How Can I Resolve Conflicts with in my Team?
Team members must be able to work together effectively. Working effectively, however, means seeking the best solution to a problem under discussion. This can trigger disagreements. As a good manager, you don’t want disagreements to escalate into unpleasant conflicts. On the other hand, you don’t want your team’s members to fail to pursue different solutions to a problem because they think such action will trigger conflicts. Failure to express different opinions and defend them can prompt groupthink, which can put an end to any creative thinking within the group.
You can confront the disputants in the hope of getting them to recognize how their behavior is interfering with the team’s mission. This is a response that works if the team is composed of members who report directly to you but less likely to be effective if it is made up of individuals from different areas of the organization.
Or you can refocus the group’s attention on the operating rules members agreed to use to achieve its goal and, more important, on the goal itself.
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Refocusing the group’s attention on its ground rules—which include how disagreements will be handled—and the importance of the mission to the team’s members or corporation as a whole, ensures an end to unpleasant behavior associated with disagreements yet permits the airing of different viewpoints from team members.
A ground rule related to disagreements, for instance, might be: The team will allow each member the chance to talk, and will hear out other members without interruption. Another might be: The focus of the team will be on its mission; the group will not be distracted by side issues.
Finally, you need to set up a ground rule that relates to how decisions will be reached. For instance, you might all agree that disagreements will be resolved by vote, slowly eliminating items until only one workable solution remains.
To help the group formulate ground rules that will keep disagreements from interfering with the team’s goals, ask the group’s members to consider what behaviors will detract from the team’s mission and what behaviors will contribute to its achievement. Critical to conflict management is raising the question early on: How will we handle conflicts and disagreements among us? Keep in mind that differences may arise about the team’s mission, how to achieve that mission (the tasks), and the dynamics of the group itself.
Input from the team in addressing these issues in the ground rules will support your subsequent actions as leader—and will ensure member support in the event that a difference gets out of hand and two or more team members bring personalities into their disagreement.