Steps for Resolving Workplace Conflict

Author Topic: Steps for Resolving Workplace Conflict  (Read 3798 times)

Offline raju

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Steps for Resolving Workplace Conflict
« on: August 22, 2010, 07:57:04 PM »
Workplace conflict is a time-consuming and costly problem that can have a severe impact on the bottom line. Despite this, many top leaders lack the ability to confront softer issues such as employee relationships in their organisations.

Workplace relationship problems can arise as the result of clashing personalities, miscommunication, perceived backbiting, negative politics, or a perception of hidden agendas. These factors create bad relations between people, and are generally the result of not following proper communication models where initial problems were not addressed.

Many leaders prefer to avoid relationship issues because they shy away from conflict, or they do not trust a model or process that will help confront issues. However, one of the toughest aspects of leadership is the ability to deal with people issues.

Conflict in the workplace is generally the result of serious disagreement over needs or goals, and can result in behaviours such as gossip, avoidance, verbal abuse, passive/aggressive communication, and hostility. This can in turn lead to a drop in productivity, a focus on problems rather than solutions, and a slump in creativity and innovation.

While tensions and misunderstandings are normal and inevitable, if left unresolved they result in hostility, stress and wasted resources.
 
Next Posting: Finding a workable solution to workplace conflict.
Syed Mizanur Rahman
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Offline shibli

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How much do we know ourselves?
« Reply #1 on: August 29, 2010, 03:11:41 PM »
Throughout our waking life, we are conscious  of a variety of things. We are often conscious of other people, of cars, trees, ants, and other objects around us. We are conscious of their features: their colors, their shapes, and the sound they make. We are conscious of events involving them: car accidents, tree blooming, and so forth.

Sometimes we are also conscious of ourselves, our features, and the events that take place within us. Thus, we may become conscious, in a certain situation, of the fact that we are nervous or uncomfortable. We may become conscious of a rising anxiety, or of a sudden cheerfulness. Sometimes we are conscious of simpler things: that we are seeing red, or that we are thinking of tomorrow’s responsibilities.

My question is how much do we know ourselves? Do we do all our duties consciously? Do our actions coincide with our words and thoughts? Very often we feel to do something but do something else. Sometimes we think we are right but we may Not be right......

Sharing ideas and opinions, sharing knowledge, discussing with fellow-mates, and taking information from them may sometimes help to know who I am and what i should do.

Do i sound too much incomprehensible??? Let me know.
Those who worship the natural elements enter darkness (Air, Water, Fire, etc.). Those who worship sambhuti sink deeper in darkness. [Yajurveda 40:9]; Sambhuti means created things, for example table, chair, idol, etc.

Offline kazi shahin

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Re: Steps for Resolving Workplace Conflict
« Reply #2 on: August 29, 2010, 11:44:29 PM »
Most of the time when bad manners surface at work it is unintentional. It's easy to get caught up in your own tasks and projects. People's focus gets so narrow that they forget to consider the impact that their words or actions will have on other people.
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Offline shibli

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Re: Steps for Resolving Workplace Conflict
« Reply #3 on: September 05, 2010, 04:33:12 PM »
BODLE JAO, BODLE DAO

We have to change ourselves first, the rest will automatically change...
Those who worship the natural elements enter darkness (Air, Water, Fire, etc.). Those who worship sambhuti sink deeper in darkness. [Yajurveda 40:9]; Sambhuti means created things, for example table, chair, idol, etc.

Offline bidita

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Re: Steps for Resolving Workplace Conflict
« Reply #4 on: September 05, 2010, 07:42:50 PM »
The effects of conflict in the workplace are widespread and costly. Its prevalence, as indicated by three serious studies, shows that 24-60% of management time and energy is spent dealing with anger. This leads to decreased productivity, increased stress among employees, hampered performance, high turnover rate, absenteeism and at its worst, violence ..


There are four specific steps  can take to reduce workplace conflict. The first of all to look at communication skills, both in terms of how they communicate and how they’re teaching their employees to communicate with each other. This, of course, includes using ‘I’ statements instead of ‘you’ language. Owning your own feelings and your own communication is a much more effective way to communicate and even more, teaching your employees to communicate that way with others, goes a long way toward reducing conflict.


The second part of communication iss to beef up listening skills. Active listening involves things like actually trying to understand what the other person is saying, and then communicating to the other person that you do indeed understand what they’re saying.

The second way to decrease workplace conflict is to establish healthy boundaries. Without boundaries, there will be conflict and squabbles, power struggles and all kinds of circumstances that make for messy situations.

You can be professional and be empathetic and compassionate toward your employees, without crossing the line of becoming their friend. This is especially important when there’s a power difference between two people in an employment situation.

The third factor to reducing conflict is a skill called ‘emotional intelligence.’ There are many aspects and facets but it basically means developing skills to be more effective by teaching people to combine both intelligence and emotions in the workplace.

Seeing and dealing with employees as human beings with real lives is often overlooked in the busy workplace. People with high emotional intelligence can do this in a professional manner, and maintain appropriate boundaries. Another aspect of EQ is knowing and being sensitive to how employees are experiencing you as a manager. Part of EQ is teaching managers to be sensitive to how they’re coming across to others.

The fourth aspect of reducing workplace conflict is setting up behavioral consequences to be used with truly uncooperative employees who are unwilling to change. Despite using all these recommendations, there will be a few employees that just won’t change because they’re unwilling or unable. That means a manager must explain a consequence, which is an action or sanction that states to the employee the likely outcome of continuing problematic behavior. It will take skills from the three previous points to do this in a non-threatening way.

Is there ever a place for anger in the workplace? Yes. When people can say, ‘Wait a minute. I’m not happy with this; I don’t like what’s going on,’ and they turn that anger into a positive action, then the anger can be seen as a kind of motivator. Sometimes when we’re in a position where we recognize that we are upset about something, and we use that to our advantage, we can make that work for us, and in the long run, actually work for the company.

As employees, the more we can learn to speak up, to be able to say what our needs and our wants are in a healthy way, and not let it fester to the point of rage or explosion, we can use our anger as a motivator to help us take action.

Employees can also change their attitude toward their job while putting up with the unpleasant aspects of it. One way to reduce conflict and to be happier is to find a way to shift our perspective and our vision of why we ’re there.


It’s all in how we view the situation and perceive what we’re doing that determines our satisfaction and fulfillment on the job.
Bidita Rahman :)
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