This article is written by | Jingtao Weiluo Think Tank
The full text is 6755 words
Where there are people, there is conflict, and your business is naturally indispensable to conflict. The conflicts of employees in enterprises are diverse, such as conflicts between departments, conflicts between employees within departments, conflicts between employees in different departments, and so on. Conflicts can happen at any time, managers need to constantly resolve these conflicts, you don't expect a day without conflicts, as long as the business exists for a day, conflicts will exist for a day.
The conventional wisdom is that conflict is a bad thing and that all conflicts must be eliminated in a timely manner. The modern view, on the other hand, is that conflict is not necessarily a bad thing. Since it must exist, why can't we turn bad things into good things?
The type of employee conflict
I. Introduction to Conflict
1. What is a conflict
Conflict has a wide range of meanings, including people's inner motivational struggles, such as making choices about an event, and external practical struggles, such as quarrels, fights, wars, and so on. From a managerial psychological point of view, we can see conflict as mutual incompatibility or mutual exclusion of two goals. Employee conflict is the result of mutual incompatibility or mutual exclusion of goals, perceptions, or feelings between employees and the organization.
2. Conflicting traditional views
The conventional wisdom is that conflict is always a bad thing, and everything should be avoided as much as possible. This is because:
(1) Managers do not want to see conflicts, if there is no conflict, it is generally considered that the work of managers is more effective;
(2) Conflict threatens the internal harmony and unity of an organization or group;
(3) Due to conflict, employees will feel uneasy, which will affect work efficiency.
3. A modern view of conflict
Modern behaviorists have a different view of conflict, arguing that:
(1) Conflict is inevitable, it occurs naturally;
(2) The attitude towards conflict can only be acceptance;
(3) Conflict not only has a negative effect, but also a positive impact;
(4) Since conflicts exist reasonably, we can only deal with conflict events as effectively as possible and maximize the positive effects of conflicts.
4. Comparison of two basic concepts (see Table 1)
Table 1 Comparison of two basic concepts
5. The relationship between conflict and organizational progress
Too many and too few conflicts can hinder the progress of the organization. The relationship between conflict and organizational progress is shown in Figure 1:
Figure 1 The relationship between conflict and organizational progress
The relationship between conflict and job performance is shown in Table 2.
Table 2 Conflict and job performance
According to the above table, if there is too little conflict in an enterprise, it will make the employees indifferent, do not care about each other, lack of creativity, so that the enterprise sticks to the stereotype, stagnation, no response to innovation, reduces work efficiency; if the enterprise has an appropriate amount of conflict, it will increase the excitement of employees, stimulate the enthusiasm and creativity of employees, make the enterprise continue to innovate and move forward, and promote the metabolism of the enterprise in management, improve the cohesion and competitiveness of the enterprise; if the conflict of the enterprise is too large, Conflict will cause harm to the enterprise, conflict will bring destruction to the enterprise, employees reflect hostility and non-cooperation between the emotions, reduce work efficiency, but also make the development of the enterprise stagnate.
Depending on the situation in which the conflict occurs, the managers of the enterprise should take different countermeasures.
When the enterprise conflict is too small, managers should take the initiative to seek innovation and change, and carry out some activities in a purposeful manner to mobilize the innovative thinking of employees. For example, hold a big discussion on enterprise management, let employees express their opinions on the problems in enterprise management, and put forward reasonable suggestions.
When the enterprise conflict is appropriate, the manager should seriously handle the conflict, and seriously and properly deal with the problems that occur in accordance with the principles of fairness and truth-seeking.
When the enterprise conflict is too large, the manager should not rush to adjudicate the conflict, but should first ease the atmosphere, do some diversion work, and effectively protect the interests of employees. When things stabilize, it is not too late to deal with the conflict.
6. The stage of development of the conflict
In general, the development of conflict goes through five stages, namely the latent stage, the perceived stage, the perceived stage, the processing phase and the outcome phase, each of which is shown in Figure 2:
Figure 2 Stages of conflict development
(1) Latent stage.
The incubation stage is the embryonic period of conflict, when conflict is still a secondary contradiction, and employees have not yet awakened to the existence of conflict. At this stage, the hotbeds of conflict already exist, and as the environment changes, the latent conflict may disappear or be intensified.
