#93 [TRANSCRIPT]: How to thrive as a dual-career couple
📄Full text of the podcast episode with Jennifer Petriglieri, author of Couples That Work
This is a transcript of the podcast interview with Jennifer Petriglieri.
🎧To listen to the podcast, click here 🎧
0:01 Hello, you're listening to Why Would Anyone. This is a space where I try to figure out why we do the things we do, and how intrinsic motivation shows up in different parts of our lives. My name is Tania Rabesandratana, and today my guest is author Jennifer Petriglieri.
Jennifer Petriglieri is an associate professor of organisational behaviour at INSEAD in France, and the author of Couples That Work: How dual-career couples can thrive in love and work. I have read and reread her book; I've found it relatable and helpful and I'm excited that Jennifer took the time to discuss her research with us. She spent years studying the lives of dual-career couples, interviewing hundreds of them to identify typical patterns and traps to avoid.
In this conversation, we talk about:
how to be intentional about who we want to be, and not just what we want to do
the balance of power and control in a couple
the three big life and work transitions that dual career couples go through
and how to navigate two midlife crises at the same time.
If I had to summarise your book, Couples That Work, in two words, I think it's about being intentional.
0:48 Absolutely, yeah. Which is not the same as planning everything, right? But certainly being intentional about choices.
1:18 What you describe really well in the book is how often we fall into patterns—say one primary career, one primary caregiver, which would have been the default model several decades ago in our family with children. We don't necessarily realise we're doing it, or we're doing it for the wrong reasons. And so we stick to those patterns, those identities that don't necessarily work for us. And it's about peeling those layers off and figuring out what we want as individuals and as a couple. So how do we connect to our intrinsic motivation, when we are two people who want maybe different things in their careers?
1:59 It's a great question because I think we often get waylaid in the shiny things, right? That we should want the car and the dog and the four-bedroom house and this job or that job. But the reality is, many of us don't want all of those things. The really important thing is to get out of the thinking of what we want, and into the thinking of who we want to be, or who we want to become. What sort of person do we want to be? And what sort of couple do we want to be? And what sort of kids do we want to raise? And what kind of community might support that? What is a good life for us? Is it, you know—geography: Is it a life in the city? Or is it a life in the suburbs? Or is it a life in the country? That answers different things to different people. Is it a life super connected to our extended family? Or is it a little bit more of a nuclear family life? Is it a life when we're very embedded in our community? And I think when we start answering these questions, a lot of the questions around the things slot into place.
3:06 So you're saying it's about identity, rather than about action?
3:10 I think initially to connect to that motivation, it's really about thinking about the big picture, which is identity. Now, sometimes people can think, Oh, how do I go about that? It seems really big. And a nice way of thinking about it is, I'm thinking of a five-year time horizon. Five years is enough time that realistically, you could make a significant transition, but it's not so far that you can't project yourself into the future. If I project myself five years forward, what is going to make for a good life for me, or for us, most importantly, for a couple? And I think if we can start to answer those big questions, and it might even be feelings—I want to feel more at one with myself; it's really important for me to destress—it might be even at the feelings level. But this is really the starting point. And from there, we can then build up into the decisions themselves or the things or the choices.
4:08 You write: "Without forethought, identity implications only become apparent a few years after you have made your choices. Many people I interviewed for this book described waking up one morning with a sudden realisation that they were living a life that they had never anticipated and had become a person they didn't want to be—that their decisions had made them instead of them making decisions." Was this something fairly universal? Because we have an image that some people are really driven, and they have a clear plan.
4:35 I think there's a mistake to equate it with how planful we are in life, because the question is: whose plan is it? And very often it's not ours. Very often we'll come across, let's take the classic late 20-year-old who seems very driven and they know what they want. And you wind back or where did you get these ideas from? Well, when I was graduating the trendy thing aim was to go into tech, so I went into tech. And my parents got married [in their] late 20s so I'm definitely getting married [in my] late 20s. So they look very planful, very directional, but it's not their direction. And so I don't think having a plan saves you! I think it's about: are you the author of your plan? Regardless of how tight that plan is, or how kind of loose and free it is, the question is, is it your plan or is it someone else's plan? And I certainly think in the first half of life, for many of us—myself included—the first stab at a plan was not my plan, it was influenced by my parents, my peers, society. And it takes a little while to get off that plan and realise that's not quite my plan, my plan is something else.
5:47 There's another important notion in your book, that's the balance of power and control. You mention that people can be really good in dual careers at making colour-coded calendars and sorting out all the logistics. But we don't really think about the balance of power and control within the couple. And that was a really eye-opening sentence for me; there's often a lot of resentment that can build up. So how do we make that balance of power really apparent, really clear? Because sometimes it's not going to be fair.
6:19 I think we can get waylaid with this idea of fairness, as if all the time week on week, it's got to be shared equally, which is not what I think of as fairness. When I think of fairness, I think: Do we both have the same share of voice? Does what matters to me and what matters to you, is that equally respected and equally acted upon? Now, that does not mean that you are going to do 50% of the washing up, and I will do 50% at the other side, but it's thinking back to that big picture. Do I have power to say, "this is what I need, this is what I want." And I know not always gonna get it. But at least I'm going to feel that you're respecting that and we are trying to work in that direction.
