CONFLICT MANAGEMENT

What is Conflict?

Conflicts are inevitable and inherent in all interdependent relationships. Where two or three are gathered for a venture, or are in an on-going interdependent relationship, conflict is inevitable. Conflicts usually reflect the diversity and complexity of human societies and are not necessarily a dysfunctional experience. Misunderstanding over roles and responsibilities, values, motivations, ethics, ego, positions, religion, attitudes, nature, personality types, customer needs feedback etc. fuel and nurture conflicts.

Collins Concise Dictionary (1988) defines conflict as a struggle between opposing forces, battle…opposition between ideas, interest, etc., controversy between two simultaneous but incompatible wishes or drives, sometimes leading to tension. To Rahim (1992), conflict is opposition from disagreements about goals, thoughts, or emotions within or among individuals, teams, departments, or organizations.

The aged, long-term approach, method or system put in place to manage conflicts in particular reference to work environment is referred to as workplace conflict management. This could be structural or purely individual but usually centered on ensuring that conflict do not disrupts productivity, morale and interdependent relationships for the good of the workplace or the organization.

Conflict Sides

Every argument has an opposing side that is worth understanding or has its own valid reasoning. Conflicts can be resolved if opposing positions and interests are clearly understood and respected without necessarily favoring or agreeing with either one. Conflict can lead to better decisions and be a way of exploring an issue from every possible angle, laying out all options on the table. However, where divergent viewpoints are not encouraged to be expressed and openly discussed/evaluated before decision making, failure becomes the consequence of conflict. In the final analysis, conflict is not always negative. The reason for ineffective outcomes and failure is probably because the positives of conflicts are not advantageously utilized.

Negatives of Conflicts

When we are in conflict, we all say things we do not mean and mean things we do not say. Rarely do we communicate at a deep level what we really, honestly feel. Conflicts have the capacity to confuse and hypnotize us such that we come to believe that there is no way out other than battle.

Conflict possesses a dark, hypnotic, destructive power of attachment when it is time to leave; demonization when it is time to forgive; and articulate speech when it is time to be silent or to listen. Conflict strokes and crushes our egos, fuels and exhausts our will, energizes us and freezes us in fear, speaking deep to the ancient part of our souls that thirsts for power and delights in revenge.

In conflicts, efforts at honesty have been interpreted as an attack and empathy as weakness. We have all experienced times in our lives when we lacked the skills needed to communicate honestly and empathetically with others. We have not known how to temper our anger with compassion, listen to the other person’s pain, discover what caused the other person to act as they did, take responsibility for our own miscommunication and conflicts. As a result, we have felt trapped in our conflicts, believing that there was no exit.

We describe conflicts in terms of injustice, unfairness, harassment, aggression, dishonesty, evil, rejection and inequality as opposed to being about petty incidents. We are seduced by the apparent importance of our conflicts and hypnotized by the adversarial process feeling cleansed when we transform our narrow, petty concerns into strong feelings.

Positive Side of Conflicts.

Honest differences are often healthy sign of progress. Conflict can either be positive or negative – positive, if it leads to change and development; negative, if it leads to chaos and destruction. It is possible to change our perception of conflict from negative to positive i.e., destructive to developmental. Conflict energy can therefore be channeled into possible ways as an opportunity for change by focusing on the positive dimension.

Conflicts are sometimes “desirable” to –

• generate new ideas.
• test group cohesion.
• explore possibilities.
• effect necessary changes.
• break unwholesome alliances.
• provide opportunity for dialogue.
• reveal different needs and interests.
• create mutual respect and dependence.
• release tension and bottled-up feelings.
• recruit like minds and build formidable teams.
• provide emancipation from oppression and tyranny.
• identify the boundaries between the possible and the impossible.
• reveal fears and provide an opportunity to understand the other party better.

Causes of Conflicts

According to Dr. Daniel Dana in his book Managing Differences, “in every relationship, the differences that make us unique individuals are also sources of potential conflict between us. We differ in our values, self-interests, priorities and in many other ways. The greater the differences, the heavier the burden on our ability to manage those differences. The less effectively we manage differences, the more conflict we experience as a result”.