(2) The stage of being recognized.
At this stage, the employee has already felt the existence of the conflict, but at this time the employee has not realized the importance of the conflict, and the conflict has not yet caused actual harm to the employee. If employees take timely measures at this time, they can alleviate conflicts that may erupt in the future.
(3) The stage of being felt.
At this stage, the conflict has already had an emotional impact on the employee. Employees may be angry at unfair treatment or confused about the choices that need to be made. Different employees feel differently about the conflict, which is related to the personality, values and other factors of the parties.
(4) Processing stage.
Employees need to deal with conflicts in a variety of ways. Like evasion, compromise, cooperation, and so on. There are different ways to deal with different conflicts, and even if they are the same conflict, different employees take different measures. The handling of conflicts epitomizes the way and ability of employees to deal with the world, and also reflects the value system and understanding of employees.
(5) Ending stage.
There will always be results in the handling of conflicts. Different treatments produce different results. The result may be in the interest of the parties or against the parties. When the conflict is resolved once and for all, the effect of that outcome will continue. But in many cases, conflicts are not resolved once and for all, and the outcome is only a phased outcome. Sometimes even one conflict is dealt with, which leads to several other conflicts.
Second, the type of employee conflict
1. Categorize according to content
Depending on the content of the conflict, we can simply divide the employee conflict into the following three types:
(1) Goal conflict: When the ultimate state that employees want to obtain is incompatible with each other, there will be goal conflicts. For example, if an employee wants a stable work environment (so that he can continue to review school) and the company is ready to send him on frequent business trips to run sales, there will be a conflict of goals. Conflict of purpose is the most common type of conflict and is also the most difficult to deal with because of the issues of interest involving both parties to the conflict.
(2) Cognitive conflict: When the employee's cognition (suggestions, opinions and ideas, etc.) conflicts with the cognition of others or organizations, an awareness conflict will occur. For example, employees think that the company's work evaluation method is not reasonable, and the manager believes that this evaluation method is applicable, which creates a conflict of understanding.
Another kind of cognitive conflict is the conflict of values and beliefs. For such conflicts, it is difficult to deal with through simple persuasion education, because it will make the parties adhere to their own ideas and beliefs. A better way to deal with it is to seek common ground while reserving differences, to tolerate each other, and to respect individual values and beliefs without seriously affecting the interests of the group.
(3) Emotional conflict: Emotional conflict occurs when employees are emotionally or emotionally unable to align with others or organizations. Emotional conflicts must have background events that can produce such emotions, and sometimes background events are found and can be well resolved to alleviate emotional conflicts. But when emotion has become a stereotype, there is nothing that can be done to solve specific problems alone. This requires adequate communication between the two parties to the conflict (or through a third party) to achieve mutual trust and thus resolve the emotional conflict.
2. Dublin's conflict classification model
The behaviorist Dublin divides conflict into two scales, one of which studies the pros and cons of conflict and divides it into beneficial and harmful; the other scale, which divides conflict into substantive and personal, starting from the substance of conflict. Substance refers to conflicts involving technical or administrative factors; the essence of the individual involves conflicts of personal emotions, attitudes, and personality factors. See Table 3:
Table 3 Dublin conflict classification model
Depending on this classification, conflicts can be divided into four types:
Type 1: Beneficial substance. Such conflicts are concrete transactional conflicts that themselves serve the interests of the parties to the conflict. For example, a discussion on how to improve working conditions.
Type 2: Harmful substance. Such conflicts are concrete transactional conflicts that are inherently detrimental to the interests of the parties to the conflict. For example, the debate between the company and the employee about the treatment.
Type 3: Beneficial to individuals. Such conflicts are conflicts of personal feelings, and the conflict itself is in the interest of all parties to the conflict.
Type 4: Harmful to individuals. Such conflicts are conflicts of personal feelings, and the conflict itself is detrimental to the interests of the parties to the conflict.
