Usually, everyone fears conflicts and spends a lot of effort to avoid them. The main reason is the perception of conflicts as a quarrel, in which there is a huge risk of a waste of time, deterioration of relations in the team and, as a result, deterioration of the work process.
It is worth realizing that conflicts are inevitable. No matter how hard we try, conflicts will still be an integral part of the workflow. And at this point it becomes important how we approach them: from the destructive side, where everyone just argues with each other, or from the constructive side, where we try to identify contradictions, find agreements and develop.
Conflict is a natural stage in the life of a team
According to Bruce Tuckman's theory, there are four (or five) stages in the development of any team:
At first stage there is forming of the team and adaptation to work: each team member tries to show his/her best side, the team produces good results.
At the second stage the storm begins — constant conflicts in the team: someone does not like the way his colleague works, someone thinks that someone is not using the library correctly. At the storm stage, all the contradictions and problems of the team become visible.
At the third stage there is normalization of work: almost all conflicts are resolved, or their corners are smoothed, and the team can work calmly further.
In the fourth stage, the team can be at its highest performance and conflicts do not occur at all.
That is why the main task of the leader is to lead the team through the storm as quickly as possible and with minimal loss of life
However, it is important to realize that responsibility for conflicts does not lie directly with the manager: it is not always possible to influence the decisions and emotions of others. If you have the opportunity to ask for help (for example, from mediators), be brave to ask and do not always seek to save the situation on your own.
How can I reduce the risks of conflict?
Avoid Fundamental Attribution Errors
A fundamental attribution error is overestimating personal reasons and underestimating circumstances when interpreting a person's behavior.
For example, if someone is late to an online meeting, don't assume the person did it intentionally or from their own irresponsibility. More likely, there was a reason for it that was related to the circumstances.
Use “I” Messaging Technique
If you are upset and angry about something, and you want to give feedback, try to use “I-messages” that reflect your emotions and do not contain any accusatory points. These messages are hard to argue with because it's much harder to argue feelings than facts. “I” messages are the way of expressing your thoughts and emotions about a particular experience or interaction using a soft voice and a statement with the words, “I feel…”.
“I-message” consists of four parts:
- fact — describe the factual aspect of the event. Try to describe the fact as non-judgmentally as possible,
- feelings — describe the feelings and emotions associated with the fact,
- explanation — an explanation of why the feelings occurred,
- intention — suggest a desired way of developing/resolving the situation.
Apologize If You Need to
Apologizing can be very scary, but don't underestimate the power of it. It might be more like a gesture sometimes, but is often what is missing to avoid a conflict situation. If you feel like you were wrong or offended someone, go over and apologize. This will not only reduce the likelihood of conflict, but also increase trust in the team.
What to Do If Conflicts Appear
Globally, you need to analyze the context and figure out what to do about the conflict: to resolve it or not to resolve it
According to the Thomas-Kilmann tool, there are five main modes to manage the conflict: competing, avoiding, accommodating, collaborating, and compromising.
Avoidance and accommodating are behavioral options in which you weigh the arguments and risks and realize that essentially in this case not resolving the conflict is the solution :)
Avoidance
— is total rejection of conflict: postponing the discussion until the problem is no longer relevant, or outright sabotaging the discussion.
This style may be appropriate when the conflict seems trivial, you don't have time to solve the problem (or very little), you feel you have no chance of winning, or you fear you will be met with resentment.
Accommodating
— is denial of one's own wants and needs in favor of the wants and needs of others.
This method is suitable for situations in which the cause of the conflict (a particular issue) is much more important to others than to you, or there is no opportunity (e.g., time) to influence the other person's opinion.
And if you do plan to resolve the conflict, you're more interested in the other three behavioral options:
Competing
— is rivalry, which implies having a clear and unyielding position that does not shift in the opposite direction.
This style is appropriate for situations where you are asserting your legal rights, trying to make a quick decision, wanting to end an ongoing conflict, or preventing a bad decision from being made.
