers. Doing this reflection requires a bit of time to think about it and usually it’s good to log it down somewhere so that you can keep track of thoughts you have in your head.

Most of these questions involve intentional observation. You observe them at work and the effects of their behavior on others. Based on those observations, you reflect on them. Reflecting internally allows you to delve into these subtler aspects of the relationship, leveraging your observations to better understand the stakeholder's dynamics.

Synthesize

This category of things to think about are in the middle of the spectrum. A majority of things would fall in this category. These are things where you ask the person their thoughts, but also reflect upon it yourself and then synthesize all of it to come up with insights. This synthesis helps unearth deeper insights by leveraging the strengths of both the previous approaches.

Some examples of these include:

• What are their goals?
• What have they accomplished lately?
• How can you help them?

Let’s take an example - the question about how to help them. It would be useful to ask explicitly their opinion of how you could help them. If you reflect upon it, you might uncover an insight allowing you to help your stakeholder in a better way that they never thought of. For example, a person might ask their manager for approval to a particular workshop to address a certain skill. Upon reflecting upon it based on what the employee said, they might think of a more relevant workshop to attend, or a good book to read on the topic, or connect them to another person in the company who has worked on a similar area.

In this way, you could help them in a much better way - but it required getting to know their thoughts, and then synthesizing that with your knowledge and experience.

What kind of relationships does the AERIS model work best with?

The AERIS model shines brightest in one-on-one relationships at work, whether it's managing up with your boss, managing down with your direct reports, or managing across with your peers. Its power lies in unraveling the complexity of these interpersonal connections, leading to more productive and intentional one-on-one meetings.

It's important to note that the AERIS model may not be the ideal fit for 1-to-many relationships, such as dealing with an entire team as a whole. In such cases, alternative models may be more appropriate.

Also, it’s important to think of yourself as your most important stakeholder. Too many people are so busy thinking about others that they forget to intentionally think about themselves properly. Voohy provides another model to think about that.

What's the best way to use the AERIS model?

The best way to use the AERIS model is with Voohy. You can add notebooks for your stakeholders and get a pre-populated list of AERIS-inspired questions to explore. It highlights when it’s time to think about them, and you can keep track of your thoughts over time. Keeping track of your thoughts over time will lead to stronger relationships and more fruitful interactions at work..

You can also just use traditional pen and paper. The key thing would be to think about what prompts you would like to think about in each category and keep track of your thoughts over time.

Give it a Try

The AERIS model is your secret weapon for nurturing and enhancing one-on-one relationships at work. By employing the power of asking explicitly, reflecting internally, and synthesizing insights, you'll gain a deeper understanding of your stakeholders, ultimately leading to more meaningful and impactful connections at work.