Power imbalances can undermine team morale and performance, as illustrated through the example of Roberto—a team member whose dominance disrupts collaboration. Emotional intelligence, influence, and shared goals can help leaders restore healthier team dynamics.
Key Insights
- Significant power imbalances with conflicting goals often result in reduced productivity, low morale, and rising internal tension.
- Leaders can improve team dynamics by building rapport, validating contributions, and focusing conversations on shared interests.
- While third-party facilitation is sometimes needed, developing internal conflict management skills is a long-term leadership advantage.
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Welcome back. I don't know about you, but I look at that case study and say, I don't want to be in that. And yet, aren't there oftentimes where there is a dominant person, personality, sitting within our group?
And in this case, we have Roberto. And in this case, his level of power, as he sees it, and as it's been given to him by those around him, is extremely high, isn't it? The goals are mismatched, at least in the beginning, but certainly, his power imbalance is very high. And so what do we have here? We have low morale.
We have a lack of productivity. We have tension. We have all the things that low power and low goal would include.
Now, we might find a variety of different ways to go at this, but I do think that if we can start looking at what do we share in terms of interests, and what do we share in terms of goals, and what do we share in terms of caring about the ultimate impact on the agency and who it serves, then that can be the beginning of a stronger discussion. But what's always interesting is when you have a Roberto, oftentimes what you have to do is, I'm stuck on a word here, but to validate his seniority, validate his experience, validate his success, which I know is very hard, but in doing so, also suggest that you don't want to take any of that away from him, but you want to add to the conversation with your experience as well. And so if we can get a little bit closer to using our influence through our people skills and negotiate closer to the interests that we share, we can, I think, make some movement in the direction of building a better team.
Ultimately, I don't know that we can just leap right into collaborative effort yet. I think we have to pull out all of our building relationships and EI skills in order to get this conversation moving in a more positive direction. And if we can take it step by step by increasing some influence and increasing some shared goals, we might be able to get into that collaborative effort at some point, but it is going to take some time.
Is this a place where a third party might be brought in? Possibly. It depends on how critical the decision is that has to be made, or for the team to begin to be more productive together. And so qualified facilitators might be the answer.
I would suggest that's not the first thing that you want to do. It's always, I think, better if the group can do it on their own and for themselves, but it's certainly an option to bring in that third party. Right.
Life in an organization. So now that we're closing out module three, my goal for you in every module is for you to identify your strengths and areas for growth in conflict resolution. What are you good at? And what are some things that you need to add in terms of your skill sets? Because we know that an effective leader is one who is also skilled in conflict resolution.
So conflict is inevitable. We can't pretend it away. And we know that there is so much value in allowing and encouraging healthy conflict, because it really contributes to a more engaged workplace that can produce better results.
And as I just mentioned, I don't know that you can be called an effective leader without having these strong conflict resolution skills. They are essential.
