Men: Are You Treating Your Partner Like an Employee? 5 Signs You Might Be
Do you wonder why you have such great relationships with the people you work with but have so much difficulty with your partner?
Do your employees respect you and laugh at all your jokes, but things at home feel tense?
Often, without realizing it, men can confuse the dynamics of employee relationships in the office with a true partnership. If you subconsciously expect your marriage to function and flow the same way a relationship at your work setting does, you're going to continue to find yourself frustrated and angry. Your partner is not your employee, and does not want to be one in your marriage.
This blog will give you 5 dimensions of employer-employee relationships that men can bring into their marriage without realizing it that result in tension and frustration for both partners, and end with 5 dimensions of healthy relationships.
5 Dimensions of Employer-Employee Relationships
Here are the 5 dimensions of employer-employee relationships. If you notice yourself, intentionally or not, trying to replicate any of these dynamics in your own marriage, there’s likely going to be friction in the relationship.
Power Imbalance and Structural Hierarchy
If you have the ability to fire, demote, reprimand, suspend, or diminish pay of someone, you have power over them. This is an inherent dynamic in employer-employee relationships. I’m not taking a stand in this article on whether that’s a good or bad thing, but it is a reality in the capitalist system we all function in.
What that power imbalance means though, is that people are not going to feel safe to show you their true, authentic self. They may laugh and smile at your jokes, or send you a happy birthday card because your happiness with them is tied to their own financial security. That’s just a reality. It may all be happening on an unconscious level, but the reality that you as an employer hold power in your hands over the employee is going to affect the dynamic of the relationship in some way.
Men will wonder why their relationships in their personal life are so much more difficult than work relationships - and the answer is that in a true partnership there is more to work through that can’t, and shouldn’t, be solved through an organizational chart. Partnerships are more complicated, messy, and confusing than employer-employee relationships, but they also at least have the possibility of being more real, honest, and authentic.
2. Delegation of Tasks Flow Primarily One Way
Often in an employer-employee relationship, tasks flow primarily one way - from the boss to the employee. Everyone knows, and agrees, that this is basically how things should work. Particularly in a role like an administrative assistant, everyone agrees that the employees role is the take tasks off of the employers plate they feel like they do not have time to do. Sometimes managers will work in a more collaboratory way with employees, and will take on some tasks that employees struggle with, but usually even in these situations, there is a dominant flow of tasks from one person to another.
When I’ve been an employee, I always knew the kinds of tasks I could ask my employer to do and were open for negotiation, and the kinds of tasks I simply could not. I could not ask my manager to clean the toilets for me, for example, that was not a task that was open for conversation in that context.
If you come to your partnership with the idea that it should function in the same way, that your partner should basically be an administrative assistant and that tasks should be delegated predominantly one way from the husband to the partner…there is going to be friction in the relationship.
3. Critical Performance Reviews
Another component that is frequent in employer-employee relationships is the performance review. The employee is evaluated for the way they are meeting the goals of the employer, or the larger organization. The agreement is that the employee’s function is to help meet the goals of someone else - the boss, the company, etc. Should the employee not meet the standards, expectations or goals of the employer, there is usually some way to let the employee know they need to adjust their actions, and to help them do so.
This dynamic can pop up in marriages and partnerships all the time. Perhaps the most stereotypical example is wives giving critical performance reviews about household domestic labor, and husbands giving critical performance reviews about the amount of physical intimacy in the relationship. Listen, these are legitimate concerns that need to be discussed and explored with mutuality, vulnerability and curiosity…but when they turn into top-down employer-employee critical performance reviews, the ‘employee’ in the conversation is likely going to feel frustrated.
4. Compliance for Fear of Repercussions
As a friend of mine used to remind me, “money clarifies roles”. People may love their work and find meaning from it - and yet at the same time, we all have bills to pay. In an employer-employee relationship, the threat, spoken or unspoken, of termination resulting in economic insecurity is a dynamic that will make most employees, even the most disgruntled, fall in line and do what the employer tells them to.
If you find yourself consciously utilizing fear tactics to get your partner to fall into line - you really need to see a therapist. Full stop.
But most of the time, men simply find themselves confused about why their relationship with their partner is so hard to navigate compared to their work relationships. The truth is that in work settings the fear of repercussions on the part of employees influences their behavior. In a true partnership, without that fear of repercussions, partners feel free to express their disapproval in a way that lots of men who are employers are not used to dealing with, and don’t always have the tools to navigate well.
