Conflict is when one person has a disagreement with someone else. It is a mental struggle resulting from incompatible or opposite needs. Conflict at work may be two employees not getting on, or management and employees not getting on amongst themselves. There could be many reasons for people to have conflict this may be due to differences of opinion or rivalry between teams. A real life example of current conflict at work would be at BA, ‘’their staff have gone on a 12 day strike because they are angry about plans to cut the number of jobs at BA and planned changes to how much new recruits are paid.’’ [BBC1 news]
Conflict experienced
When working in a post office/ newsagents as a supervisor I was trained by my management how to run the shop and post office in a certain way. The management style was very autocratic, the job always got done and staff where told what and how to do things. However when there was a new manager everything changed overnight as her management style was completely different to the previous managers and mine. It felt unfair and hard to change and adapt a new style of management as I felt she was too laid back, didn’t really concentrate on getting the task done and wasn’t delegating to staff. This meant members of staff where becoming more laid back and casual at work for example turning up late and not doing given tasks to their full ability. Therefore I felt that I was the only one working hard and the manager didn’t care if things got done or not also members of staff stated to take sides. This resulted to staff including myself to become de-motivated, which meant targets where not being achieved. Strategy used
We where unable to resolve the conflict between us as it carried on for so long we no longer knew how to communicate effectively to solve the problem. Therefore the area manager had to get involved to help solve the problem. A meeting was held so we where able to have a civilised conversation and put our differences aside to come up with a solution to the problem. Factors that gave rise to conflict between the two of us where addressed such as our management styles, differences of opinion, role conflict and violation of territory. This meeting resulted to open communication between me and the manager as well as a downward spiral in the misunderstanding. From then onward we understood each others views, needs and priorities and worked together to achieve. It also resulted to better team work and happier more satisfied staff members. A lack of communication meant we where unable to resolve disputes however when this was corrected and replaced with approaches that where more conducive to creating peace we where able to work together and achieve better results.
Sources of power
Power is ‘’ the level of control or influence a person holds over the behaviour of others with or without their consent’’ [Mullins] Leaders have power for different reasons, some have power because they have the ability to give a bonus, because they can fire you and because they can assign you tasks you don’t want to do.
Studies on power were conducted by social psychologists John French and Bertram Raven in 1959. They identified five bases of power:
Legitimate - This comes from the belief that a person has the right to make demands, and expect compliance and obedience from others. For example the governing board of a religious place such as a church, mosque, gurdwara etc. The leaders will have legitimate power based on bylaws and constitution therefore others feel obliged to follow.
Reward - This results from one person's ability to compensate another for compliance. Reward power is used in many organisations a good example would be T-Mobile where rewards include commission, praise, pay increase, promotion etc, if staff achieve sales targets. This is affective in such organisation as rewards are valued highly by staff.
Expert - This is based on a person's superior skill and knowledge. Accepting a physician’s advice in medical matters is a good example of expert influence. One assumes and has the perception that a person has knowledge and expertise superior than their knowledge.
Referent - This is the result of a person's perceived attractiveness, worthiness, and right to respect from others. A celebrity or a social leader e.g. Martin Luther King is a good example of referent power. They have the power to influence others who then want to like them, be around them and be able to relate to them.
Coercive - This comes from the belief that a person can punish others for noncompliance. This is having the power to make someone do something they don’t want to this may be through threats. An example of this being used would be in governments. This could be seen as negative power but it helps keep the piece.
[Basic theory from mindtools]
To understand sources of power is important as they help one understand why they are influenced by someone and they are then able to build their own leadership skills by developing their own sources of power appropriately.
Conflict Management Strategies
Conflict within any organisation can arise from a number of things these may be ignoring ones needs, the use of ones power toward others, ignoring ones values, feeling and emotions are all factors of conflict. There are 5 Strategies organisations use to overcome conflict in the workplace.
Forcing - using formal authority or other power that you possess to satisfy ones concerns without regard to the concerns of the party that you are in conflict with.
Accommodating - allowing the other party to satisfy their concerns while neglecting your own.
Avoiding - not paying attention to the conflict and not taking any action to resolve it.
Compromising - attempting to resolve a conflict by identifying a solution that is partially satisfactory to both parties, but completely satisfactory to neither.
Collaborating - cooperating with the other party to understand their concerns and expressing your own concerns in an effort to find a mutually and completely satisfactory solution (win-win).
Collaborating takes time, and many conflict situations are either very urgent or too trivial to justify the time it takes to collaborate. There are many conflict situations that should be handled with one of the other four conflict management strategies rather than collaboration. Managers who are very good at conflict management are able to understand interpersonal conflict situations and use the appropriate conflict management strategy for each situation.
Strategies used and their pros and cons
In a situation at work there was a disagreement over who should work on Sundays me or my manager. As I worked until late on Friday and then all day Saturday I wanted Sunday off, however my manager disagreed as she wanted it of to spend time with her children. I would say my manager used a forcing strategy to the extent where she made it clear to me that she had authority due to her position being higher than mine. I used the accommodating strategy as I felt I had to just accept my manager’s decision and neglect my own concerns. I dealt with the situation like I did because having a good relationship with my manager was important to me, this issue was not extremely important to be also because I knew she had more power to make the decision than I did. The other important factor was time, I knew there was not a lot of time to decide who should work on Sundays and we had to come to a decision so the accommodating strategy allowed us to do this.
As we where dealing with moderately important issues, compromising could have lead to quick solution therefore been a suitable strategy to use. We could have done alternative Sundays therefore it would not have been unfair on neither of us. However, compromise would not completely satisfy either of us, and does not encourage innovation the way that taking the time to collaborate can. So, collaborating would have been the best option for us if we had the time.
Conclusion
Most people fear conflict and see it as something to avoid. However conflict is a normal part of life, both professionally and personally. Conflict in the right setting, handled in the right way, can be beneficial. It is through conflict that an awareness of the need for some necessary changes can be made, at work and at home.
Effective leaders use referent and expert power. To develop their leadership abilities, learn how to build these types of power, so that they can have a positive influence on their colleagues, team, and organisation.
References
Aldag, R. [2002]. Organizational behaviour and management: An integrated skills approach. Cincinnati: Thomson.
Hellriegel, D. [2001] Organizational behaviour, 9thed. Cincinnati, OH: Thomson
Whetten, D. A., & Cameron, [2002] Developing management skills, 5th ed. Upper Saddle River: Hall.
Barth, R. [2001] The culture builder. Education Leadership, London: Falmer.
Charles H, [2003] social work with groups, 7thed. Belmont: USA
Laurie, J. Mullins. [2007] Management and organisational behaviour, 8thed. Essex: Pitman
Looking at conflict [online]. ACLU. Available from: http://search.bbc.co.uk/search/ [Accessed on 28th January 2010]
Abdala, P, [2009] Conflict resolution. [online]. ACLU. Available from: http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/new [Accessed on 28th January 2010]
Good detail and informative well done.
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