Managing conflict at work: why managers fail
Abstract
Conflict management is an integral part of a manager's role, but many managers shy away from tackling difficult situations, because they often lack the necessary skills and experience. Managers' failings in this area of management, however, cannot always be ascribed to a lack of competence. This article draws on research within the fields of management behaviour and social science to examine the causes of workplace conflict and the conflict process itself. A range of factors are identified within both, which act as barriers to effective management. The article concludes that managers cannot always be blamed for poor conflict outcomes, but can and should work to build workplaces where issues are brought out into the open and discussed freely and honestly and where employees take an active role in finding the right solutions.
Everyone at one time or another will experience some form of conflict at work. How individuals handle this depends on a number of factors — their personality, upbringing and culture, how experienced they are in dealing with similar situations, how important the issues are to them and how emotionally involved they are. These are among the factors that come into play in a conflict situation serving to muddy the waters and complicate things so that it often seems impossible to recognize the real underlying issues.
In the UK, expert advisory organizations, such as the Advisory Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS, 2009) and the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD, 2007), recommend that individuals try to resolve conflicts informally between themselves first. Failing this, the next logical step is to approach the manager who will be able to sort the problem out. Or, will they? Unfortunately, although conflict management is an integral part of a manager's role, many managers lack the necessary skills. Few managers receive training in conflict management. Even fewer consider that they need such training with the consequence that difficult situations are all too often made worse or difficult conversations never take place when they really should (Masters and Albright, 2002). Serious, unresolved workplace conflicts lead to low staff morale, high staff turnover and poor client relationships.
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