Article published in Business Success

How to deal with conflict

By Christina Osborne, Chief Executive of Business Solutions

When two people have a different opinion and both think they are right - you have the potential for conflict. People in conflict stop listening to each other. The only words that are heard are those that reinforce the mindset that the other person is being deliberately antagonistic and difficult. The will to build a relationship or use skills like empathy disappears. Trust is broken. Any interaction between the two people quickly declines into a spiral of attack and counter-attack.

In the past, awe of your position and your power as their employer might have prevented staff from raising disagreement with you. People today have no such automatic respect for status - as Managers we have to earn the respect of our team and know how to deal with potential conflict.

Causes of Conflict
Assess your Options
Avoiding Conflict
Managing Conflict

Causes of Conflict

Conflict in a work situation often arises when one person wants to introduce change that will affect another individual. Some people can tolerate frequent change whereas, for others, any change is a disruption to their life that they will resist. The proposed change itself may not always be the problem - how you introduce change into the workplace can make a big difference to how acceptable it will be.

Most people who resist change consider that concern for self is the most important thing. To minimise the likelihood of conflict, before you introduce change, answer the WIFM question (What's in it for me?) from your employee's perspective. The answers you come up with will enable you to present the benefits of change to help overcome their resistant or sceptical attitude. Outline the reasons for change to reduce the potential for misunderstanding and emphasise what will remain unchanged while change is happening in other areas.

Conflict can also arise if people are unclear about what is expected of them or if instructions are given with no opportunity to ask questions or receive training on any aspects about which the person is unsure. Always advise people what they have to do - in terms of standards or objectives for their job. Allow people time to process new information and to discuss how confident they feel about accomplishing new tasks. Back to Top

Assess your Options

If your are experiencing conflict with one particular employee, you need to understand the problem before you can assess how to deal with the conflict. Define why you think the problem is happening and look at any recurring patterns if it has happened before. Approach the problem with an open mind and see it from as many perspectives as you can - including that of your difficult employee. Brainstorm possible solutions with yourself - perhaps on a post-it note - and capture any ideas, however impractical, for solving the problem. Once you have listed a number of options, you can decide on the best solution. Before you make your decision, define the objectives that the best solution should achieve. Look at each possible solution and give a score out of 10 against the ideal until it is clear which option meets the most objectives.

Avoiding Conflict

Prevention, through good practice on how you introduce change and give people responsibilities, is the best option. In a conflict situation, avoidance tactics may work once or twice in the short-term but are usually not a successful long-term strategy. The first option you have is to walk away from conflict. If the other person is shouting at you or is too upset or angry to listen, then sometimes giving 'time out' is the best option. This gives an opportunity for emotions to subside and you time to think about the problem objectively. Make it clear this is only a temporary postponement and make an appointment to meet again.

If everyone else in your team is co-operative and works well together, it is tempting to work round the difficult person. This second option could, however, reward the individual for their difficult behaviour. If you keep asking others to do things in a hurry rather than face conflict with this individual, you are setting a precedent that gives an easier life to the least deserving team member. This will have an impact on the motivation of the rest of the team who are taking their fair share of responsibilities.

Pretending not to notice signs of conflict is the third option and can be done by withdrawing eye contact to indicate your disapproval. Sometimes this is enough to signal that the behaviour is unacceptable and needs to change. In some cases, looking the other way can make someone more difficult as a way of regaining your attention. If conflict continues, you have to tackle it.

Take a positive approach by acting as if you expect even the most difficult people to co-operate. Prepare to overcome any objections and reduce opportunities for interpersonal conflict. Agree objectives and standards and encourage people to write them down in their own words so that it is clear they have understood and agreed.

Managing Conflict

As the manager in a conflict situation, you may need to contribute more than 50/50 towards positive communication between the two of you. When you describe the objectives that need to be achieved, are you stating these in positive terms rather than negative ones? For example, rather than saying Don't send copy documents to everyone in the office, change it to the positive: Just send John Smith a copy of the monthly spreadsheet and Jenny Jones the project list.

Check your own body language to make sure you are not provoking conflict through non-verbal communication. Are you maintaining eye contact and really listening to what the other person has to say? You need to have patience and persistence when dealing with conflict and some techniques to try until you discover what works with a particular person.

The simplest way to manage conflict is to ask a question that requires thought to answer. Ask someone who seems to be disagreeing with you or who cannot see any other way to approach a problem: What are the advantages and disadvantages of your suggestion? As the individual tells you their thoughts, it is possible that pitfalls, which had not been thought of before, will become apparent. If they cannot see any pitfalls, probe to bring out any conflict by asking open questions that begin with What……..? What if………… to help them think the situation through.

If people feel cornered, this can bring about a conflict situation. Leave the individual an escape route by giving at least two options - leaving an element of choice between two solutions you could live with provides a way for the person to 'save face'.

Defining ground rules or limits within which you agree to work with members of your team can be a first step to avoiding potential conflict. It is often easier to begin with an agreement on ground rules than it is to achieve agreement on the problem between you. The first rule to focus two individuals on coming to a solution is to set a time limit for the discussion. Other useful rules including listening to each other, looking at the benefits of each other's proposals rather than reasons why they will not work or taking turns to speak.

Following the same principles, if conflict arises between different functions in a company, service standards or performance levels that teams can expect from each other could be noted in a brief service level agreement.

In a conflict situation, both people involved will be unable to move forward together until there is an admission that a problem exists. If the difficult person cannot see that there are issues between you, you need to give feedback on the effects you observe and ask questions until they can. It is unlikely that your team member will make a commitment to solving the problem until he or she can see the impact it is having on the team, on the organisation or on customers. Advise your employee of the impact and use open questions (beginning mainly with What? or How?) to explore what caused the problem and who else might be involved. Come up with ideas to solve the problem together and ask the individual to summarise the solutions you have agreed with them.

The best way to deal with conflict is to explore honestly, with the other person involved, what the issues are from both perspectives. Once you have both agreed there is a problem, you can discuss ways to solve the disagreement. The important thing is to keep listening to each other and to ask questions until you fully understand the cause of the conflict. After dealing with a conflict situation, ask yourself how well you did:

Did you listen?
Did the questions you used begin with What? to open up the conversation rather than Did? Have? which close down a conversation?
Did you remain calm and focused on facts?
Did you achieve an action plan?
Did you ask your team member to summarise agreed actions?
Have you arranged a future session to review progress?

If you answered Yes to each question on this checklist, you will find yourself better able to deal with most conflict situations at work.

Christina Osborne is author of management books published worldwide by Dorling Kindersley and has started up a network for Directors in the Institute of Directors West Thames region.

You can buy her books, also translated into other languages, through the Business Solutions’ website, or email christinaosborne@bsol.co.uk