7:03 And I think this is the piece we often miss in that, I always say: if you're arguing about who's buying the milk, it's never about the milk. It's never about the division of time. It's about: Well hang on a minute, how come your time is more valued than my time? Or how come you get to choose? What this says about who's in control, who gets respected, whose voice is heard, is really important.
7:18 You would assume that 50/50 couples are the happiest, right? Or the most content. It's not actually the case! What is the case is the couples who are the most content are couples who are very clear about the rules of the game. Very clear about what the division of labour is, very clear around who decides in which domains, are very clear on whose career leads or follows right now—that can change over time. And it's that clarity that leads to no resentment, or very little resentment, very little fights, because we both know where we are, very little uncertainty. And as you said, it's the resentment, it's the conflict, it's the uncertainty, these are the things that really irk us in the couple.
7:31 In your research, you've identified three transitions that dual-career couples go through over time. Can you give us a brief summary of those?
8:27 When I started doing the research, I thought, "Oh, my goodness, couples all have such different challenges, how am I going to make sense of these?" And of course, the specifics we face are always different, but the patterns are really, really similar. And what I found was there are three times in particular that are very challenging for couples, and they sort of map on to certain career and life stages.
8:47 The first tricky period is in the early days of our relationship, after the honeymoon period when everything was wonderful, when we're really faced with our first tough choice. And this is regardless of life stage. We might be an older couple who maybe got together later and are bringing our own children with us; we might be in our 20s getting together for the first time. But at first when we have to make a tough decision, whether it's a career decision, like you get a job across the country, do I move with you? How do we manage that? Or maybe we have a child? How do we manage all those caregiving responsibilities? Or maybe it's the choice of do we blend our families? That's a really difficult choice, and how do we manage that?
9:25 And so this first transition is really about: can we combine our previously parallel lives in a way that maintains a good balance of power and gives us both most of what we want? Of course, we are going to have to sacrifice a little bit. And it's a really rough transition because we over-focus on the practicalities. Who earns the most? Okay, you, therefore we'll clearly go with your job. Or how much time are we going to take off to care for the baby? Well, I earn this much and childcare costs this much, so this is how we're going to figure it out. Or geography: there are more opportunities in this one town, so that's where we're going to live. It looks very rational, but that's not what we're struggling with. We're really struggling about who gets to choose, how do we choose and the power. So that's the first transition.
9:25 The second transition really comes at that midlife time, when it's a natural time that we're reassessing everything. You know, when you get to my age, mid-40s, everything's up in the air. And that's a really tough time for couples. I'm engaged in my own identity transition, and you might be as well, and how do we combine those together? And how do we rethink our lives together?
10:31 And the third tough time is a little bit later. It's when if we've had children, they've flown the nest, when we're getting on in our careers, but we've still got a lot of life left. And there's often a question of legacy, right? What does all this mean? I've worked for 30 years, and what? And that can be quite a challenging time because we're really starting to rethink: what has this all been for? What's the meaning of all this? And again, what does it mean to be in our couple? Now, maybe the children have left home, now we're not parents anymore, what are we to each other?
So these are the three kinds of transitions. The specifics are very different, but that pattern is very similar, these three periods of big renegotiations in the couple.
11:13 I'd like to talk about the second transition. We maybe have some anger, resentment that builds up because—wait a minute, I've just been spending all these decades doing what my culture or my family or what my boss expected of me! And now I want some freedom or some decision power. So what's your advice for how to navigate this as a couple?
11:34 I think one thing, before we get to the navigation, is this idea that it's actually quite normal. Sometimes we can think of intrinsic motivation as if it's a North Star that's constantly guiding us. But it's really important to recognise that what motivated us when we were 20 is different from what motivates us when we're 40, and that's actually very normal. And that's a good thing! I think there's a tendency in the second transition to think: what's wrong with me? There's something wrong. And there really isn't, this is a very natural stage. And I think at this stage, more than ever, communication in the couple is important. Now, of course, to say communication is important in a couple is obvious. But what I found in my research is that many couples talk all the time, and they say nothing to each other. So can we get back to basics? And when I mean basics, it's: what do we want out of life? What's important to us? What's changed? What do we want now? That's okay, things have changed, we just need to figure it out, and understand what each other wants.
12:44 You write in the book: "For some people, this new way of being will lead to a new way of doing—a new career, a new interest, for some even a new partner. But inner change must drive the outer one, lest the latter become a dramatic way to avoid the former." That's the image we have of the typical midlife crisis, where we'll make an extravagant purchase, or we'll just kind of blow up our lives and start afresh. But we haven't really done the work that gives this any meaning.
