Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Conflict
Conflict
t hat
all
Conflict was seen as a
p e s t be avoided.
Testuling
from poor
onenness and trust
Deiweei people, and
communication,
a lack ot
emotionally stable teams can put task contlict in perspective and focus on
how the variance in ideas can help solve the problem, rather than letting
Vice President
it degenerate into relationship conflicts. Aparna Ballakur,
that when a team member
of Human Resources at Yahoo! India, narrated
of noisiness of people around
complained of his inability to work because
called all the concerned
him she decided to address the issue head on. She
member. The
people and told them about the difficulty faced by the team
team discussed the issue and was able to amicably settle the matter. Durin
the discussion afew other issues also came up which were obviously arece
the well-being of the team members."
ing What about process conflict? Researchers found that process conne
revolve around delegation and roles. Conflicts over delegation ofteu mem
volve around shirking, and conflicts over roles can leave some group
bers feeling marginalized. Thus, process conflicts often become iug hig
conflicts. ltS a m
personalized and quickly devolve into relationship
of course, that arguing about how to do something takes time avay
from
and
actually doing it. We've all been part of groups in which the arg
debates about roles and responsibilities seem to go nowhere.
Loci of Confhct
Another way to
understand conflict is to
that urs flict occurs. Here, too, there consider its locus, or where the con-
Conflict are three
aset
basic types.
betweem people. Intragroup conflict occurs Dyadic conflict 1s COnnC
wo
Conthct that
tergroup contlict is contlict between within a group or team. u -
literature on task,groups teams.
or
oun COniicL or team Nearly all the
within
a group
siders iniragroup conflict relationship, and process conflict COU
Conflict (within the group). That makes
contlict
alergIOup
Co
between groups and teams often exist sense given
only to perform a particular task. However, hatit
g r o u p s or teams
doesn t necessarily tell us about the other loci of
search has found that for conflict. For
task conflict to influence example,
re-
within the team, it is intragroup
which important that the pertormance
have a supportive climate
mistakes aren't penalized and everyteams
team
in
back. But is this member "[has] the other s
concept useful for
group conflict for the understanding the effects of inter
team to organization? Think
adapt and improve, perhaps a certainabout, say, an IPL team. For a
good tor team amount of task conflict is
one
performance,
another. But would we careespecially when the team members support
members from another team? whether members from one team supported
with one another so that Probably not. In fact, if groups are competing
only one team can
almost inevitable. When is that "win," interteam conflict seems
One study that did focus on helpful, and when is it a concern?
tween an individual's intergroup conflict found an interplay be-
position within a group and the
way that individual
managed conilict between groups. Group members who were
peripheral in their own groups were better at resolving conflicts relatively
their group and another one. But between
this happened only when those
eral members were still accountable
to their
periph-
core of vour work group." Thus, being at the
group does not necessarily make you the best to
manage conflict with other person
groups.
Another intriguing question abóut loci is whether
conflicts interact or
buffer one another. Assume, for
example, that Smita and Shakti are on the
same team. What
happens if they don't get along interpersonally (dyadic
conflict) and their team also has high personality conflict? What happens
to their team if two other team members, Vineeta and Harsh, do get along
well: It's also possible to ask this question at the
intragroup and intergroup
level. Intense intergroup conflict can be quite stressful to group members
and might well affect the way they interact. One study found, for example,
that high levels of conflict between teams caused individuals to focus on
complying with norms within their teams.
Thus, understanding functional and dysfurnctional conflict requires
not only that we identify the type of conflict; we also need to know where it
Occurs. lt's possible that while the concepts of task, relationship, and pro
cess conflict are useful in understanding intragroup or even dyadic con-
effects of intergroup conflict.
flict, they are less useful in explaining the
In sum, the traditional view that all
conflict should be eliminated is
that conflict can stimulate active dis
short-sighted. The interactionist view emotions is incom-
cussion without spilling over into negative, disruptive
in terms of type and locus helps us realize
plete. Thinking about conflict and when it does occur,
that it is probably inevitable in most organizations,
to make it as productive as possible.
we can attempt
Exhibit 14-4 Conflict Management Techniques
esolution Techniques
Conflict-Resoli
Face-to-face meeting of the conflicting parties for the
purpose of
Problem so/ving
and resolving it
through open discussion. identifying the problem
ble
Superordinate goals Creating a shared goal that cannot be attained without the
conflicting parties. cooperation of each of the
When conflict is caused by the scarcity of a resource (for
a
tA/tering the human variablee Using behavioral change techniques such as human relations training to alter attitudes and
behaviors that cause conflict.
Altering the stuuctural Changing the formal organization structure and the interaction patterns of conflicting parties
variables through job redesign, transfers, creation of coordinating positions, and the like