Leaders must realize that conflict in the workplace is on the rise. As power and decision-making continue migrating to the front-line of contemporary organizations, leaders have increased opportunities to prevent and mediate unhealthy conflict between newly empowered co-workers and overly-competitive teams. But this is certainly not an opportunity that is sought after, considering the tendency for most organizational leaders within the United States to eschew conflict. Leaders who continue to adopt a "conflict averse" persona, developing the conflict resolution skills neither within themselves nor their subordinates, become wholly destructive barriers to increased communication, innovation, and teamwork within their respective organizations. The first of two leadership development tactics for improving conflict resolutions skill is understanding the common approaches toward conflict.
The Thomas-Kilman Conflict Mode Instrument has long established the five foundational approaches toward conflict that we see in organizations today. The approaches are: Competing (assertive, uncooperative), Avoiding (unassertive, uncooperative), Accommodating (unassertive, uncooperative), Collaborating (assertive, cooperative), and Compromising (intermediate assertiveness and cooperativeness). Leaders begin by increasing self-awareness for their preferred approach toward conflict both in and out of the workplace. Once this understanding is in place, the leader will know which approach they are drawn to and which approach is their least preferred. This self-awareness can then increase awareness of other's preferred styles, heigtening empathy during conflict. As these approaches are all useful on some level, leaders must increase their ability to behaviorally shift into each style as appropriate and proactively attend to conflict when it arises.
Learning to shift into each conflict approach is based on development in two areas: situational understanding and behavioral practice. Situational understanding is the strategic awareness and accurate choice of applying the correct style to the correct situation in an organizational context. For instance, a team working through a series of quick decisions of moderate importance would waste valuable time and energy choosing the collaborative approach toward conflict when the compromise approach would certainly do. Further development in this area can be had by reading the book, "The Conflict Resolution Toolbox" by Gary Furlong and by seeking out the assistance of a certified and experienced coach.
As leaders we must embrace conflict as a necessary facet of our increasingly effective culture, not a barrier that we need to turn away from in fear.
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