Not the sort of workplace conflict that turns nice people into bar brawlers or food fight participants in the company cafeteria or neighborhood diner.

I’m talking about “double secret” conflict – the most damaging kind.

Why do I call it “double secret” workplace conflict? Because most conflict in workplace is misdiagnosed as bad people doing bad things to each other for some unknown reason.

Most of the time “double secret” workplace conflict is invisible to the naked eye.

People act nice toward one another and seem to be cooperating and doing what they’ve been tasked to do, but things never work out right, for no apparent reason.

Unresolved “double secret” conflict in workplace shows up in the results arising from it, such as poor business decisions. No matter how large or how small your organization the best decisions are those made jointly by the right people with the good of the whole as their sole motivation.

When one person feels that the only way they can “get back at” one of their team members or the organization in general – they may sabotage decisions, sometimes causing great harm.

By taking the attitude that their ideas are the only ones worth considering they force others to bend to their will. By delaying their own investigation into the alternatives they can put off decisions until they get their own way or until the decision is made without them – putting them in a prime “why didn’t you wait for my input” position if things go bad.

Look at your own organization – see how creative the other people are at manipulating you until they get their own way.

Another way that “double secret” conflict in workplace rears its ugly head is in turf wars and the dreaded NIH syndrome that is often displayed by the instigators. Turf wars are designed to keep people away from what’s yours. If they can’t get in and you can decide what gets out – they have to take your decisions at face value, whether they are accurate or disabling or not.

Business decisions made when only one person has access to the information upon which the decisions are based are flawed at best.

When the NIH syndrome is in place, ideas not invented here, are rejected out of hand. This may not look like conflict to you, if your vision of workplace conflict resembles the gunfight at the OK Corral, but it is just as deadly. When decisions are made based on untested assumptions they are rarely the best decisions possible.

The NIH syndrome insures that no one else’s input is considered – and the organization comes up the loser.

What should you do if you think there is “double secret” conflict in the workplace where you are? Most of you will probably continue to try to ignore it, put it down to other causes – things you can’t do anything about, so you won’t have to deal with it, or just figure it comes with the territory.

A few of you will look for a solution, but you will find them illusive – because you really can’t pinpoint a specific example and random poking around and generalizations only make people mad. The culprits go way under cover or fight back with such venom you’re sorry you ever thought it would work.

For those of you who are serious about dealing head on with “double secret” conflict in workplace, setting up programs or policies that offer workplace conflict resolution – well, you need help. By help I mean motivation – something people will pay attention to, like money, profit, additions to your bottom line – however you characterize the positive side of the ledger.

In other words you need to figure out how to quantify the loses resulting from “double secret” workplace conflict.  There are those in your organization who do not realize the role they are playing, others who would like to be noticed and taken into consideration in identifying the hidden conflict related issues, and those who sincerely do not want to be part of a productive team who need to be identified, so they can be replaced.

For two dozen years I have seen that the only thing that motivates the majority of organizations – moves them from tacit acquiescence of discomfort to an environment of total cooperation, is the money.

People must see the bottom line dollars and cents cost of the conflicts taking place before they will be willing to put up with the temporary discomfort of doing something about it.

Successful organization leaders understand that a key ingredient of success is the development and maintenance of shared goals for the future – shared by everyone in the organization. They also instinctively realize the stressful impact of workplace conflict, whether overt or covert, and appreciate how workplace conflict resolution strategies offer concrete savings to the individuals and the organization.

Recommended Reading

• Conflict in Workplace: Your Good People Quit
• DRS Peer Mediation
• how personality is a component in many workplace conflicts?
• A Particular Cost of Conflict Calculator Can Illustrate The Urgency of Facing Workplace Conflict in Ones Corporation
• The Complete Guide to Conflict Resolution in the Workplace

Technorati Tags: Business Conflict, Conflict Strategies, conlict in workplace, Workplace Conflict Resolution

One form of mediation that has been particularly useful in addressing employment disputes is “transformative” mediation. Transformative mediation uses a process whereby people who have a need for ongoing interdependent relationships explore their differences at a restorative level to get their relationship back on track.

