What do you do if your team is stuck in a cycle of workplace conflicts?

Our own biases can cloud our understanding of a situation. Active listening helps us hear things from different perspectives and avoid making assumptions. Along with active listening, take time for self-reflection. Identify your own biases and how they might influence your interpretation of a situation. Then actively seek out diverse viewpoints and perspectives. Consult team members outside your usual circle (if possible) to challenge your own assumptions.

Creating a safe space isn't always a quick fix, but it's a non-negotiable step towards true resolution and healthy growth of an organisation. As the leader or mediator, play a key role in setting the tone. Demonstrate that all perspectives are valued and listen actively. However if the safe place is already broken beyond repair consider a trained mediator. They bring skills and neutrality that can be hard to achieve internally. Tight-knit teams sometimes assume their bond makes them immune to problems. This overconfidence prevents them from addressing internal issues proactively, creating a particularly challenging situation when newcomers join the team.

Clear norms are important, but true conflict prevention comes from tying them to your shared goals. Norms based on shared goals are more adaptable because they can be revisited and adjusted to fit new situations while still keeping the team on track. When team members collaborate to create norms based on achieving common goals, they're more likely to take ownership and be motivated to follow them. It becomes a collaborative effort, not just a set of rules imposed from above.

Identify the major cause of the issue, come up with different ways to solve the issues. Meet with every members involved in the conflict and profer the solution.

Conflict resolution can be stressful. Injecting a spirit of playfulness (even with serious topics) helps to reduce tension. Silly suggestions (initially) can sometimes lead to surprisingly workable solutions when refined. Creativity in conflict resolution also helps build a resilient team. By learning to approach disagreements as opportunities to think differently, your team becomes better equipped to handle complex challenges that truly require innovative solutions.

Know that, a little bit of conflict can actually be healthy for a team, as it can lead to new ideas and innovation. The key is to manage conflict constructively and find ways to resolve it before it becomes really toxic. Emphasize the importance of celebrating successful conflict resolution. This reinforces positive behaviors, makes the hard work feel worthwhile, and helps shift the team's mindset towards seeing conflict as something that can be overcome.