It should be noted that the type to which a conflict belongs is not static, and it may change with changes in the environment or events. For example, due to the management errors of the superior, the performance of the subordinates is reduced, which is itself a substantive conflict, but if the superior is like this for a long time, it is inevitable that there will be personal conflicts (emotional conflicts).
Causes of employee conflict
I. Dublin's model of the causes of conflict
Dublin, a well-known behavioral scientist, used a systematic perspective to observe the problem of conflict and proposed a system model of conflict, as shown in Figure 3:
Figure 3 Model of the causes of the Dublin conflict
According to the system model, the causes of conflicts can be divided into the following eight types:
(1) Human personality.
Differences in personality can lead to different understandings of the same issues by parties to a conflict, and if such differences in understanding cannot be reconciled, they are bound to lead to conflict. In addition, different personalities approach problems differently, and because of these inconsistencies, conflicts can also arise.
(2) Competition for limited resources.
Resources are always limited, and the struggle for limited resources by the parties to the conflict for their own interests will also lead to conflict. Within the enterprise, the financial, material and human resources of the enterprise are limited, and the competition for these resources in different departments will definitely lead to conflicts between departments.
(3) Conflicts of values and interests.
Inconsistencies in different values and interests are also a source of conflict. Values are formed by a person's long-term practice, and cannot be changed in a short-term stage, so the conflict of values is also long-term.
Conflicts of interest can be reflected as direct conflicts of interest and indirect conflicts of interest. For example, unfair treatment is a direct conflict of interest; while the conflict of training opportunities, development opportunities and other issues is reflected as a conflict of indirect interests.
(4) Role conflicts.
Conflicts can also arise when the role of the enterprise is inaccurate or the employees themselves do not recognize their role positioning. For example, if a department manager interferes with the affairs of other departments without authorization, it will naturally clash with the department manager. In the enterprise, the root cause of role conflict is that the enterprise role is not accurately positioned. Because the enterprise has not carried out effective work analysis, the enterprise's model of copying and copying documents such as job responsibilities to other enterprises is not in line with the reality of the enterprise, which is bound to lead to inaccurate role positioning of the enterprise.
(5) Chasing power.
Some people are empowered. In particular, some managers are loyal to the pursuit of power, and cannot do things within their own work in peace; they like to deal with things beyond their duties and levels, which will cause multi-headed leadership of employees and disorderly management of enterprises. Conflict is inevitable in such circumstances.
(6) The provisions of duties are not clear.
Conflicts can arise because of the different responsibilities of departments, or because the responsibilities of each position are unclear. The lack of clarity of responsibilities is reflected in the fact that some work is not done, and on the other hand, it is reflected in the intersection of work content.
(7) There is a change in the organization.
When the business direction, personnel structure and management mode of the enterprise change, the original balance state will be broken, and new conflicts will naturally be caused. After some conflict, companies will reach a new equilibrium.
(8) Poor organizational atmosphere.
The values of the enterprise are confused, there are no strict management regulations, and the managers and employees in the enterprise are busy for their own interests. In this atmosphere, it is also easy to cause conflicts.
Second, the causes of individual conflicts among employees
Individual employee conflicts refer to the conflicts of employees themselves, which are generally not directly related to other personnel. The causes of individual employee conflicts can be divided into three types: double-trend conflict, double-avoidance conflict and avoidance-type conflict.
1. Bi-trend conflict
The parties to the conflict themselves are in the interest of the employees themselves. For example, because of the outstanding performance of the employee, the company is ready to reward the employee, so that the employee can choose whether to travel or train. This conflict is beneficial to the employee regardless of which outcome is chosen.
2. Double avoidance type conflict
In contrast to bipoloc conflict, the parties to the conflict themselves are disadvantageous to the employees themselves. For example, due to poor performance of employees, the company gave employees the choice of salary reduction or resignation.
3. Avoidance conflict
The parties to the conflict may themselves be beneficial to the employees themselves, or they may be disadvantaged by the employees themselves. For example, if employees re-choose their jobs, they may choose a better place than the current unit, and it may also be that the new unit is not as good as the current one.
Third, the causes of conflicts between employees
The causes of conflict between employees are diverse. To sum up, there are four main types:
1. Conflicts based on information
Information not being shared is a major cause of information-based conflicts.
