Introduction
Relationship Café may be regarded as a community that provides education services and relationship assessment. Its fundamental objective consists in helping people to improve their relationships in a friendly and caring environment. Relationship Café aims to use an eclectic approach on the basis of scientific researches in order to connect people together in a positive way. According to the organization, relationships include not only romance and dating but family and workplace as well. People are not born with natural abilities to navigate any kind of relationships in a positive and healthy manner. However, they may subsequently learn the communication skills necessary for the maintenance of an appropriate and healthy relational lifestyle. Relationship Café is occupied with the enhancement of relationships between couples, unmarried partners, parents and their children, and step-parents and their step-children. It addresses both parenting and couple’s needs and focuses on the strengthening of family bonds.
Supportive Resources
It goes without saying that the activities of Relationship Café require specific supportive resources with practices that may be applied to relationship improvement between people. Potential resources that may have a highly positive impact on Relationship Café include:
- National Parenting Education Network (NPEN);
- Nurturing Parenting Program;
- Parent to Parent Program Miami;
- Children’s Trust;
- 1-2-3 Magic;
- Adventure in Intimacy;
- Miami Couples Center.
All programs share the same vision with Relationship Café, and they are dedicated to the establishment of healthy nurturing and interpersonal relationships. They are responsible for the education and support of people with interpersonal or parenting difficulties regardless of their age, gender, socioeconomic status, nationality, and religious beliefs. The NPEN may be immeasurably beneficial for individuals who aim to help parents as it provides a substantial number of opportunities for professional development in the sphere of parenting education. The Nurturing Parenting Program and the 1-2-3 Magic use a well-elaborated parenting disciplinary approach to strengthen family bonds and help parents and children who have crucial behavioral and communication problems between each other. The Parent to Parent Program Miami helps parents who have children with various disabilities. This resource is highly essential as a crucial number of parents cannot maintain healthy relationships with their children if they have mental or physical disorders. The Adventure in Intimacy and the Miami Couples Center aim to help couples to strengthen their relationships as well. All programs use such practices as online and face-to-face courses, therapies, information distribution, and intensive sessions.
Community’s Appropriate and Inappropriate Practices
Relationship Café provides help for individuals, couples, and families through targeted education classes, individual meetings, assessment and counseling services, and webinars that gather people from all over the world. They are dedicated to the establishment of self-balance, strong family bonds, and couples’ mutual understanding, the emotional support of adolescents, and the negotiation of grief. It goes without saying that the Relationship Café’s practices provide positive outcomes for people due to the cooperation, compassion, and respect of all members of the community who aims to help individuals, couples, children, and parents. In addition, the organization meets the community’s needs as it creates a comfortable atmosphere not only between help providers and clients but between people as well. In recent years, the issue of disconnection between community members that resulted in depression, stress, and anxiety had become substantively disturbing. That is why the strategy of cooperation may be regarded as beneficial for the performance of Relationship Café.
At the same time, all practices connected with confrontation are not applicable for Relationship Café as they do not meet its mission, vision, and purpose. Confrontation refers to “bringing the demands of one party to the attention of another and forcing compliance” (Homan, 2016, p. 419). This strategy does not imply support and does not contribute to the establishment of healthy family, parenting, or working relationships based on mutual respect, understanding, and trust.
Appropriate Practices of a New Organization
In general, an organization that aims to connect people, support them, and help them in the improvement of their relationships with partners, children, or parents should apply the strategies of collaboration, negotiation, and co-optation. Collaboration implies the contribution of resources by parties in order to achieve common goals (Homan, 2016). In order to provide and receive support, educate in an appropriate manner, and create a comfortable atmosphere, community members and help providers should cooperate. Educators and supporters will not be able to find appropriate words of support or elaborate on the correct algorithm of actions for people to improve their relationships without information from individuals who need help. Collaboration may be reflected in individual online and face-to-face meetings and consultations.
Conclusion
In turn, negotiation is defined as “the process of bringing parties with different interests and perspectives to an agreement” (Homan, 2016, p. 419). Negation is the main strategy that fully corresponds to the organization’s mission, and it may be reflected in group supporting activities, online systems of information distribution, and webinars. Co-optation occurs when “parties share common beliefs about matters, and when the success or failure of one party produces feelings of success or failure in the other” (Homan, 2016, p. 419). Community members who help or educate other people have a genuine desire to help them. They share the common belief that their activities are highly essential as they help to establish a healthy relational lifestyle.
Reference
Homan, M. S. (2016). Promoting community change: Making it happen in the real world (6th ed.). Cengage Learning.