12:52 Yeah, and I think we see this most clearly with career transitions. So often at this stage, people will make a dramatic career transition. And we've seen this with COVID: there's been an increase in people making dramatic career transitions, and it's super exciting. And for the first month, we're happy, this is the best thing I've ever done! And then suddenly, those doubts are coming back and they're the same doubts. Oh, I'm still feeling a little rudderless. What's happening? And I think it's because we've not gone back to that intrinsic motivation, we've not gone back to what's really important. And what I find interesting is, of course, it's very sexy to make a big career transition. But when people do that work, they often find the transition they need is smaller than they imagined. It's not going 180, it might just be about approaching work in a different way or changing things around the margins. Because it's fairly rare for someone to do a 180 on their intrinsic motivation, it's more of a shift of direction, as opposed to an about-turn. And that's why it's so important to do that work first, before you buy the Porsche or whatever it is, and figure out that's also not making you happy.
14:26 Again, the particular challenge when you do this as a couple is: how do we make sure that it's not someone's midlife crisis that is going to take precedence. “Oh, you want to make this dramatic change! Yes, we're going to go all in on your business venture.” And then again, that control lies in the hands of one part of the couple and the other one can get really resentful.
14:32 Absolutely. And this is why it's really important to lead with the inner change because it's often those new knee-jerk decisions that then the other partner supports. And then the person who made the knee-jerk decision is feeling awfully guilty. And I guess my main thing here is: go slow. Even if you're unhappy, there's no urgent rush to suddenly click change that. Just giving yourself the time, can we give ourselves permission to say, You know what? For the next year, we're going to keep talking, but we're going to promise we're not making any decisions. And I think that's a really healthy thing to do. Even if we're super tempted, we're going to say, Okay, not until this time next year do either of us jump. And I think you're much more likely to make a mindful transition that takes both partners with you.
15:43 But I think the midlife crisis is a time of urgency when you suddenly realise death is coming, we’re all going to die soon!
15:50 Absolutely. I think at this age, we are very confronted with death. Often that comes in the form of the death of our parents. This is a typical age where our parents are either ailing, facing death, or they're unfortunately passing away. And it's usually a time when we probably lose one or two friends. This tends to be the start of those early deaths. And I think the danger with that death anxiety is two things: either we act too quickly, or it freezes us. It's too much to face. But actually, when you look at the research on this, it is really, really helpful to consider death, not in a morbid way, but to recognise that actually, life is finite and I need to make some choices before there's not enough time left.
16:43 Just not tomorrow.
16:45 Just not tomorrow!
16:48 The remedy to all of these challenges, in a nutshell, is to talk to each other, but for real. What's your advice on how to have those conversations, what traps to avoid?
16:58 I would say it is talking to each other about specific things. And also having some kind of couple memory around those conversations; some couples write it down or whatever, it doesn't need to be written down. But I think having some sort of stake in the ground. I would say I think the first thing is, don't go nuclear. Don't think, okay, we need to sit down tonight! And we need to agree on everything and talk about everything! It's just not going to happen. I think it's about a series of conversations as opposed to a conversation. And I think it's the idea of weaving the idea of meaningful conversations into the fabric of your relationship. So rather than this "oh my goodness, it's the first Monday of the month, we need to have one of those conversations", it's just being a part of the conversations you have. So you talk about the weather and you also talk about how work is going, and you also talk about the life direction, or you also talk about the boundaries with your extended family. So I think part of it is demystifying this and making it less of a special thing. And more of just, this is a normal thing to talk about. And I would say that's true with your friends as well. So the more we normalise this in our friends’ group, with our parents or siblings, the more that kind of works.
18:17 And I would also say if you've never had these conversations, it's about starting small. So what does that look like? The easiest way to start is really this intrinsic motivation conversation. Can I understand what you want, what a good life looks like for you? And can I really appreciate that? Another great thing about that conversation is we don't need to agree on anything. We are simply building an understanding. And I think we often get into the trap of assuming what our partner wants. And I imagine if many people had that conversation this evening, they would be quite surprised by what their partner said. And I think it can be quite shocking. I never realised that was so important to you! Or I hadn't realised [that] doing this thing in the next five years was really top of mind. And I think from there, it's talking about the boundaries. How do we support each other to get this? How do we keep the balance? It's all those conversations, which are a little bit more negotiation. But I think the bottom line is, Do I understand what makes you tick, and where you want to go? And if I understand that, a lot of things fall into place.
19:29 Thank you to Jennifer Petriglieri and to you for listening to our conversation. If you'd like to find out more about her work and her book, Couples That Work, go to her website www.jpetriglieri.com
19:48 This was the third episode of the Why Would Anyone podcast with me, Tania Rabesandratana. For the complete show notes, go to my newsletter about intrinsic motivation, tania.substack.com and subscribe to get the next articles and episodes straight into your inbox.
20:08 Finally, I want to let you know I am the recipient of the attuned writer fellowship. Attuned is a psychology- and AI-powered platform that tracks and measures intrinsic motivation to boost employee engagement, drive performance, and make work more meaningful. Found out more and sign up for a free demo at www.attuned.ai. Thank you, and till soon!
