Conflict Management: The Key to Successful Teamwork

Effective conflict management is the key to successful teamwork.?

By managing conflict, however, we don’t mean leaders need to quell all conflict.?

While they need to manage destructive conflict, building good conflict (yes, building it!) can be motivating for team members.?

What the Research Says About Conflict at Work

Destructive conflict is costly for businesses. The Myers-Briggs Company shared that a recent survey in the United Kingdom projected the cost of conflict at ￡28.5 billion (roughly $47 billion Canadian).

In August 2022, the Myers-Briggs Company published the results of their study, Conflict at work, which explored how workers view conflict and offered suggestions about how knowing their own conflict and personality styles can help folks deal with conflict better.

Spoiler: This is because personality styles affect conflict on any team.

Those surveyed for the Conflict at work study reported:

• Spending an average of 4.34 hours each week dealing with conflict – taking focus away from work.
• That the more they had to deal with conflict, the lower their job satisfaction and the less included they felt.
• Conflict results in feeling anxious, depressed, fearful and stressed.?
• That conflict management is an essential skill for leaders (in fact, 98 percent of respondents identified conflict management skills as extremely or very important).?

Men were much more likely than women to report that they rarely had to deal with conflict. Not surprisingly, they were more likely to say they viewed conflict positively, had higher job satisfaction and personally managed conflict well.?

When assessing whether leaders managed conflict well or poorly, respondents were more likely to identify women managers as more skilled at conflict management.

After the Covid pandemic, remote workers tend to say conflict decreased while non-remote workers say it increased. (Pro tip: Leaders can build strong relationships in hybrid workplaces.)

Common Causes of Workplace Conflict

The Myers-Briggs Company study respondents highlighted a few common causes of discord in the office:

• Poor communication
• Poorly defined roles
• Heavy workloads
• Personality clashes
• Changes in policies, products and organizational structures

As executive leadership coaches, we’d also add:

• Competing goals or pressures
• Competition for resources
• Confusion around policies or regulations
• Friction between different positions of authority or responsibility
• Irritation with someone who has a different personality style – or one that is too similar

It’s very helpful when leaders know how to implement six simple shifts to assist with conflict management.?

The Benefits of the Right Kind of Conflict

Some conflict is motivating for team members and can foster creativity and innovation. This happens when the conflict is around ideas, not people or relationships.

When there are strong relationships and trust, team members can debate, disagree and share concerns. This pursuit of what’s better for the organization is what allows folks to be innovative and drives success.

Resolving Conflict

• There are several ways that leaders can improve their conflict management skills. They can:

• Listen to understand, not to respond.
• Ask for opinions, explore different viewpoints and get more information.
• Acknowledge points of tension or conflict so that it can be discussed and resolved (even if it means having difficult conversations remotely).?
• Get comfortable with discomfort. It’s not possible to please everyone.
• Improve self-awareness by using assessment tools to understand your personality style, how you deal with conflict and how to interact with other personality styles better. (There are different tools to understand yourself and others; at Padraig, we use the Everything DiSC Assessments with our clients.)
• Strengthen the relationships between team members by building trust and communicating regularly.?
• Use coaching to improve how they approach conflict management and also help team members learn to manage conflict better.?

It’s important not to ignore conflict – because it will fester. Instead, tackle conflict quickly. As we said in a recent blog, resolving conflict starts with “the why” of it.

Coach’s Questions

As a leader, how have you encouraged good conflict? What steps have you taken to discourage bad conflict? Can you think of examples of your team members debating ideas to do better? What can you do to improve conflict management?

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This article was originally published on the Padraig Blog.