Brave Discussions

Unless there’s a conflict crisis, the vast majority of conflicts fly under the radar; and the more senior managers are, the less they know!

This translates into lost productivity, in the form of wasted time, overlooked opportunities, loss of investment in skilled employees, degraded decision quality, absenteeism, lowered motivation, theft, sabotage, vandalism, restructuring, health costs and more.

It’s the normal, ‘everyday’ work disputes that cost so much. They’re the ones that we don’t even see happening. They’re the ones that we can’t even budget for!

How can these attitudes to conflict change? Most of us have never been taught to deal with conflict effectively. Mismanaged, avoided, or hidden conflict can be destructive without even being noticed. It is not cost effective for managers or supervisors to micromanage daily disputes, yet they are ultimately responsible for optimal productivity, which is hampered by conflict within their teams.

The key to a culture of conflict savvy behaviour in the first instance is that conflict be dealt with directly, at the lowest level, by the people involved. Besides being the cheapest method, it is vastly more effective.

With proper training and within the right environment, workers will collaborate to invent solutions that satisfy their interests and needs – a far better outcome than solutions imposed by a senior/ third party.

When people have the skills to confront problems and the prospects of improved work situations, they will gradually stop sweeping things under the rug: it is simply a matter of learning how to have a productive conversation after suffering anger, hurt, or humiliation.

As MTI’s Southern African representative and accredited trainer, I have proudly selected Dan Dana’s Successful Conflict Conversations Course because it addresses everyday situations that block optimum interdependence between workers in a proven one day workshop that has been taught for decades to thousands of people around the world, and is widely considered to be the best there is.

The rest of the article is available here.

                       

Mervyn Malamed

Mervyn Malamed is an Organisational Conflict Management professional. Employees who are equipped to cope with crises and conflict carry a positive mind-set to friends, family and more. This exponential effect rubs off; it enhances lives and comes around to further enrich that same employee, co-workers, and the organisation itself.  With… MORE >