Professor of Ethnic Conflicts, Professor Eghosa E. Osaghae tells us that conflicts are propelled by factors such as struggle for scarce resources, social injustice, class antagonisms, unequal power relations, differences in values and interests and state and government partisanship. Other factors, include diminishing resources, contradictions of economic and political reforms and the emergence of a generation of frustrated and unemployed youths desperate to make ends meet in a depressed economy, exacerbated by the ventilation for suppressed demands that have been provided by democratic struggles.

There are a number of factors known to cause conflict, broadly categorized thus –

1. Task Interdependencies – In essence, the greater the extent of task interdependence among individuals or groups (that is, the more they have to work together or collaborate to accomplish a goal), the greater the likelihood of conflict because the interdependence makes avoiding the conflict more difficult. This occurs in part because high task interdependency heightens the intensity of relationships. Hence, a small disagreement can very quickly get blown up into a major issue.

• Status Inconsistencies – among the parties involved for example, managers and non-managerial personnel in an organization most often than not, affect views of organizational policies and fairness.

• Jurisdictional Ambiguities – Conflict can also emerge from situations where it is unclear exactly where responsibility for something lies.

• Communication Problems – It suffice to say that the various communication problems or ambiguities in the communication process can facilitate conflict. When one person misunderstands a message or when information is withheld, the person often responds with frustration and anger.

• Dependence on Common Resource Pool – Whenever several departments must compete for scarce resources, conflict is almost inevitable. When resources are limited, a zero-sum game exists in which someone wins and, invariably, someone loses.

• Lack of Common Performance Standards – Differences in performance criteria and reward systems provide more potential for conflict among differing groups within the same organization/environment.

• Individual Differences – A variety of individual differences, such as personal abilities, traits, and skills, can influence in no small way the nature of interpersonal relations. Individual dominance, aggressiveness, authoritarianism, and tolerance for ambiguity all seem to influence how an individual deals with potential conflict. Indeed, such characteristics may determine whether or not conflict is created at all.

Conflict Theories

Conflict theories simply put, are the philosophies underlying sociological approaches, and intentional thinking around how people understand conflict and how they can resolve it in constructive ways. Conflict theory states that tensions and conflicts arise when resources, status, and power are unevenly distributed between groups in society and that these conflicts become the engine for social change. In this context, power can be understood as control of material resources and accumulated wealth, control of politics and the institutions that make up society, and one’s social status relative to others (determined not just by class but by race, gender, sexuality, culture, and religion, among other things).

Human Needs Theory

This theory is based on the deprivation of individual’s or communities’ access to the satisfaction of their basic needs; physical, psychological, social and spiritual such as food, shelter, clothing, security, employment etc. which exacerbates conflicts. Manfred Max-Neef postulates that the inadequate satisfaction of any of the fundamental human needs generates pathology. The pathology can be described both in economic and political terms. Economically the pathology is expressed as unemployment, hyperinflation and poor quality of life. At the political level, the pathology can be expressed as fear or xenophobia, crime or violence, exile, marginalization. According to Max-Neef, at the heart of the Needs Theory, is the tension between deprivation and potential, embedding needs-based conflicts.

Relational Theory

Conflicts are caused by interaction of different individuals or groups with different cultural orientations, interests, and values. Relational needs include values, perception, scarce resources and communication. The relational theory attempts to understand ethnic or identity-based conflicts by interrogating why people resent those different from them? Sociological, it is proven that difference challenges one’s identity formation process. From perceiving oneself as the center of the world, the presence of another person or group challenges one to rethink this identity as sharing the center with another person.

Political economy underscores the tension between groups. It shows that groups who share a common resource are likely to engage in violent conflict more than groups who do not. Scrambling for limited shared resource can lead to want to eliminate, injure, or neutralize the other. Violent historical relations can perpetuate the divide and make more entrenched the dehumanization of the other. Common indicators of social divide include stereotypes and prejudice. Hence, daily interactions should be well-lubricated to minimize conflicts.