Compromising
— is finding a solution that partially satisfies both sides of the conflict.
This style is suitable for situations in which you need to make a decision/solve a problem in the shortest possible time and neither side of the conflict is ready to give in to the other. Or when you need a temporary solution that does not require perfect elaboration.
Collaborating
— is finding a solution that fully satisfies both sides of the conflict.
This style may be appropriate when several points of view need to be considered, the outcome of the conflict resolution is too important for anyone to be dissatisfied, or the views of several stakeholders need to be presented.
Each option has its advantages and disadvantages, so it is not advisable to adopt exclusively one of them. For example, if you resolve a conflict in which one side was completely wrong and is in a defensive position through cooperation or compromise, trust in the team may be undermined.
“Either, or” and “and/both”
When organizing a discussion to resolve conflicts through collaboration, the manager should keep an eye on how people communicate their ideas. Often, it's only 2 ways: “either/or” and “and both”.
“Either, or” — a person is willing to think and reason only within their options (versions of events, decisions, opinions, and so on).
“And/both” — a person is willing to discuss not only their options, but other people's options as well.
If someone gets into an “either, or” position, suggest looking at the issue through a different lens (e.g., could there be other points of view that would help to resolve?..)
If it is not possible to achieve an “and/both” style of reasoning, it will not be possible to use such a way of conflict resolution as collaboration. Therefore, it is better to use another style that best suits the situation.
How can I resolve a conflict if it has escalated into a quarrel?
Our short answer is: you can't. If, in the course of a conflict
- the participants begin to escalate and raise the voices,
- the level of emotional involvement increases noticeably, and participants find it harder to control their words, behavior, and emotions,
- the participants are actively start getting personal,
- generalizations, exaggerations, manipulative turns, details, and situations that are not directly related to the subject of the current conflict begin to appear in the conversation, stop the conversation completely.
In such a state, constructive discussion is almost impossible: the participants are under the influence of strong emotions. Their goal is no longer to solve a specific conflict, their goal now is to speak out, to restore justice to themselves through the expression of accumulated thoughts and emotions. Sometimes in the process the goal even becomes to offend a person, to hurt them.
Therefore, if such a conflict is not stopped, its consequences will affect the team for a long time: anger, mistrust, poor communication and resentment.
Insist on a time-out, take them to different rooms, or send them home. This way everyone can catch their breath, calm down and think about what happened in a balanced, unemotional way.
And preferably the next day, with a clear head, proceed to resolve the conflict situation in the most appropriate way.
“You just have to let them talk, then the emotions will cool down and everything will be fine”
Unfortunately, as practice shows, it won't. Perhaps at the moment the participants will really feel better, or at least both sides will speak out, and the emotional fervor will subside, however,
- the words spoken will still be remembered for a long time, and the relationship is likely to be more strained,
- sharing emotions doesn’t guarantee that the causes of a conflict situation will not lead to a similar situation in the future,
- hearing your colleagues arguing or even knowing about it can be extremely disruptive, demotivating and unpleasant for other team members, which can affect their mood, self-perception, confidence and performance,
- moreover, this approach can have a negative impact on feelings of safety (“so no one would stand up for me and stop the fight if it were me?”).
Helping to air grievances and share emotions is a really important part of the process, but it needs to be controlled.
To do this, the participants themselves should not be under the influence of strong emotions that override consciousness, and there should be a mediator to help guide the process (which is most likely a team leader!).
Help participants of the conflict to express their pain ecologically:
- organize the processes in the most appropriate way, e.g., call each participant 1 on 1 to listen to their experiences and perspectives and to have a more holistic view of the conflict,
- monitor your colleagues' communication, spot manipulation and keep your colleagues on their toes by reminding them that you have a common goal in mind,
- Use “I” Messaging Technique and explain to your colleagues why this way of expressing emotion would help you in this situation.