One might ask what the difference is between traditional and transformative methods of mediation that make transformative mediation a good fit for employment disputes. We can better understand the benefits of transformative mediation through a comparison of it with traditional or what is also known as “directive” mediation. Comparing the orientation of the mediator’s style and approach to mediation helps us to understand why transformative mediation is well suited for managing employment disputes.

Essentially, a mediator with a “directive” orientation to mediation believes the conflict represents only a problem to be solved or a dispute to be settled. The directive mediator assumes ownership of the parties’ problems and its solutions. The directive mediator directly or subtly engages in activities that drive, determine, or impose both the definition of the problem and its solution.

A mediator with a “transformative” orientation, on the other hand, believes that conflict presents opportunities for individuals to change (transform their interactions with each other), if they so choose.

During a transformative mediation session, decision making about who talks first, whether or not there will be ground rules for the session, definition of the issues and concerns, the range of the discussion, solutions and whether any resulting terms of agreement will be reduced to writing are all determined by the parties to a dispute rather than the mediator.

The mediator may appear to be an uninvolved observer of the interaction between the conflicting partners. The opposite is actually true. The mediator, rather than leading the partners’ interactions actually “follows” them around. In following, the mediator looks and listens for empowerment and recognition opportunities in the dialogue.

“Empowerment” entails those opportunities to facilitate the feelings of power over the process so that the parties feel a greater control over the mediation session and hence the outcomes. Empowerment builds the participant’s self – confidences to not only address the differences that gave rise to their dispute, but also to successfully address differences that may arise in the future work setting. This they should be able to do without the intervention of a third party such as a mediator, supervisor, union representatives or human resources staff.

As an example of the mediator eliciting empowerment she might say, “Who wants to tell their story first?”, “I want to make it clear that I don’t make that decision – you do.”, or “How are you with that point of agreement?” All of these questions help shift dependency and power from the mediator to the partners in conflict.

“Recognition” is achieved when, given some degree of empowerment, conflict partners experience an expanded willingness to acknowledge and be responsive to the other partner’s situations and common human qualities.

A transformative mediator fosters recognition by encouraging and supporting (but not forcing) each partner’s voluntary efforts to achieve new understandings of the other’s perspectives (at every opportunity in the session). In a mediated session between Mary and Jim, Jim might say, “Mary, your report summary was very well done” At that point the transformative mediator may slow down the process and seek acknowledgement of the recognition of Mary by Jim. He might say, “Mary, Jim appears to be praising your work. You do not seem to accept it. How are you feeling about…? Can you tell me about…?”

With recognition the partners choose to become more open, attentive, responsive to the situation of another, thereby expanding their perspective to include appreciation for another’s situation.

Transformative mediation is ideally suited for disputes that occur in a work setting because it:

1.encourages the expression of feelings which lead to unveiling the real interests of the parties,
2.helps the parties move from relative weakness to relative strength,
3.helps the parties get clearer, more confident, and more decisive thereby strengthening their capacity for self-determination,
4.helps the partners in a dispute move from self-absorption to attentiveness to others by strengthening their capacity to become more open, receptive and responsive to others.

All of these enhanced capabilities practiced in the mediation session help the partners continue to build their relationship back in the work place.

Since the partners have more control over the transformative mediation process than they would have in a mediation session where a more traditional style is practiced, the agreements the partners come away with are viewed as their own and hence are longer lasting.

Executives, supervisors and managers can apply some of the principles of transformative mediation described here to help facilitate better communication with and among their staff, and to reduce the time, expense and the headaches associated with unmanaged employee disputes.

Larry Blackwell is President of Blackwell and Associates, a consulting firm helping organizations build cooperation for improved team functioning. He is an attorney and EEOC mediator.
Mr. Blackwell specializes in workplace mediation, diversity and in-house discrimination investigations.

You are encouraged to contact him at 612.824.2616 or through email at blackwell_associates@earthlink.net, or visit his website at: Blackwell and Associates, ( http://www.blackwel-and-associates.vpweb.com )

Recommended Reading

• Conflict in Workplace: Your Good People Quit
• DRS Peer Mediation
• how personality is a component in many workplace conflicts?
• A Particular Cost of Conflict Calculator Can Illustrate The Urgency of Facing Workplace Conflict in Ones Corporation
• The Complete Guide to Conflict Resolution in the Workplace

Technorati Tags: conlict in workplace, Larry Blackwell