Political Theory

The state is a theatre of competition between individuals and groups who seek to eliminate or disable rivals. The Political theory Assumes the state is the sole context where various groups or individuals are competing to take advantage of others. They often believe that they will only gain access to the state when others are eliminated or disabled. Here, power is perceived to be a critical currency for the gratification of dignity, recognition, freedom etc. Conflict is then the consequence of failed or weak state, absence of regime legitimacy and poor governance. Anarchical international systems based on competing national interests are either behind violent intra/interstate conflicts or fuel the conflicts once they erupt.

Transformative Theory

Transformative Theory Assumes that conflict is caused by systemic and structural injustice and inequality expressed by competing social, cultural, economic, religious and political frameworks. As people compete within these frameworks/structures, conflicts result either as a demand for change or resistance to it. Structural factors encompass tangible or symbolic resources like traditional institutions, beliefs and practices, government institutions, laws, governance, etc. which consequently favors one group over the other, exclusive and unwelcoming new ideas of cultures.

Structures are slow to change. They are sometimes static, while demographic, environmental, economic and social changes are taking place. The tension between static institutions and structures and the dynamic change processes in people, perceptions, the environment, etc. is a source of conflict. For example, while population increases, institutions that provide social services remain the same. An agro-based society like Cote d’Ivoire in Africa may have more mouths to feed, but the soil is increasingly becoming infertile. Nearly all African countries are still producing primary goods although this economic system is irrelevant to the current system of globalization.

There are two sources of change – endogenous and exogenous. Endogenous change takes place within. It is not imposed. It is a product of the inherent regenerative capacity of the society. Endogenous change happens out of encounters. Every encounter presents opportunity for learning, for growth, for development. It will take a reflective person or society to identify the lessons that an encounter presents. When the lessons are identified and the society learns from them, new meanings are constructed from which the society forms new cultures and structures to complement the new knowledge.

Exogenous change is driven from without. It assumes that existing cultures, structures, systems and instruments in another society are flawed and must be replaced immediately with new ones that are inherently different from the ones known by the society to be changed. Exogenous change comes from an encounter with an individual or another society in which that individual or society feels obliged to impose its ways of life on the other group. Usually, the outsider is convinced that the change will be for the good of the other and is even surprised that the other is hesitant in embracing it.

Types of Conflicts.

From the forgoing subhead, at least four types of conflict can be identified:

1. Goals conflict:- which can occur when one person or group desires a different outcome than others do. This is simply a clash over whose goals are going to be pursued.
2. Cognitive conflict:- results when one person or group holds ideas or opinions that are inconsistent with those of others. This type of conflict is evident in political debates.
3. Affective conflict:- emerges when one person’s or group’s feelings or emotions (attitudes) are incompatible with those of others. Affective conflict is seen in situations where two individuals simply do not get along with each other.
4. Behavioral conflict:- exists when one person or group does something (i.e., behaves in a certain way) that is unacceptable to others. Dressing for work in a way that “offends” others and using profane language are examples of behavioral conflict.

Each of these types of conflict is usually triggered by different factors, and each can lead to very different responses by the individual or group. But the bottom line remains that nothing moves forward except through conflict. It come from challenges and must be resolved on the way to achieving their goals.

Conflict is opposition – generally either internal or external. Internal conflicts happen inside the characters mind or heart i.e., an inner turmoil causing some emotional pain or increased tension. It often involves making personal decision or choice among various options. For example, food, cloths, life career etc. External conflict on the other hand, pits the character against some exterior forces or views happening outside the characters mind. For example, inter-personal, person vs. person, person vs. nature, society, technology etc. Within the workplace, types of conflict can be categorized thus –

• Organization: inter and intra organizational conflicts
• Group: inter and intra group conflicts
• Individual: interpersonal conflicts.

Principles Conflict Resolution

Conflicts may be personal, professional or philosophical, but they are almost always rooted in communication problems that can be improved by working with skillful facilitation. Facilitation is a term that means different things to different people. In the context of conflict management, facilitation is generally considered to be a process in which a neutral person helps two or more persons, or a group work together more effectively. Facilitators may work with small groups within an organization, or with representatives of different organizations who are working together in a collaborative or consensus-building process. Such facilitator may be internal or external i.e., brought from outside the organization. Either way, he or she must be acceptable to all members of the group.

