The Impact of Conflict: Navigating Healthy and Unhealthy Dynamics

Welcome back. You're already beginning to see that this whole discussion about conflict is rather complex, and we are taking some time to take a look at it, but it is definitely a subject area in which you could pursue even more fully. And we are going to pursue it more fully by going on to the next section in this, which is to talk about the impacts of healthy and unhealthy conflict.

All right, and there is a pretty significant difference between the two because healthy conflict creates productivity. It creates an engaged workplace. It produces better results in terms of problem-solving and decision-making.

And so our goal here isn't to get rid of conflict, but it is to make sure that any conflict we're experiencing in the workplace is healthy. Unhealthy conflict gets in the way, and it can be destructive. So let's take a look at the difference between healthy conflict and unhealthy conflict.

So when we're talking about healthy conflict, what we know is that we are encouraging healthy conflict, which is a flourishing kind of environment to operate in, when we have clear expectations, when we encourage and embrace questions and answers, when we are human, when we bring our genuine self into the conversation, and when we allow ourselves to be vulnerable. So let's just take these apart for a moment. To set clear expectations, okay, what are we doing here? We're defining what productivity and success look like in our team, let's say, and we keep repeating that.

We keep making our expectations for the team really clear. I think it helps team members understand if I know what I expect to bring to the table, then it's easier for me to bring that to the table. And so those expectations may include that we're always respectful here.

We do not attack anyone as we have a difference of opinion. We expect different perspectives. This is an open discussion where it's safe for you to say what you want to say here, as long as you're not attacking another person.

We're attacking problems here. We're making decisions here. We're trying to find new and innovative solutions here.

It requires discussion. Asking questions, you know what? First of all, if you're unclear about my expectations, then you'd better ask me what they are, because I'll work really hard to be more specific about that. And, you know, sometimes people are reluctant to ask questions, but maybe that's happening because you're in a larger group.

But if I talk to them one-on-one, they are more likely to pose questions to me and generate a conversation that way. You know what? That being human piece is so critical from my point of view, because the more I know about the people around me, the more I know about what's important to them, what motivates them, what their values are, or what creates tension for them, what's easier for them to work in. You know what? That one-on-one engagement where I'm really trying to get a good sense of who this other person is and what makes them tick, you know what? That encourages both of us, I think, to pursue differences of opinion in a very mature way.

I think vulnerability is also another key trait for leaders in general, but specifically when we are trying to work through some conflict. You know, isn't it much easier to work through a conflict with someone you see as genuine and honest and one who fosters mutual respect and trust? You know, somebody who can admit a mistake if they made one and can adjust. These are all our EI qualities that we talked about in the last module, for sure.

So, what we know is when we feel safe in an environment, and these steps create safety, do they not, then we are going to get more creative solutions, better collaboration, more innovation, bottom line, more progress. Things will move forward in a more productive and valuable way. All right.

If all conflict could be so healthy, but our experience is that it's not. Unfortunately, I think all of us have experienced some unhealthy conflict in the workplace. And when does it occur? Well, it occurs when one person or a group tries to assert some power over another.

And it could include talking over them, blaming them, claiming superiority, and putting other people down with negative statements. You know what, this kind of conflict is disruptive. It disrupts teams.

It leads to resentment. There's negativity. And you can actually see more employee turnover as a result of it.

When it's allowed to go on for an extended period of time in the workplace, there's often this denial that there is a problem. Like, no, that's really not as big a problem as everyone's making it. Well, yeah, it is.

And then there's a lot of avoidance of dealing with the issues. There's a lot of anger. There's a lot of blame.

There's a lot of manipulation. And what we know is that it's really hard to work in a workplace like this because you don't feel safe. You're trying to duck and stay out of the conflict, trying to just kind of keep focused on what you have to do and not engage in all of that stuff over there that feels bad.

I have worked in, I've done training in some agencies where all the training in the world wasn't going to solve the problem. And one in particular, I was brought in to talk about building employee trust in the organization. And evidently, there had been a survey, one of those employee engagement surveys, and the results were disastrous.

