UNIT FIVE

MANAGEMENT OF ORGANIZATIONAL CONFLICT

 Wat is conflict?
› conflict: a situation in which two or more people
disagree over issues of organizational substance and/or
experience some emotional antagonism with one
another.

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CONT’D---

Features of conflict
 Conflict occurs when two or more parties pursue mutually exclusive
goals, values or events.
 Conflict arises out of two perceptions.
 Conflict refers to deliberate behavior.
 Conflict is different from competition.
 In conflict one said sees an opportunity to acquire resources/ perform
activities where as in competition both sides try to win, but neither side
actively interferes with the other.
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CONT’D---

Positive consequences of conflict

 It is major stimulant for change.
 Group think is avoided.
 It fosters creativity and innovation.
 Cohesion and satisfaction.
 A minimum level of conflict is optimal.
 It also helps individuals in reducing accumulated ill-
feelings and tensions between them.
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 A good fight clears the air.

CONT’D---
Negative conflicts

1. It creates stress in people:

 it extracts its fall on the physical and mental health of the
combatants. An intense conflict generates feelings of anxiety,
guilty, frustrations and hostility.

2. Diversion of energy:
 this is one of the most dead full consequences of conflict is the
diversion of the groups’ time and effort toward winning the
conflict rather than toward achieving organizational goals. 4
CAUSE OF CONFLICT IN ORGANIZATIONS
1. Communication

 Insufficient exchange of information, and noise in the communication

channel are all barriers to communication and potential antecedent

conditions to conflict.

2. Coordination of work

 Organizations need coordination among several departments’

activities to manufacture products or give services, and friction often

arises in the process.

 Essentially, the conflict arises from the interdependence of the tasks 5

of the units in the organizations.

CONT’D---
Task interdependence
 refers to the amount of reliance a work group has to put on another
organizational unit to complete its projects. Generally, there are three
kinds of task interdependence. These are:

A. Sequential task interdependence

 This kind of interdependence requires one group to complete its task
before another group can start its tasks.
 That is the product (output) of one group is the raw material (input) of
another group.
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 Poor performance by the first group can make the second group perform
poorly, so conflicts between the groups can be intense.
CONT’D---

B. Reciprocal task interdependence

 In this kind of task interdependence, some out puts of each group
become inputs of the other group.
 The close the links among the groups provide many areas for potential
conflicts.

C. Pooled task interdependence

 Pooled interdependence requires no interaction among groups because
each group performs separately.
 Organization can coordinate group efforts through standard policies7 and
procedures.
CONT’D---

3. Difference in terms of goals

Groups within organizations have diverse goals.

For example,
 purchasing is concerned with the timely acquisition of inputs at lower prices.
 marketing’s goals concentrate on disposing of out puts and increasing revenues.
 quality control’s attention is focused on improving quality and ensuring that the
organization’s product meet the standards and production units seek efficiency
of operations by maintaining a steady production flow.
 This diversity of goals among groups is a major source of conflict. 8
CONT’D---

4. Organizational reward system

 Groups come into conflict as they compete for scarce resources. Causes related to

reward system may include: resource interdependence, conflicting rewarding

system, and competition as a motivational strategy.

5. Resource inter dependence

 Eg. Two separate manufacturing plants making the same product may compete for

additional budget allocations or additional personnel from corporate headquarters.

6. Conflicting reward system

 Reward systems are found to create conflict when one member’s gain in at other’s
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expense.
TYPES OF ORGANIZATIONAL
CONFLICT
I. Individual Level
II. Group Level
III. Organizational Level

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I. INDIVIDUAL LEVEL CONFLICTS
A) Intra-individual – it is internal to the persons.
 it can be related to two things:
 Conflicts arising due to divergent goals and

 Conflicts arising from out of multiple roles to be played daily.

Goal conflict
 Occurs when a goal that an individual is attempting to achieve
has both positive and negative features or when two or more
competing goal exist.
 Three types of goal conflict:

1. Approach –Approach : a person wants two +ve situations

but can have only one.
For example, a person has two attractive job offers and he 11
has to choose any one of them- tension arises.
2. Approach –Avoidance : a goal having both +ve and -ve
aspects. For example, a person is approaching to accept
a job offer, because the salary is attractive- but at the
same time he is repelled back as the job is very risky.

3. Avoidance –Avoidance: easily resolved type b/c a person

faced with two negative goals may not choose either of
them and may simply leave/go away/ the situation.
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Role Conflict :
 Role – a set of expectations people have about the behavior of
a person in a position.
 Three types of roles clearly emerge:
 Expected role; is what other people expect from an individual.
 Perceived role; is how the individual thinks he/she should
behave to fulfill the expected role.
 Actual /enacted; is the way the person actually behaves in a
role in organization.
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B) INTER-PERSONAL CONFLICT

 It involves two or more individuals who holds polarized

points of view, who are somewhat intolerant of
ambiguities.
 Main reasons for such type of conflict are;
 Difference in personality diversity.
 Difference in perception.
 Clashes of values and interest.
 Power and status difference.
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 Scarce resources.
 GROUP LEVEL CONFLICT
A) Inter-group conflict:
 Most of the departments in the organization compete for the allocation of scares resources and power;
they differ in goals, work activities power and prestige.
 Sources include;
 Incompatible goals
 Task interdependence
 Resource allocation
 Competitive incentives and reward system
 Line and staff conflicts
 Difference in values and perceptions
 Other reasons like
 Heterogeneity of members
 Communication distortions
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 Participative decision making
 Low formalization
 CONSEQUENCES OF INTERGROUP CONFLICTS

1. Winner parties/ Groups experiencing conflicts react in fairly predictable ways.

 Changes which occur within the groups:

 Members show ‘we’ feelings.
 Superiority complex develops.
 High morale.