The core values that guide the practice of facilitation are valid information, free and informed choice and internal commitment to those choices. Valid information means that parties involved share all information relevant to the conflict. Free and informed choice means that parties have the ability to define their own goals and ways of achieving them. Internal commitment to the choice made means that parties feel personally responsible for the choices they make. This type of commitment results because parties are happy with their decision and involvement in it, not because there is any possibility of reward or punishment for supporting it.

Facilitators must have a variety of skills and techniques to be effective. Strong verbal and analytical skills are essential. Facilitators must know what questions to ask, when to ask them, and how questions should be structured to get good answers without defensiveness. Facilitators must know how to probe for more information when the initial answers are not sufficient.

Within the workplace, there are steps to simplify the process and ensure more effective communication and a more effective conflict resolution process. The steps are as follows:

1.    Clarify what the conflict is by getting to the heart of the conflict. The goal is to get both sides to discuss what needs are not being met on both sides of the conflict. Facilitation at this stage of the process entails obtaining as much information as possible on each side’s point of view through questioning.

2.    Establish a common goal i.e., a desired outcome of the conflict for both parties. When people know that they’re working towards the same goal, they’re more apt to participate truthfully to make sure that they reach that end goal. To accomplish this, discuss what each party would like to see happen and find commonality in both sides as a starting point for a shared outcome. That commonality can be as simple as “both sides want to end the conflict.”

3.    Discuss ways to meet the common goal. Keep going until all the options are exhausted.

4.    Determine the barriers to the common goal. An understanding of the possible problems that may be encountered along the way lets one proactively find solutions and have plans in place to handle issues.

1. Agree on the best way to resolve the conflict and discuss the responsibility each party has in maintaining the solution. It is also important to use this opportunity to get to the root cause to ensure this conflict will not come up again. A lot of times when we try to fix problems, we get so caught up in fixing it that we do not identify what we need to do so it does not happen.

Interveners in conflict situations work with certain specialized tools for effective management or resolution of a conflict situation. A better understanding of these tools necessitates a description of conflict progression/stages of conflict and workforce diversity/human systems.

Workforce Diversity/Human Systems.

Simply put, workplaces are human systems. Each type of person in the system brings to bear the full range of psychological and emotional behavior (type) while applying themselves to work. Workplaces that capitalize on diversity are likely to perform better because, it is a tool in understanding and engaging well with others, effectively communicating better, and doing better problem solving, building and managing high-performance teams, and knowledge of dominant workplace assessment.

Using the Myers-Briggs Theory (MBTI) which is simply descriptive, MBTI suggests that much seemingly random variation in behavior is actually a quiet orderly and consistent being due to basic differences in the way individuals prefer to use their perception and judgment. In order words, the MBTI has two functions i.e., how we get data and how we make decisions; and two Attitudes, which describe how we focus our energy and how we orient ourselves to the outside world, respectively. Each of the functions and attitudes are referred to as the four (4) Preference Pairs which operates along a continuum.

2 Functions:

    How we gather data:            Sensing – Intuition

    How we make decisions:      Judging – Feeling

2 Attitudes:

    How we focus/generate energy:     Extraversion – Introversion

    How we orient to the outside world:           Judging – Perceiving

The various combinations of the 2 Functions and 2 Attitudes yield 16 Personality Types within the MBTI, knowledge which had direct impact on what can be expected from employees. It is also a key tool to self-awareness, valuable to becoming a leader, consequently better-informed self-management.

Conflict Progression/Stages

One of the challenges in making an intervention is the phase of engagement/intervention. The entry point of an intervener would more often than not, determine whether the conflict situation would be transformed into more positive structures. These stages of conflict include

• Formation stage: Here, a problem emerges and things that were previously taken for granted become serious issues.
• Escalation stage: This is characterized by the development of enemy images. People begin to take sides, perceptions become distorted and parties begin to commit resources to defend their positions. Leaders begin to make inflammatory statements regarding such positions.
• Crisis: The peak of the conflict. Tension and violence is most intense at this stage and communication between the opposing sides ceases with possible loss of human lives and material resources.
• De-escalation stage: At this stage, there is gradual cessation of hostilities arising either from conflict fatigue, weariness, hunger, sanctions or external intervention by a third party.
• Transformation stage: Here all causes of the conflict have been removed and reconciliation has occurred. Note however that this stage is usually difficult to attain.