The employees were extremely unhappy with the new director, who had been brought in to clean up the mess. And I had these unhappy people in class who were, and they were supervisors, and they were being asked to build trust within the agency when they themselves had been pretty much told that they were the problem. It was a very complicated situation.

And they were angry and they were resentful. And they took it out on me to a certain degree until we kind of came to, I'm not the enemy here, I'm trying to help. But I said, so why is there so much stress and conflict going on in here? Why is there so much negativity? And they said, well, the director didn't feel that the holiday party was appropriate.

So that he, it was a he, he took that away because we didn't deserve it. He took away any participative decision-making. He pretty much is treating everyone like children.

And it just went on and on and on and on and on. And so in class, we were doing some kind of survey on negativity. And I mean, these 25 people scored an average of a three on a scale of 10, which was 10 was good.

And so it was a very real and poor situation. You would probably ask, Why didn't these people just leave? Well, it was in a more remote location with a very specialized type of work. And most of these people had grown up in the area, had family in the area.

And it wasn't like they were just going to go to another agency in DC. I mean, it was pretty remote. So that was not exactly the option that most of them had.

We, we did get to a place in the class where we could talk about ways to handle it and ways to navigate around it. One of the employees in the class decided to share what we had talked about with the director, and shared that in our very internal training, the group scored three out of 10 in terms of workplace satisfaction, that kind of thing. The director chose to put out an email to all employees that said, your negativity is not my problem.

Fix it if you want to last here. No wonder there was so much unhealthy conflict going on in this agency. I'm laughing, but I'm not laughing.

It was one of the worst that I had ever seen. The good news is the director didn't last long there. And I did not go back to that particular agency to see how things were going after that.

But I can tell you they probably could not have gotten any worse. And so unhealthy conflict can be personally destructive, personally defensive, personally unproductive, and also organizationally defensive and unproductive. It's the spiral downward.

And it becomes harder and harder even for the best employees to be able to generate enough energy and motivation to be at their best. It's stabilizing. So we do know when it comes to unhealthy conflict, you know what, we might as well call it what it is.

This is not working here. And avoiding it or pretending it doesn't exist doesn't make it go away. And usually it gets worse.

And I think what we have to do to turn around is look at conflict as an opportunity. And an opportunity to conquer problems and to make the workplace better. And as soon as we start seeing conflict, workplace conflict, this is the time when we need to start asking questions about how we are going to face it. And how are we going to use this as an opportunity? It may be in terms of encouraging accountability; let's pretend you have two people who were going at it, and they just won't stop.

And yeah, I would encourage them to resolve it between themselves before taking it, let's say to another level. And asking them to work through the issues to a satisfactory degree. I would certainly point out the benefits of them doing that.

And the value in them treating their conflict as a professional opportunity to get back to their best. I might give them some guidelines, remember those tips, for how to converse with one another. But I would like to stay out of it and encourage them to take ownership of the problem that they are having between the two of them.

That does not mean that I never step in. But it means that I delay stepping in. I'm trying to teach those other people that there's a better way to resolve conflict.

And if they can be successful in that, then that was a good growth experience for them as well. However, if the accountability approach does not work and the unhealthy conflict continues, then it's probably time for me as a leader to get myself involved in it. I still want to be guiding the conversation.

I want to discourage the personal attacks. I want to facilitate a mutual decision that's going to accommodate both parties. And I do want them to move to action.

So I am going to certainly be encouraging that and maybe even requiring that. But yes, there are times when I must get involved. And if I don't, then I'm not holding myself accountable to what I should be doing as a leader.

There are times when it's so deep and so difficult that bringing in an outside and objective party might be the best solution. I don't like to use those as the first solution. I would prefer to see if we can't get through this ourselves.

But if I feel like the conflict is too close, too personal, and I can't see any movement in any direction, then I probably need to bring in someone who is professionally skilled as a mediator or facilitator to help us with it. What I know that I know that I know that I know is that unhealthy conflict, when left to continue, is disastrous for an organization. This is where organizational environments begin to be called toxic.

And that is not what we want under our leadership, for sure.