Managing Conflict Sara Weinstock Wieji – The Chinese word for crisis ➢危機 is the Chinese symbol for crisis. ➢危 wei means danger, jeopardy or peril ➢機會 jihui means opportunity. ➢Thus weiji 危機 is at the intersection of danger and opportunity. Approaches to Conflict ➢Avoiding ➢Accommodating ➢Competing ➢Collaborating ➢Compromising Avoiding ➢This is the response your book refers to as ‘neglect’ or ‘exit’ or ‘loyalty,’ depending on the reason behind the avoidance ➢Can be physical or psychological ➢ You can either physically walk away or mentally withdraw ➢Consider avoiding ➢ When the situation is genuinely trivial ➢ When you have no chance of winning (you’re outmatched in a bar fight) ➢ To let others cool down and gain perspective ➢ When the long-term costs of winning outweigh the short-term gains ➢ When others could resolve the conflict more effectively Accommodating ➢This is the response your book refers to as ‘loyalty’ ➢Accommodating means giving ground as a way of maintaining harmony ➢Consider accommodating ➢ When you’re wrong ➢ When the issue is important to the other party and not to you ➢ To build social credits for future issues ➢ To minimize loss when you are outmatched and losing ➢ When harmony and stability are more important than the subject at hand ➢ To allow others to learn by their own mistakes ➢ Parents use this response with their teens all the time! Competing ➢This is a combination of the responses your book refers to as ‘voice’ and ‘win-lose’ ➢Competing means that the only way for one party to reach its goals is by overcoming the other party ➢ Zero sum approach +1 -1 = 0 ➢ Either you lose and I win or I lose and you win ➢ Best when used in a conflict situation with someone with whom you do not have an ongoing relationship ➢Consider competing ➢ When quick, decisive action is vital (emergencies) ➢ When others will take advantage of your non-competitive behavior (buying a used car) Collaborating ➢This is a combination of the responses your book refers to as ‘voice’ and ‘win-win’ ➢Collaborating means being committed to working together to solve conflicts ➢Based on the assumption it is possible to meet the needs of both parties ➢Consider collaborating ➢ When finding solutions to both parties’ concerns is too important to be compromised ➢ When the long-term relationship between parties is important and so is the conflict ➢ To gain commitment of all parties by building consensus ➢ When the other party is willing to collaborate Compromising ➢This is a combination of the responses your book refers to as ‘voice’ and can be either ‘win-win’ or ‘win-lose’ or ‘lose-lose’ ➢Compromise means that each party sacrifices something they’re seeking to gain an agreement ➢Consider compromising ➢ When goals are important, but not worth potential disruption of more assertive modes of conflict resolution ➢ When opponents of equal power have mutually exclusive goals ➢ To achieve temporary settlements of complex issues ➢ To arrive at expedient solutions under time pressure ➢ As a back-up, when collaboration is unsuccessful Tips for Conflict Resolution ➢To Thine Own Self Be True ➢ Remember Communication Context ➢ Use Mindful Listening Skills ➢ Assert Your Needs Clearly and Specifically ➢Approach Problem-Solving with Flexibility ➢Manage Impasse with Calmness, Patience and Respect ➢Brainstorm a List of Possible Solutions ➢Evaluate the Alternative Solutions ➢Implement and Evaluate - Live and Learn ➢ To Thine Own Self Be True ➢Understand your own perceptions, biases and triggers ➢ Forewarned is forearmed ➢ If you know your own weak points, your opponent will be less able to exploit them ➢Create a personally affirming environment ➢ Eat, sleep, exercise, minimize other stressors ➢Identify desired outcomes from the negotiation ➢ You should know before you begin a conflict what you want from it ➢ When you know what you must have and what you hope to achieve, you are in a better position to compromise or collaborate without giving away what is important to you ➢Remember Communication Context ➢Choose an appropriate space for discussion ➢ Private and neutral, or perhaps you want to be on your ‘home turf’ ➢Choose an appropriate time for your discussion ➢ You don’t want to bring up your desire for a raise with your boss at 5pm Friday or 8am Monday. ➢Agree to ground rules for a more formal conflict ➢Use Mindful Listening Skills ➢“Seek first to understand, then to be understood” (Covey) ➢Control noise and other factors ➢Ask questions ➢Use aids to recall ➢Assert Your Needs Clearly and Specifically ➢Don’t let your emotions overcome you ➢You are a less effective communicator when you are overcome by emotion ➢Use I-language as you make your case ➢You-language will make the other party defensive and less inclined to negotiate ➢Don’t make claims without citing evidence ➢“I keep e-mailing about this and you never respond!” is much weaker than, “I e-mailed on August 15, August 28 and September 5 and received no reply.” ➢If you think you may be entering a conflict situation, keep a log of when and to whom you speak. Sometimes just asking for someone’s name will encourage them to be more accommodating ➢Build from what you have heard - continue to listen well Approach Problem-Solving with Flexibility ➢Identify the needs of both parties ➢Avoid thinking about how to get what you want, just think about precisely what it is that you want ➢Use dual perspective to put yourself in the other person’s position and try to see why their viewpoint is important to them ➢Sometimes a collaborative solution will occur when you focus on the needs and reasons behind the desires, and not on the desires themselves ➢ If you want to go out for Mexican food and your husband wants Chinese, instead of arguing about it, try to collaborate. Don’t think about how to get what you want, think about what is important about your desire. Maybe you want Mexican because it’s close to the house and he wants Chinese because it’s healthy. Now that you know the reasons, maybe together you can select the Thai restaurant down the street instead. Now you both have what your desires met, just not in the way you thought they would be met. Manage Impasse with Calmness, Patience and Respect ➢Clarify your own feelings and desired outcomes ➢Paraphrase to clarify the feelings of the other party ➢Take a structured break, as needed. Make sure if you use the exit response that everyone knows that the break in action is temporary. Brainstorm a List of Possible Solutions ➢This approach works best when the other party is willing to collaborate ➢Quantity of responses is more important than quality. ➢No idea is too outlandish to consider – maybe by giving voice to an unworkable solution, you will give someone else an idea that actually will solve the problem. ➢Avoid evaluating at this stage. Nothing deflates creativity like evaluation Evaluate the Alternative Solutions ➢After brainstorming, THEN evaluate ➢Again, don’t evaluate during, evaluate afterwards. ➢Some solutions will be crossed off the list immediately, others will be combined. ➢Criteria for a successful solution might include: ➢ Is it fair and balanced? ➢ Are the action steps realistic? ➢ Do we have the time, energy, skills and resources to followthrough and implement this agreement? ➢ Is the agreement specific enough to proceed? ➢ Does everyone understand what we need to do and when we need to do it? Implement and Evaluate - Live and Learn ➢ Try it out. You will never know if it works until you try it ➢ Visit with a postmortem. ➢ After the solution has been in place for a few weeks, get together and discuss if it’s actually solving the problem ➢ You may discover that another of your brainstormed solutions would work better. Don’t get stuck.
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