Facilitating/Handling Conflict Style

The choice of an appropriate conflict resolution mode depends to a great extent on the situation and the goals of each party. Each party must decide the extent to which it is interested in satisfying its own concerns – “assertiveness”, and the extent to which it is interested in helping satisfy the opponent’s concerns – “cooperativeness”. Assertiveness can range from assertive to unassertive on one continuum, and cooperativeness can range from uncooperative to cooperative on the other continuum. Once the parties have determined their desired balance between the two competing concerns – either consciously or unconsciously, the resolution strategy emerges.

Accommodation – this is a low level of assertion either due to internal motivations or due to external factors such as political pressures.  Accommodating acquiesces or yields approach prizes the relationship over the tumult of the conflict i.e. one party gives in to the wishes or demand of another.  Accommodation does not solve the problem it just suppresses the concerns. It simply asks one of the players to make accommodations for other players.

Avoiding – if a player does not like conflict, he/she will undertake extraordinary measures to avoid it. Conversely, a conflict junkie, will go out of their way to be involved in conflict.  Avoiding does not take on the problem, but rather, like an ostrich puts their head in the sand either hoping the problem will go away or people will just get tired of complaining about the area of concern. Parties choose this approach when the discomfort of confrontation exceeds the potential reward of resolution of the conflict. Experience suggests this approach comes with a myriad of other problems such as neglect and is not an appropriate approach for most conflicts.

Collaboration – is a combination of assertion and collaboration. This approach can resolve issues or problems as the objective is to meet both sides (or all sides) needs.  It requires investment in time as detailed exploration and understanding of the individual objectives and obstacles with the possibility of co-creating a shared solution that everyone can support. A great way to collaborate and overcome conflict is to “reach out and touch them”.

Competing – here the strong willed, strong personalities or strong political influences make command decisions relying on these levels of clout to quickly move to a decision.  Competing may be a good approach for emergency situations where a quick good decision, pulling all the other parties behind a clear, singular approach is required, but it inhibits growth.  This is not a middle ground approach, but an approach that gives both sides what is needed.

Compromise – middle ground, both sides find a mutually conducive ground where parties are partially assertive and cooperative. The concept here is that everyone gives up a little bit of what they want, and no one gets everything they want – “splits the difference” the perception of the best outcome when working by compromise of being fair even if no one particularly is happy with the final outcome.

Workplace Conflict

People experience conflict in their day-to-day lives with friends, families, and in their professional lives. In a working environment filled with people of all generations, widely divergent views and backgrounds, conflicts are bound to happen and these conflict causes a massive degree of frustration, pain, discomfort, sadness, as well as cost. The fact of the matter is conflict in the workplace is unavoidable as people’s ideas, decisions or actions relating directly to the job may be in opposition, or two people would just not get along. The idea is not to try to prevent them but rather to resolve and manage them in an effective manner.

Even though people often think of conflict management in the workplace as a leadership skill, leaning heavily on bosses and HR departments, in most cases, it’s the employees who are in the best position to deal with conflict in its early stages before it builds into something bigger necessitating a third-party “to wear the hat” of mediation. Note however that mediation does not always require a third party. Mediation can take the form of self-mediation or managerial mediation. Self-mediation as very few disagreements require a third-party mediator.

Self-mediation basically allows one to mediate his/her own disputes without the help of a third party. It emotionally and practically prepares one for difficult scenarios and settles some intra-personal conflicts. Self-mediation entails that those individuals who are in a conflict create time to sit and explore ways of resolving the conflict, without the help of a third party. The process is only possible where the parties adhere to two cardinal rules: –

1. Do not distance i.e., the parties commit to stick it out and not walk away or to withdraw from communication, whether in self-defense or in retaliation against the other.
2. Do not Coerce i.e., neither party should use their position to win a power struggle by imposing a one-sided solution through threats, ultimatums, intimidation, or other force.

