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The Top 5 Skills Every Manager Needs to Resolve Conflict
Many of us associate conflict with fear, shame, and frustration. We often try to dodge conflict by being overly agreeable or avoiding conversations altogether to avoid these uncomfortable feelings. However, these behaviours are counterproductive. Avoiding conflict means losing out on essential feedback and ideas for improvement.
Here's a potential hot take: conflict can actually be a sign of a healthy and engaged team. In environments where everyone always agrees, employees might not be fully invested or afraid to speak up. Constructive conflict indicates that team members are passionate about their work and care enough to voice differing opinions. This dynamic can lead to richer discussions and more innovative solutions if managed respectfully and productively.
Managers must learn how to embrace conflict and manage it productively to encourage conversation and new perspectives. Effectively managed conflict strengthens teams by fostering innovative and collaborative discussions essential for advancing a business's success.
So, repeat after me: conflict is not a dirty word.
When managers help their teams see conflict as a tool for exchanging ideas while ensuring everyone is heard, it transforms from a fearful argument into effective communication.
Conflict management is one of the hardest skills for managers. To help you master it, here are five essential skills for leading your team successfully through conflict.
Table of Contents:
1. Use emotional intelligence in conflict resolution
Your emotional intelligence (EI) skills strongly correlate with your ability to manage and resolve conflict. EI is defined as the ability to identify and manage your own emotions and the emotions of others. With a firm grasp on EI, you can understand other people’s reactions, identify their emotions, and negotiate situations effectively.
Emotional intelligence comprises four facets:
- Self-awareness: Understanding yourself and your emotions. This involves recognizing your emotional triggers and how your emotions can affect your thoughts and behaviour.
- Self-management: Managing your emotions and impulses. This includes controlling impulsive feelings and behaviours, managing your stress in healthy ways, taking initiative, following through on commitments, and adapting to changing circumstances.
- Social awareness: Understanding others' emotions. This entails empathizing with others, recognizing and understanding their emotions, needs, and concerns, and picking up on emotional cues, social dynamics, and power relationships.
- Social management: Effectively managing relationships. This involves developing and maintaining good relationships, communicating clearly, inspiring and influencing others, working well in a team, and managing conflict.
Mastering these pillars enables you to forge deeper connections, understand your leadership strengths, and navigate interpersonal dynamics effectively. From resolving conflicts to preempting them, emotional intelligence is the bedrock that elevates you from being just an individual contributor to becoming a leader for your team. With heightened emotional intelligence, you can build a positive work environment, foster teamwork, and drive organizational success.
2. Understand Your Team Members and Their Needs
Understanding and managing different personalities at work is vital for creating an effective team. By knowing your team members as individuals, you can recognize their triggers and know how to calm them or encourage them. The better you understand your team’s personalities, the better environment you can provide.
The DISC tool is helpful in understanding various personality types. It gives teams a common language to improve understanding and communication.
Within DISC, there are four different personality types:
1. Dominant
The D style is a fast-paced and direct individual.
When you find yourself coming into conflict with a Dominant personality, keep in mind these key points when communicating with them:
- Keep things short and to the point.
- Focus on objectives and what needs to be done.
- Dominant personalities also like to take charge, so give these individuals room to voice their opinions and concerns.
2. Influential
The I style loves people.
They’re very friendly, enthusiastic, charming, and energetic.
When coming into conflict with an, I style, here are some key points to remember:
- Influential people love recognition, so don’t be afraid to praise them for an idea or opinion they share with you or the team.
- These types of personalities feel social rejection and being ignored. Always be sure to acknowledge influential individuals and ensure they feel recognized within the team.
- Influential individuals are talkative and often have a lot to say. Ensure that you give them room to be heard and voice their comments and concerns.
3. Steady
Steady individuals tend to be slightly slower-paced than Ds and Is, but they’re very dependable and understanding them, making them a classic team player.
When you find you are experiencing conflict with a Steady person, keep these things in mind:
- Steady people want an environment of support and cooperation, so always take the time to thank an S personality for their work and make an effort to show you’re there to help them.
- Since Ss like to take more time, give them time and space to respond to your questions and concerns.
- Ss tend to avoid change, so be willing to give them space to process new things and show them you’re there to help them as they take on new roles.
4. Conscientiousness
The conscientious personality also likes to take their time, like an S, but they’re very analytical and data-driven.
If you find you experience conflict with a conscientious individual, remember these tips:
- Cs are logical and systematic, giving them time to analyze and describe their side of the story.
- Due to their data-driven nature, you want to show a C that you respect a problem’s objectiveness, so be sure to focus on the facts primarily.
- Conscientious personalities tend to isolate themselves and be overly critical of themselves. To help them recognize their strengths, involve them in conversation by asking them open-ended questions and praising their good ideas.
If you want to learn more about each DISC personality and what you, as a manager, can do to support each one in the workplace, check out my article: Understanding and Managing Different Personalities in the Workplace.
3. Establish team norms to ensure effective communication
Creating communication norms helps team members navigate conflict successfully. Establishing rules of conflict provides a common ground for seamless communication.
Here’s an example of a conflict rulebook for your team:
1. Encourage questions.
2. Don’t downplay minor issues.
3. Assume the best intentions in messages.
4. Set up meetings for bigger issues.
5. Identify the problem and present facts.
6. Set end goals to avoid circular discussions.
7. Create a conflict ‘contract’ for mutual understanding.
8. Follow up to ensure resolution.
These rules strengthen team dynamics by creating a psychologically safe environment for interaction.
4. Be willing to make hard decisions
Conflict management is challenging, and sometimes you won’t be able to please everyone.
When conflicts are tough to resolve, remember your team’s dynamics and business goals to find the most beneficial solution. Here are tips for making tough decisions:
- Align decisions with company values.
- Use historical data and knowledge.
- Document problems, decisions, and consequences.
- Listen to concerns but come prepared with counterpoints.
- Communicate decisions clearly to all parties.
Taking action is better than letting problems fester. Making decisions that benefit the team and business builds trust and commitment.
5. Frame discussion objectively
In conflict, give team members space to express their emotions and validate their feelings.
However, emotions shouldn’t be the basis for problem-solving. Keep emotions under control and think and speak objectively.
Use questions like “What is the project’s end goal?” and “What are the expectations of workplace conduct?” to reframe discussions.
Focus on the problem to avoid personal offenses and achieve effective problem-solving and conflict resolution.
Takeaways
In this article, you learned five steps to resolve better and manage conflict in the workplace.
You now know:
✔️ Why and how to use emotional intelligence when managing conflict.
✔️ How to interact with different personalities effectively during times of conflict.
✔️ The effectiveness of established communication norms in teamwork and how to create them on your team.
✔️ The importance of being able to make tough decisions and tips on how to do so.
✔️ The necessity of keeping conflict objective and fact-based.
Remember, conflict resolution isn't just about smoothing things over; it's about leveraging diverse perspectives to drive progress. By addressing conflicts head-on, we create an environment where every voice is heard, respected, and valued. This transforms conflict into a tool for building a vibrant and engaged team.
A DISC Behavior Assessment is the best way to understand your team's personalities.
Each DISC Assessment includes a Self Assessment and DISC Style evaluation worksheet
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