Conflict is what people always experience in their daily lives. It frequently occurs in interactions with people at work, school, and home. Conflicts in the workplace where people work with diverse perspectives from different geographic, cultural, and intellectual backgrounds can be experienced more often. Each person has other thoughts and solutions for the same problem, resulting in conflicts in dealing with them. What should managers or leaders need to do effectively resolve conflicts that inevitably occur in the workplace?
What is conflict management?
According to a survey, more than half of all employees have experienced or seen conflicts. It is also said that office workers generally spend about three hours a week trying to resolve conflicts. Conflict management is one of the most effective ways that companies can use to solve such frequent conflict situations. The goal of conflict management is to solve or overcome problems by listening to, understanding, and cooperating. A manager who is competent in conflict management wisely solves conflict situations in the organization so members can fully demonstrate their capabilities and leads them to an organization with mutual trust and good communication.
What causes workplace conflict
- Difference in personalities
Various people work in the workplace. Each person’s unique personality, propensity, characteristics, ability, perspective, and background make their work life more diverse and richer. However, these differences are one of the main causes of conflict at work. The difference in personality between extroverts and introverts appears to be the biggest factor of conflict. Conflicts according to character frequently occur as they cannot understand and adapt to each other’s personalities.
- Leadership style
Conflicts may arise if the leadership style of the leader who leads the organization does not fit with the organization’s members. Every leader has a leadership style. Some leaders value the process and harmonize with members of the organization, while others prioritize results and push employees to work. Some leaders love rules and are strict, while others are tolerant, understanding, and friendly. If leadership style does not match the employee’s working tendency, it may lead to conflict.
- Working style
Workers have their working styles. Some people do things in a systematic order as instructed, while others do things creatively and in their way. Also, some people check everything meticulously and carefully, so there are times when it takes too long to woke on. On the other hand, they narrow only the necessary parts quickly and make mistakes while doing things quickly in a short time. In organizations that must work together and often have things connected, conflicts often arise depending on their different work styles.
- Resistance to change
Conflicts between management and staff are generally caused by fear of change and uncomfortable feelings about new things. Because people tend to maintain a state of familiarity and anxiety about unknowns, whenever an organization adopts new things and implements changes, employees become stressed and reject them, resulting in conflicts with each other. Conflicts often arise between management and employees when promoting new management policies, work methods, and job changes.
- Work bullying
Bullying coworkers or being bullied by their bosses, i.e., physically, mentally, and verbally abused, or threatening the safety and health of coworkers whose behaviour is different, is defined as workplace bullying. Management needs to pay special attention to this trend of workplace harassment these days. In-work bullying is a part of the leadership’s careful management because it can lead to negative consequences such as personal mental health problems and organizational productivity decline, fraud, and conflict.
How to resolve conflict at work
- Clarify the source of conflict
The most important first task is to identify the source of the conflict. Knowing what part of the disagreement is and finding the cause can prevent the conflict from getting bigger. In addition, it should be fully discussed the things that must be satisfied from each standpoint. It is an important step to know in which direction conflicts should be resolved.
- Listen actively
For honest and accurate communication, it is important to find a safe and private place to talk. It gives parties with conflicting interests enough time to talk about their opinions and what parts of the matter are. Managers or leaders actively listen to their stories by allowing talking team members to know and understand each other’s causes of conflict.
- Decide ways to meet the common goal
After listening carefully to the stories of both parties, talk to the people around them about how they felt and understood the problem. After that, it is necessary to gather to discuss common ways to manage and solve the issue at hand so that these problems do not arise again. When team members communicate and solve problems together, allows the team to overcome the conflict together, and helps prevent the same problem from occurring.
- Preventative strategies
To find a way to resolve the conflict and decide on a solution, an agreement must be reached between the parties, and they need to take responsibility for fixing the problem. And it is necessary to devise a conflict prevention strategy for the future so that this will not happen again because of the agreement. Managers and leaders can develop conflict management skills by knowing lessons learned through conflict and how to solve conflicts when they occur and by educating them.
Conclusion
Society today lives in an extremely divided social environment and politics. In this society, people cannot live without conflict. Because we are all different and cannot make other things the same. So, especially in the workplace, conflict management steps are needed to resolve and manage conflicts. It is essential to achieve organizational goals and resolve conflicts. However, beyond that, we will be able to live in harmony together when we first recognize, understand, and accept the differences that are different. The same is true in the workplace. The company will be able to develop further when both organizers and management recognize, respect, and work in cooperation with each other.
References
- indeed for employers, 2022. Conflict management: 6 examples for the workplace. [online] Available at:< Conflict Management: 6 Examples for the Workplace [Updated for 2022] (indeed.com)> [Accessed 4August].
- Tahir Abbas, 2022. 10 Common causes of conflict at workplace. [online] Available at: < 10 Common Causes of Conflict at Workplace cause of conflict at workplace | CMI CMI (changemanagementinsight.com)> [Accessed 3 August].
- Workmates by HR Cloud, 2021. 7 Tips on how to manage and resolve conflict in the workplace. [online] Available at:< 7 Strategies on How to Resolve Conflict In The Workplace | HR Cloud> [Accessed 5August].