Managerial mediation on the other hand represents an approach to addressing workplace conflict that is supportive of interest-based relationships yet also addresses rights and power. It allows managers to bring employees together with the stated purpose of reaching an understanding based on what is important to them (their interests) within the bounds of the law, contract, and policy (their rights), without the manager having to impose the decision. It does so within the context of the existing power differentials that do exist between the employer and the employee, between the supervisor and the employee and even between two peers (their social power).

Managerial mediation provides a clear and simple alternative strategy for managers. It helps avoid dysfunctional and negative response to conflict and instead encourages disputants to engage in functional conflict, to solve the business problems that can so frequently derail business goals. Managerial mediation entails actively creating an environment where employees feel listened to, understood, and respected. It promotes an identification of what is a difference of opinion and what is unacceptable work behavior and who should solve a given conflict; and an understanding of a process for how to mediate conflict at work in coordination with the impacted parties.

The organization tends to appear as a mediator between adversaries or as ‘arbitrator’ i.e., those managers which by using their experiences must continuously develop new strategies and techniques for conflict resolution by utilizing their experiences. But whatever the approach used will depend on the conflict, the parties to the conflict and the potential damage that the conflict can cause to the organization.

Gender Issues and Conflict in the Workplace

Gender goes beyond whether someone is just male, female, or non-binary. Gender plays roles in the workplace that mimic the societal expectations around gender skills, responsibilities, and limitations. Gender dynamics play out whether we necessarily notice them especially in workforces where one gender is the majority, other genders run the risk of experiencing conflict which can include discrimination and harassment. It appears clearly in the processes used to resolve disputes in the workplace. Any type of conflict uses immense mental and emotional energy from those involved which will make it challenging to focus on the task at hand.

Sometimes, workplace gender conflicts can come from a company culture that normalizes discriminatory behavior. For instance, workplaces that allow inappropriate joking about different gender and gender roles, where gender-based pay gaps are acceptable, and where sexual harassment goes undisciplined. “Boys club” types of workplaces are vulnerable to gender conflict in the workplace given how normal it is to exclude women solely based on their gender. Likewise, company cultures that are comfortable excluding men or discriminating against transgender employees can find themselves in a challenging situation.

Gender conflict leads to stress and tension as, women are expected to be “nice,” a subtly nefarious burden few men must bear. This indirect yet powerful pressure forces woman employees to suppress their real and natural emotions which may include healthy feelings of frustration, anger, and aggressiveness. Thus, their true emotions and attitudes go underground to keep up appearances of how they should behave. But what importantly should be noted, is that gender conflict is an empowerment which should be taken positively.

To combat conflict situations and harmful comment from colleagues of the opposite gender, employees should speak frankly about their real feeling and tell others what they do not like to hear. If words do leave a stronger impression on the female brain, then part of self-mediation plan is finding ways to release the impact of those remarks that hurt, for example through exercise – an excellent remedy for letting go of toxins including statements that do not promote feel good feeling. Appreciating the differences in male-and female-speak, especially when one party accidentally hurts or offends another, can heighten the level of mutual respect at work without either gender being held as the culprit.

Employers are encouraged to understand employment laws, share that knowledge with all company managers, and create policies that comply, including a policy about how to escalate discrimination complaints so they do not go ignored. Additionally, ensuring the company culture is not normalizing potentially harmful and illegal behavior can help make egregious behavior easier to catch and manage earlier on. All managers should have a toolbox of ways to resolve conflict at work so that all disputes, whether they’re directly related to gender, can be handled in a timely manner without causing additional disruptions to the work environment. Resolving gender conflict in the workplace is a difficult task. Get support from neutral and experienced professionals who can diffuse the tension at work and avoid costly consequences.

Conclusion

Since conflict is a part of human life, it is impossible to avoid it in business life. Whether the organization is an economic operator or practices some other services, it is quite evident that conflicts occur in organizations because of competition for supremacy, leadership style, scarcity of common resources, etc., This reduces staff satisfaction about the job and reduces productivity or service rendered. Early recognition of the conflict and paying attention to the conflicting parties is very important. Negotiation and sometimes mediation between parties involved is the best way to resolve conflict.

It is impossible to eliminate conflict totally. Mangers who try to eliminate conflict will not last long, while those who manage it well will typically experience both institutional benefits on which the level of organizational performance is the highest and personal satisfaction.