First, not sharing information can create a sense of unfairness among employees. Two employees in the same position and the same superior, due to the preference of the manager or other reasons, the amount of information they obtain in the work is different, and the employees with a small amount of information have an unfair feeling, and if this situation continues, it will even produce hostility towards another employee or superior.
2. Conflict based on values
Due to the different growth environment, education level, social experience, etc. of each employee, it is normal for values to differ. There is no conflict between the values themselves, but the values are often reflected in the work attitude and work behavior of employees, and the different attitudes and behaviors of employees may conflict.
3. Conflict based on cognition
Different understandings of the same thing also create conflicts. For example, the same software development, due to the different understanding of the technical route, there will naturally be conflicts in the development process. It is normal for each employee to have a different understanding of the same thing, which requires the decision-makers of the enterprise to make decisions, so that everyone can have a unified understanding and unified action to achieve the business goals of the enterprise.
4. Based conflict
The conflict based on the position stems from the manager's sense of position. Managers often form this conflict when considering problems from their own development and self-interest. For example, some managers are afraid that their subordinates will surpass themselves and are reluctant to delegate to their subordinates; some managers interfere with the work of subordinates or other departments in order to show their management talents, which are concrete manifestations of local consciousness.
Fourth, the causes of organizational conflicts
Organizational conflict refers to the conflict between groups and employees within an enterprise, and between groups and groups. The main causes of organizational conflicts are job responsibility conflicts, conflicts between production departments and functional departments, horizontal conflicts and vertical conflicts.
1. Conflict of job responsibilities
Unclear responsibilities of departmental positions are prone to organizational conflicts. Unclear job responsibilities include the following two aspects:
(1) The job responsibilities themselves are not clear.
If the enterprise does not have job responsibilities, or has not carried out job analysis, the job responsibilities follow the analysis results of other enterprises, or the enterprise has undergone major changes, it will be manifested as the job responsibilities themselves are not clear. If the job responsibilities themselves are not clear, there will be no accurate division of labor for the employee's work, and over time, conflicts will arise.
(2) Failure to work according to job responsibilities.
Although some enterprises have clear and applicable job responsibilities, due to the insufficient implementation of job responsibilities, employees do not work in accordance with the requirements of job responsibilities, and conflicts will also occur. At this time, it should be noted that the implementation of job responsibilities managers are very responsible, if the manager does not strictly follow the job responsibilities to assign work, employees even if they want to work according to the job responsibilities, will be at a loss.
2. Conflicts between production departments and functional departments
Broadly speaking, the production department is a department that directly brings profits to the enterprise, such as the technology department, the manufacturing department, the production department, the marketing department, etc. can be regarded as the production department. Functional departments are departments that serve the production department, such as administration department, human resources department, finance department, etc.
Since the functional departments are both management departments and service departments, and are service departments for various departments of the enterprise, the production department rarely deals with other departments, and the nature and tasks of the work are also very different. Therefore, conflicts between production departments and functional departments also have their inevitability.
For example, in order to maintain the company's financial situation, the financial department strictly implements the company's financial reimbursement system, and the marketing department will naturally be controlled by the financial department due to the large cost of travel and entertainment, and the marketing department believes that their expenses are normal, because they need to establish a relationship with customers, so that the marketing department will conflict with the financial department.
3. Horizontal conflict
Horizontal conflict refers to parallel conflict between groups. For example, the conflict in the above example is both a conflict between the production department and the functional department, but also a horizontal conflict.
4. Vertical conflict
Vertical conflict refers to conflict between groups that have affiliations. For example, the conflict between the head office and the branch, the conflict between the decision-making level and the functional department, and so on.
Resolution of the conflict
First, the general method of resolving employee conflicts
The following six methods can generally be used to resolve employee conflicts: consultation, superior arbitration, procrastination, peaceful coexistence, transfer targeting and education.
1. Negotiation Law
This is a common way to resolve conflicts and is the best solution. This approach is appropriate when both parties to a conflict are evenly matched and the reasons are justified. The specific method is that the manager understands the opinions, opinions and reasons of the two parties to the conflict separately, and then organizes a tripartite meeting so that the two parties to the conflict fully understand each other's ideas, and finally reach an agreement through effective communication.
