Effective Conflict Mediation

Conflict in any environment is natural and bound to take place. Most movies require some form of conflict in order to help the audience develop a sense of loss and later to recover and feel the joy and excitement of recovery. Hollywood writers base a portion of a films premise on this very concept. Also, most psychiatrists would argue that a relationship free of any contention, or a portion of turmoil, is possibly in a far worse state than that of a relationship with apparent struggle.

Struggle, many times, may imply an effort is being put forward to resolve conflict. Therefore, it can be argued that conflict is natural and healthy. What remains to be determined is the affect we have on a given situation based on our response. So how do we respond? The situation presented regarding an employee who has alienated clients and coworkers is a great scenario to evaluate conflict resolution and no doubt these kinds of situations take place all of the time and in many environments. The work place is one such environment, but it tends to be a complicated organism. However, like most things that become complicated a simple fix just might be the answer.

Prior to finding a fix to a problem it’s important to know the root of the problem. This requires sincere research and if the appropriate steps aren’t taken the problem can actually escalate and worsen; we in effect create a greater issue. Dennis Sandole studied the various ways in which conflict can be best resolved. In his published work "Comprehensive Mapping of Conflict and Conflict Resolution: A Three Pillar Approach, A." he states, “Although, prescriptively, an effective intervention ought to depend upon knowing something about any given conflict and its causes and conditions before intervening into it, descriptively, there is a "two-culture problem" between the academic and other researchers who study and theorize about conflicts and the practitioners who actually try to intervene in them. My objective here, therefore, is to propose and outline such a mapping in a manner that connects theory to practice, to maximize the prospects that interventions will be effective: unless we know what makes conflicts "tick," we may, good intentions to the contrary, only make matters worse.” (Sandhole 1998)

With these factors being taken into consideration it becomes important to find out what the root of the problem might be with an employee. I would suggest giving all parties involved the benefit of the doubt. This would entail the necessity to engage the situation and take the time to sit down and have face-to-face interaction with the employees involved in the conflict. While doing so, I would suggest that empathy is key to providing mediation and resolving the situation for both parties.

So many times dismissal is a choice management rushes toward and the resolution of conflict is simply observed through avoidance rather than careful consideration and big picture thinking. This kind of scenario relates directly back to our fight or flight mentality and unfortunately taking flight always seems like the easiest solution but reaps a far lesser reward.

References

Sandole, Dennis J.D. "Comprehensive Mapping of Conflict and Conflict Resolution: A    Three Pillar Approach, A." , December 1998