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Article

The Relational Consultant

Pages 318-329
Published online: 28 Dec 2017
 
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The rise of relational transactional analysis in conjunction with a reconnection of transactional analysis with its psychoanalytic roots raises the question of the importance of these developments for organizational consultants in transactional analysis. This article explores what psychoanalysis and group relations offer to organizational consultants. The focus is on three core aspects of psychoanalysis: its perspective, the value of the object relations approach, and the understanding of the role of the unconscious. From there three contributions of psychoanalysis to consulting in organizations are elaborated and integrated in a relational approach to consulting. The key is the understanding of the role of the consultant as the “signifier of transformation” (Bollas, 1987, p. 14), who, while working with a client-organization, supports the organization in integrating its ways of relating into its way of being.

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Servaas van Beekum

Servaas van Beekum, drs., is a social scientist with a background in analytic, humanistic, and systemic modalities. He is a Teaching and Supervising Transactional Analyst, a psychotherapist (Pacfa reg), a supervisor, and an executive coach (EAS/ASCCANZ reg.) as well as a consultant to organizations. He is the past president of EATA and the ITAA and works globally as a guest trainer and supervisor. He is a cofounder of Group Relations Nederland (1992) and Group Relations Australia (2005), associations that study unconscious group process in organizations. He currently lives in Sydney, where he runs a private practice as a psychotherapist, coach, and supervisor. He can be reached at 158 Wellington Street, Bondi/Sydney 2026, NSW, Australia; e-mail: .