5. Lack of Honesty for Fear of Repercussions
Again, the power that the employer holds over the employee in the form of wages present and future means that the employee is not going to be completely honest with the employer. It’s just not in their best interest to do so.
Bosses will tell themselves, “oh, but I’m a good manager, my employee’s love me”. You may be a great person and a considerate employer, and, the power differential in the relationship is always at play and always affecting the relationship. It just is.
This lack of honesty can often confuse managers into thinking that there is something off about their partner at home, because ‘everyone else’ seems to get along with them at work…when the reality is just that people are modifying themselves because they fear the repercussions of being truly honest in your presence.
5 Dimensions of a Healthy Marriage/Relationship
So, what does a healthy marriage/relationship/partnership look like?
Here are 5 signs:
True Partnership and Equality
In a healthy relationship, instead of a power imbalance like the employer-employee relationship, both people view themselves as equals in a true partnership. It’s from that place of true partnership that all those decisions about who does what and how we treat each other get worked out. If you don’t sense that you are and should be in an equal partnership on some level…even if you don’t explicitly state it, your partner will feel the difference.
2. Shared Responsibilities and Teamwork
In a true partnership, therefore, tasks aren’t delegated exclusively from one member to the other. Partnerships work together to figure out what works best for the benefit of all the members in the family/relationship.
Now, it may be the case that different areas of life together are delegated to one person (for example, general car maintenance is an area that I have responsibility over in my relationship)...but my wife and I came to that decision together, and continue to check in about how that’s going. (And, by the way, I don’t want this brief example to make it seem like my wife and I have it totally figured out…we don’t…but we’re working on it and thankful for the progress that we have made over the past 15 years together).
3. Shared Expectations and Dialogue
Instead of the employer setting the expectations and values and giving criticism when the employee does not meet those standards, a healthy relationship involves the shared creation of values and expectations, and constant shared dialogue about what is happening within each partner.
Being in a marriage or serious relationship with another person is often a strange kind of cultural exchange program. One partner spends money freely and lives care-free, while the other saves every penny. There is a clash of expectations and values. In an office setting these differences are easy to solve by positional hierarchy…the boss, executive, ceo, shift manager etc. has the final call.
A true partnership demands much more work and dialogue to work through these differences. Neither person is right or wrong, good or bad, just different. Understanding each partner’s history, and the fears and hopes that are driving those differences can go a long way to helping you both remember you’re on the same team. You can see each other as full complex humans, which you can connect with.
4. Emotional Safety and Security
While jobs with a paycheck create a certain kind of economic leverage over their employees to get the behavior they desire, in a true partnership the goal is truly shared safety and security.
What a difference to know your partner desires to be with you because they feel safe and secure with you beside them in the world, not because they need a paycheck. You can both work to create that sort of safety, security and support for one another.
5. Honesty, Vulnerability, and Intimacy
A true partnership involves trust. Trust is gained when honesty and vulnerability is handled with safety, care, and thoughtfulness. Both partners in any relationship bring with them all kinds of wounds, hurts, trauma, baggage…whatever you want to call it, and sometimes because of this we can end up sending messages to our partners that it is not safe to be their full selves in their relationship with us. I’ll also name that the parts of ourselves that we struggle to have compassion with are parts that we will have difficulty embracing in our partner.
This is why individual, as well as couples counseling often plays an important dynamic in helping a relationship grow and thrive. As you understand and have compassion for yourself on a deeper level - you’ll be able to offer that trust and security for your partner in a whole new way.
But here’s the sad news: too many men continue to struggle in their relationships and do nothing about it. Marriage experts estimate that couples are unhappy for six years before actually getting counseling.
You do not have to continue to suffer. Get help, today.
Wishing you the best on your mental health journey.
Hi, I’m Travis.
My clients describe me as calm, compassionate, and curious…
You have these qualities inside you at your core too. You just need a little help uncovering them.
If you’re dominated by anger, anxiety, shame, or self-criticism, we can help you re-connect with who you really are: confident, calm, courageous, compassionate, and connected to yourself and others.
Travis Jeffords - LCMHCA MDiv. | Male Counselor
In-person counselor: Greensboro & Winston-Salem
Virtual counselor: North Carolina
Licensed Counselor