2. Superior Arbitration Law
When the hostility between the parties to the conflict is serious and one of the parties to the conflict is obviously unreasonable, the superior arbitration method should be adopted, and it is more appropriate for the superior to directly conduct the arbitration.
3. Procrastination law
Conflicts between the two sides are not very serious and are based on awareness, and if these conflicts do not have much impact on work, the delaying method is more effective. Over time and environmental changes, conflict may naturally disappear.
4. Peaceful Coexistence Act
For conflicts of values or religious beliefs, it is easy to use the method of peaceful coexistence. Only when both sides of the conflict seek common ground while reserving differences and learn to recognize and accept each other's values and beliefs can they develop together.
5. Transfer target method
When employees themselves are in conflict, it is more effective to adopt the transfer target method. For example, let employees focus on a certain point of interest, forget about unpleasant things, and so on.
6. Education Law
If employees have their own conflicts because of some unrealistic ideas, managers can help employees recognize their own reality and educate employees to use the right way to see and understand problems. This helps employees mitigate conflicts.
Second, Thomas's conflict management model
Thomas argues that the mode of dealing with conflict is two-dimensional. One dimension is the degree of arbitrariness, and the other dimension is the degree of cooperation. These two-dimensional interactions result in a total of five treatments. As shown in Figure 4:
Figure 4 Thomas conflict handling model
The chart abscissa indicates the degree of "cooperation". "Cooperation" here means: to satisfy the interests of others. The ordinate indicates the degree of "arbitrariness". The so-called "arbitrary" refers to: to satisfy their own interests. In this two-dimensional model, there are five strategies for dealing with conflict, namely: jus cogens, avoidance, compromise, restraint and cooperation (see Table 4).
Table 4 Five strategies for handling conflicts in Toddler
Solutions to organizational conflicts
There are many ways to resolve organizational conflicts, but there are three main ones. They are the law of authority, the law of segregation and the law of buffer.
1. Law of Authority
The law of authority is the method of using authority control to resolve conflicts. When an organization is in conflict, managers can resolve the conflict by using their authority to adjudicate the conflict. A typical example is that when various departments compete for the company's limited resources, the general manager often makes the final decision on the allocation of resources.
2. Isolation method
The vertical management system is actually the specific application of the isolation method. When a department needs the cooperation of other departments, it usually does not go directly to the department to make a request, but reports to its direct superior, who coordinates with the other party's superior, and the other party's superior arranges with the department. This isolation reduces conflicts between departments. But the drawbacks are also obvious, it is not suitable for the needs of modern enterprises to reflect quickly, and lacks the team's active and collaborative spirit.
3. Buffering method
The buffer method can be divided into three forms: reserve buffer, liaison officer as buffer, and mediation department as buffer.
(1) Use reserves as a buffer.
Some reserves are made between the two associated departments, thereby reducing interdepartmental conflicts. For example, the administrative department is responsible for the procurement of the company's office supplies, and if the administrative department has a reserve of items, it can be received in time when other departments need to receive office supplies, which will naturally reduce the conflicts between them.
(2) Buffered by a liaison officer.
Department managers in each department often act as liaisons, dealing with collaboration and coordination issues between their own and other departments. Of course, you can also set the position of the manager assistant, so that the manager assistant acts as a liaison.
(3) Use the mediation department as a buffer.
For larger enterprises, there is a special coordination department responsible for coordinating inter-departmental conflicts. In fact, the regular office meetings of various enterprises are often a temporary mediation department. At regular office meetings, it is easier to resolve conflicts between departments because the company's decision-making level and the relevant representatives of the conflict are present.
This article is an excerpt from the ☞ Employee Management Handbook
The employee management manual involves a comprehensive dynamic process of employee management overview, employee work analysis, employee quality assessment, employee pressure management, employee motivation management, employee communication management, employee authorization management, employee conflict management, employee career development management, employee job satisfaction, knowledge-based employee management, employee labor protection, talent loss prevention and employee management operation practices, etc., which is a golden key to open the door to successful management of employees.