After 10 years of resisting Married at First Sight Australia, I have succumbed to the "social experiment." It's where Aussie singles tie the knot with partners selected for them by relationship experts, meeting for the first time on their wedding day.
Okay - I'll be honest. By succumbed, I mean fallen for the show hook, line and sinker.
I'm obsessed.
Couples aren't legally married. But they go through the motions - a scenic wedding complete with wedding reception, a luxury honeymoon and then living together in an apartment. There are regular commitment ceremonies where couples have the option to stay or leave, as well as attend dinner parties where everyone gets together (and challenge those who have acted badly during the week to be accountable for their actions).
What I particularly love is that a team of "relationship experts" watch the dinner parties and take part in the commitment ceremonies. Skilfully coaching individuals on their "toxic themes", self-sabotage and poor behaviours. Those who are open to learning about themselves and how they act in relationships, get schooled very well.
What fascinates me is how often individuals on the show talk about accountability or about feeling safe with their new partner.
Cast members who mistreat their partner or say something inappropriate are really made aware of their misdemeanours. The group comes down on them hard.
Until a contestant can admit to their mistakes, and show signs of improvement, the cast show little trust in them as being a decent human being. If they do make efforts to change, the group celebrates and accepts them with open arms. Just like any successful workplace culture.
The show is a brilliant case study on how accountability and psychological safety work together in relationships and in groups.
For some time, I have broken down how accountability and psychological safety work together to form four different team zones - including the Achievement Zone, in the workplace.
This time I want to talk about it through the lens of the stars on the show and how they build or break trust with those around them through being accountable (their own behaviours or holding others to account) and creating safety (through accepting negative feedback, admitting mistakes and being open to change or allowing themselves to feel safe).
How each individual creates or breaks safety and accountability highlights their leadership capabilities.
Let's break it down.
Jamie, account manager, aged 28 - Jamie is authentically herself. She's not afraid to laugh at her mistakes or say what she's thinking. Even though her Instagram posts would fool you into thinking she has an OnlyFans page (she doesn't), she's highly empathetic and quick to notice bad behaviours. Even at a young age, she shows a remarkable ability to call people out on inconsistent behaviours, curiously question bogus responses and hold people to a higher standard.
In her marriage, she has shown skillfuly formed a strong and trusting alliance with Dave, her husband, in the show highlighting her talent for interpersonal skills.
In my opinion, Jamie has the capacity to be a highly effective leader. She makes the environment safe for people to be themselves and holds people accountable in a non-judgemental, supportive way. Not only that she's fun and focuses people on the brighter side of life.
Both Rhi and Carina, also share similar leadership capabilities with Jamie - holding people to account and not tolerating drama. However, I don't feel I have seen enough of them to provide deeper commentary.
Jacqui, consultant, aged 29 - I've never met anyone, who calls themselves really intelligent, to be anything but intelligent. While at least Jacqui can prove her cognitive intelligence with a law degree, it's pretty clear that her emotional intelligence is frightfully low.
Jacqui's whole life credo is to win and look good doing it. No matter what she does she's the 'best.'
Whenever someone tells you they are amazing at something, you know, it's always their biggest blind spot. Typically, it's what they suck at, but their need to believe it's a strength stops them from actually working on it (or admitting it's not true).
It also means that they will spend a lot of time manipulating others (her favourite technique seems to be fake crying), lying, garnering support from others (usually men) and playing the victim card. All in the pursuit of trying to control the world around her to be seen as how she wishes to be seen.
In other words, she's fake, inauthentic and emotionally immature.
When you consider that high performance is created at the intersection of high accountability and safety in a team, these are two qualities that Jacqui tears down, not builds up.
Jacqui is not a team player. Her drive to be seen as successful means she will do anything to have a leadership position. She sees everyone as a competitor - particularly women. Her career will always be about her and what she has achieved, no matter how much work her team actually does on her behalf.
Jacqui will always struggle to work well with others, if she continues on this path. Working for herself is the best option.
Adrian, entrepreneur, 30 years old - I've met men like Adrian before in the workplace. They use their looks and their charm to get (mostly) women to forgive their poor work ethic and mistakes.
How people take feedback for their poor behaviour says a lot about them. Adrian consistently gaslighted Awhina when it came to owning up to his behaviours. Failing to not only see how much she worked on the relationship and looked after him, but what he was doing wrong.
His inability to even try to build a deep relationship with his bride points to his real desire to be made 'famous' by the show.
Adrian makes for a lazy, superficial and self-entitled employee. And a terrible leader. His inability to be accountable or create safety (even threatening it) means he's a walking big red flag. Self employment is his best option.
Billy, plasterer, 31 - Throughout the show Billy has been respectful to women, calling out the terrible things Ryan said about his wife, Jacqui, and showing empathy to his own wife, Sierah.
His ability to be vulnerable and share his childhood pain shows a remarkable ability to be authentic when building relationships. He works on building psychological safety quickly.
Even when he did stuff up and say something mildly inappropriate (about having a wife-swap), he owned it.
Billy worked hard to build psychological safety with his emotionally unavailable wife and consistently held others in the group to account for poor behaviours.
In my opinion, he makes not only a great team player, but has the capacity to be a really effective leader.
The same can also be said for Jeff and Paul, who both seem to have the emotional intelligence to cringe at negative comments towards women and call it out. They have both shown love and respect to their wives (at time of writing).
Eliot, entrepreneur, 35 - With his unrealistic high expectations and inability to look within, Eliot's lack of self-awareness is quite stunning.
