5 Powerful Conflict Resolution Strategies
Conflict Resolution Strategies: A Canadian’s Perspective
Growing up a Canadian, I quickly learned the value my country places on being “polite.” I would hear it constantly when I traveled, “you’re a Canadian? I love Canadians! You are all so nice.” Indeed, Canadians take great pride in our reputation as friendly and polite people, and we go to great lengths to protect that culture. Perhaps too far at times.
Take for example a recent story I heard from a colleague of mine. He has a background in sports coaching and has trained many professional and Olympic athletes. As a European who has lived in Canada for a significant amount of time now, he mentioned to me how many athletic teams and organizations are now moving away from Canadian coaches in his particular sport because of their inability to hold their athletes accountable and have difficult conversations. So yes there is such a thing as being too polite.
Nonetheless, as I grew up I started noticing many inconsistencies in what we claimed our cultural identity was, and how many people behaved. Sure people would often say the right things in public, then behind closed doors you would hear what they actually thought. Underneath the aura of politeness lay many avoidant and passive-aggressive habits, and I am not excluding myself by the way. The point is that even for nice Canadians, conflict is still an ongoing issue in daily life. We simply try to pretend it isn’t there. But really can you blame us? Most people were raised under the mantras of “don’t rock the boat,” and “let sleeping dogs lie.” The problem is that these behaviors do not help us reduce conflict, rather they hinder our ability to resolve it, thus affecting our performance. This is especially true in the workplace.
The Fear of Conflict Resolution
In a recent survey conducted by CIPD, the most common responses to resolving conflict in the workplace were:
47% letting it go
29% discussing it with HR
21% talking to someone outside of work
And only 17% answered addressing the issue directly with the person involved
So it’s safe to say that Canadians are not the only ones who have an aversion to conflict. Clearly, confrontation and conflict resolution are skills that are sorely lacking in many organizations. To cover up this deficiency, many workplaces adopt a mindset of artificial harmony. Coach Amy Gallo describes this concept quite well in this video. Simply put, this state is where groups prioritize maintaining the perception of harmony over addressing issues. So they will pretend they agree and have pleasant relationships while ignoring anything that could spark conflict. In my years as a leadership coach, I would say the majority of organizations engage in some form of artificial harmony.
Some behaviors you may see here are:
Failure to speak up in meetings. Everyone nods their head in agreement, when deep down they may disagree or have reservations.
Rather than confront the individuals involved, people will gossip to others or go straight to HR when there is a conflict.
Leadership is friendly with their team but doesn’t hold them accountable.
People only communicate with each other through email, rather than a phone call or meeting in person.
Bad behaviors or poor performance is tolerated, and the team finds ways to simply work around it, rather than address it.
These are all strong indicators of artificial harmony, and my experience is that every organization experiences at least 1 or 2 of these regularly. Typically this condition arises when teams lack confidence in their ability to resolve conflict or their organization's level of support. As we know human beings are instant gratification machines and in most cases, people will prioritize the immediate security of avoiding conflict, rather than the future benefit of resolving an issue.
This is where organizations have an incredible opportunity to better equip their people with communication and conflict resolution tools, and then implement policies to support them. Overall, the goal is to create a self-help system for conflict. When teams have just a few go-to tools and strategies, they are much more likely to attempt to resolve issues themselves. From there it is important that leadership has established the next steps in the case of a failed resolution attempt.
So with that said, here are some practical tools and strategies for helping your people approach difficult conversations with confidence.
5 Resolution Strategies
1. Assume Positive Intent
One of the most important parts of conflict resolution is what we call emotional regulation. We could define this term as one’s ability to effectively manage and respond to an emotional experience.
Conflict of course can be a very emotional experience, which is why we must develop this form of self-control. In the immortal words of Mike Tyson:
“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.”
We can learn a bunch of great tools, but the moment we feel angry, upset, or threatened, we tend to forget what we know and simply react. A great way to decrease our reactivity is by assuming positive intent of the other party. If we start from this place, we will be less defensive and able to think more clearly in the moment because we can attribute the behaviors or the person to something other than malice. Even if the other person did not have good intentions, assuming that from the beginning will rarely lead us to a good response. Instead, we are more likely to react out of anger or fear and escalate the situation.
2. Questions before Opinions
In a similar spirit to the last point, starting the conversation with questions rather than our opinions will not only make us less reactive but the other party as well because they feel we are interested in their side of the story. However, the important caveat here is that we ask open-ended, non-judgmental questions. In other words, questions with the intention to understand rather than poke holes in the other person’s reasoning. In doing this, will help de-escalate the situation and also provide us with a bigger pool of information to work with in the conversation.
3. Move from Positions to Interests
When conflict or negotiations hit a standstill, chances are it is because one or both sides have become entrenched in their position. A position is what you have decided on, where the underlying interest is why you decided that.
For example: let’s say a marketing team is divided over some design choices for a new ad. One side wants something bright and flashy, while the other side wants more cool colors. Those are their positions and currently, they are incompatible. Someone has to win that argument, and someone has to lose. However, perhaps the underlying interest for the side that wants a bright and flashy design is that the group lead has had poor performance on some of his projects in the past and wants to try something new that will be eye-catching. However, he may not volunteer this information out of fear or shame. He may not even know he is thinking that way.
When we are stuck in positions, we are more likely to turn the conversation into a zero-sum game. On the other hand, underlying interests are usually much more flexible and can be met in several ways. Asking good open-ended questions can help you uncover what the interest is. Some great questions I like include:
How did you arrive at this idea?
What is most important to you here?
Can you tell me more about that?
4. Mirroring and Paraphrasing
Active listening is a powerful tool for building trust and rapport, and these are 2 great forms of it. Mirroring involves paying attention to certain words or phrases that the other person uses and repeating them back to the individual. This shows them that you are listening and care about their perspective. Furthermore, it also activates the individuals mirror neurons in their brain which help build emotional connection.
Paraphrasing can also be effective. With this tool, you repeat back what you heard the other person say in your own words. This shows the other party what you understood about their perspective so you can clarify gaps in understanding.
5. Establish a Clear Resolution Process
Finally, on a macro level, it can be very helpful for an organization to create a clear set of steps for resolving conflicts. Make sure at each step to communicate what the expectations are, and how people will be supported.
An example of this could be:
Step 1 – Individuals are expected to attempt to resolve the conflict on their own.
Step 2 – They will meet with their supervisor and report on what they tried and how it went.
Step 3 – If the issue is still not resolved, it could be escalated higher up in the organization to HR or senior leadership.
Step 4 – Finally the organization could seek the help of a 3rd party… like myself (sorry for the shameless plug.)
More Resources for Conflict Resolution
These are some of the most impactful tools and methods I teach for equipping your people to deal with difficult conversations. As I said earlier, the focus should be building out a self-help system that empowers your people to resolve issues on their own. From there you simply need to provide the proper support.
Some additional resources you may find helpful are a couple of recent blog posts of mine:
De-escalation 101 for the Workplace
Workplace Conflict: 3 Surprising Ways it Escalates
Finally, if you are looking for ways to equip your people for confident communication, I would love to have a conversation about how coaching and workshops with me can help your organization build an effective system for managing conflict. Go ahead and book a Discovery Call with me to find out more!