 Changes Which Take Place between the groups:

 Negative sentiments/outlook/ against the rival group (enemy).
 We are ‘good’ they are ‘bad’ feelings.
 More aggressive, over estimates its strengths and achievements.
 More concerned for member needs and generally satisfied with itself. 16

 Becomes a well-knit group.

2. Defeated/Loosing/ Groups
 Changes which occur within the groups:
 Members indulge in mutual discrimination and shifting of blame.
 Inferiority complex.
 Low morale.
 Member lose cohesions.

 Changes which take place between the groups:

 Enemy’s win increases tension and conflicts.
 Initially resists admitting defeat.
 Search on for a convenient scapegoat.
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 Communication with winners breaks down.
 Disintegrate/fall apart/.
 ORGANIZATIONAL LEVEL CONFLICTS

A)Intra-organizational conflicts:
 The well springs of conflicts in an organization are many. But, mainly
three kinds of internal strains can be identified.

a. The horizontal strains:

 The competition between different functional subsystems.
 It refers to conflict between employees or departments of the same
hierarchical level in an organization.

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b. The vertical strains:
 The competition between various levels in the hierarchy for power,
privilege/reward.
 this conflict separates people in various levels of the occupational ladders in
organizations.
 It refers to any conflict between levels in an organization.
 It occurs usually in superior-subordinate relations.

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c. Line and staff conflict :-
 controversy and conflict are inherent in the concept of line and staff.
 It is not an easy task to divide and distribute expertise, authority and
roles in equitable quantities between the line generalists and staff
specialists.

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B) INTER-ORGANIZATIONAL CONFLICT

 These are much the same as those arising within an organization.

 The bases are essentially the same as the bases of intergroup conflict.
 Most commonly cited reasons are incompatible objectives, conflicts
over status, prestige and money.
 Inter-organizational conflict is more extensive, more diffuse than the
conflict among persons or groups.

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 TYPES OF INTER-ORGANIZATIONAL CONFLICTS

1/ Management –Government
 Conflicts over political contributions, bribery, anti-trust actions, fair
trade, consumer protection etc.

2/ Inter-Management:-
 Managements may compete against each other in ways that they
believe will enhance their position in the industry.
 Disputes over patents and fulfillment of contracts, price wars may be
included here.
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3) Inter-Union:
 unions may compete for members or jobs as in jurisdictional disputes.

4/ Union –Government:
 The unions will be scrutinized by agents of government for illegal activities like
criminal activities, discrimination, illegal strikes etc.

5/ Union -Management:
 if management and labor are to retain their institutional ideal ties, they must
disagree and must adopt appropriate roles.
 Conflict is essential to survival for the union; lack of conflict would weaken it.
Conflict between labor and management is expressed in many forms like strikes,
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peaceful bargains, grievances, debates, loyalties, sabotage and absenteeism.
 Five Conflict Management Styles
Assertive Competing Collaborating
Assertiveness

Compromising
Unassertive

Avoiding
Accommodating

Uncooperative Cooperative
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Cooperativeness
1. Avoidance-being uncooperative and unassertive; downplaying
disagreement, withdrawing from the situation, and /or staying
neutral at all costs. Lose-lose style.

2. Accommodation or Smoothing-being cooperative but unassertive;

letting others’ wishes rule; smoothing over differences to maintain
superficial (apparent) harmony.

3. Competition or authoritative command-being uncooperative but

assertive; working against the wishes of the other party, engaging in
win-lose competition, or forcing through the exercise of authority.
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4. Compromise-being moderately cooperative and assertive but not to
either extreme; bargaining for “acceptable” solutions in which each
party wins a bit and loses a bit. Trade-offs style (lose something to
gain the other)

5. Collaboration or problem solving-being cooperative and assertive;

trying to fully satisfy everyone’s concerns by working through
differences; finding and solving problems so that everyone gains.
Win-win style.

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but I think each style can be
appropriate in different
circumstances...

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AVOIDANCE IS APPROPRIATE WHEN...
 You have no chance of satisfying your concerns
 let people cool down

Accommodation Is Appropriate When ...

 You realize you are wrong

 Issue is much more important to other party

 To build up credit for later negotiations

 To preserve harmony

Competition Is Appropriate When...

 No long term relationship

 To protect yourself against untrustworthy parties

 Unpopular courses of action need implementation

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 Issues are vital to your welfare
Collaboration Is Appropriate When ...
 Both parties’ concerns are too important to be
compromised
 To gain commitment

Compromising Is Appropriate When ...

 Goals are less important to you than collaboration

 Mutually exclusive goals

 To achieve temporary settlements

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END

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