If there is one thing that MAFS is teaching me is that toxic people have a list of justifications for their behaviours that they think are totally reasonable. And while I always knew they did that, what has been quite revealing to me, is when they blatantly lie about their behaviours. It's quite interesting to see someone vehemently say "No, I didn't do that", even when they know the camera crew filmed them. He believes his own lies and sadly, he's not the only one to do so on the show.
What has been most fascinating is to watch Eliot looking quite stunned, when his excuses for his poor treatment of Lauren have been totally refuted by the group. Even his new wife, Veronica, has pushed back on his poor behaviour and not tolerated his excuses.
Again, Eliot is another contestant who is appalling at creating safety and being accountable. Not a team player, nor a leader you want to follow. If you were to work with him, just follow the advice Lauren said to his second wife and "Run."
Morena, fitness instructor/DJ, 57 - Morena reminds me of some female leaders who get promoted because of their technical skill and ability to make money for the company. But everyone is scared of them - including their boss who makes excuses about firing them.
We all know Morena types who are quick to retaliate by filing a complaint or a lawsuit.
Morena is all about her. She is totally unaware of how she treats people - making out she is always the victim. While she seems to have learnt that her form of communication is aggressive, pointing a finger at anyone who disagrees with her, I can't see her less aggressive demeanour lasting long.
She certainly does not create safety and she is not accountable. Despite her age, her emotional maturity is staggeringly low. Morena would make a terrible leader.
People like Morena need an enabler to succeed - whether in marriage or in the workplace. Someone who avoids conflict and works on making them feel better, even when they treat them terribly. And that's Tony - her husband in the show.
Tony, charter captain, 53 - There's a good reason why Tony charters boats. Water is peaceful and magical. All your cares slip away when you're at sea and people problems can be be easily forgotten.
Tony is a chronic conflict avoider. While you think that would be a poor match for someone like Morena, it can actually work, provided he does everything he can to appease her.
Of course, nothing he does will ever be good enough for her.
When it comes to leadership, conflict avoiders, can be leaders, but not very good ones. Their inability to hold people to account inevitably means they create toxic cultures in their team or workplace. It means they fail to create psychological safety.
Frequently, I get called in to work with leadership teams that are low in trust. They are almost always led by a conflict avoider.
Sierah, finance advisor, 31 - I feel sorry for Sierah. Her inability to be in touch with her own feelings and her strong need for validation about her attractiveness from men lead her to making some appalling choices.
I'll be honest it's hard to know how she is in a professional sense when her whole world revolves around men finding her attractive.
Sierah finds it hard to feel safe because of her fear of being rejected. It means she misinterprets genuine acts of connection. This also means she is not building safety for others, mainly because she can't even find it within herself.
On a positive note, she can selectively admit she made bad choices, regret them and apologises. The fact that she can be accountable is a good sign. Although, until she knows herself better (and gets out of her head), she will struggle to hold others to account in an honest and understanding manner.
Awhina, Aged Care Worker, 30 - Awhina has had a rough time on MAFS with her husband, Adrian and even his extended family.
Yet, she consistently worked at holding him to account and calling out his bad behaviours. Even when he shut her down consistently, she still tried. It was refreshing to see other contestants and the relationship experts back her and not allow Adrian to smear her good name.
Awhina has the ability to be a wonderful leader. She has been consistently caring, avoided falling into a victim mindset and has been self-reflective. She has also defended herself and made it clear she needed a strong role model for her son. Through learning from her MAFS appearance she has the potential to support those who are being shutdown in a workplace and create a safe and accountable team environment.
Ryan, Project Manager, 35 - Despite Ryan working on himself and being proud of his masculinity, he is in serious denial as to who he really is. He is almost comically low in emotional intelligence and self-awareness.
To his credit, he has worked on improving his behaviours through the constant pressuring of Jacqui. But his poor behaviours are only bad to Jacqui. Even he knows he is being manipulated, but his desire to be seen as important means he has lost touch with his true self. He has also worked to create safety for Jacqui. But again, it's all one way and he hasn't created it for himself.
Ryan makes for an obedient team player who does what he is told. His poor ability to understand social cues and manage toxic people makes his leadership potential mediocre at best.
Lauren, entrepreneur, 37 - While most of Lauren's visibility on the show has been related to how poorly Eliot treated her, it still doesn't really hide the fact that Lauren isn't the easiest person to be around.
She also has unrealistically high standards, is very judgemental, emotionally aloof and has some honestly weird delineations between a woman's job and a man's job (or what really looks like the need for control).
What is commendable about Lauren is that she is unashamedly herself. Few women have that level of confidence about themselves and command respect (ironically, quite a masculine trait). Falling into a victim mindset and wailing "Oh, poor me!" is not her style.
As a business owner, she will fail to create safety with her staff with her high standards and her outdated perspective on gender roles. At this stage, we haven't seen much self-reflection on her part or openness to being accountable. In fact, we have never even seen her being kind. Her leadership capabilities only extend to having young, easily led people that she can control.
Honestly, if I'd known how much I would learn about accountability and psychological safety through watching MAFS - I would have watched it years ago!
How people establish or undermine both safety and accountability provides deep insights into their ability to nurture interpersonal relationships. Unexpectedly highlighting their leadership capabilities and leadership potential.
MAFS Australia's unique format serves as a compelling case study on trust-building and personal growth. By examining how individuals confront their behaviours and learn from their experiences, we can better understand the dynamics that foster healthy relationships, both on-screen and in our own lives (both work and personal).
Photo Credit: Nine Network