msc/ pg diploma in construction management conflict management and negotiation by professor simon...

MSc/ PG Diploma in Construction Management

Conflict Management and NegotiationConflict Management and Negotiation

By Professor Simon Burtonshaw-Gunn – licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution – Non-By Professor Simon Burtonshaw-Gunn – licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution – Non-Commercial – Share Alike LicenseCommercial – Share Alike License

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School of the Built EnvironmentMSc Construction Management People Management in the Built Environment

Presentation 1: Conflict ManagementProfessor Simon Burtonshaw-Gunn


Presentation 1: Conflict ManagementPresentation 1: Conflict Management• Understanding conflictUnderstanding conflict• Preventing conflictPreventing conflict• Dealing with conflictDealing with conflict

Presentation content . . .


As a manager you are responsible for the activities of your team of people.

You may also be working alongside other managers who are responsible for their own teams.

Understanding Conflict

Conflict arises from differences. When individuals come together in work teams their differences in terms of power, values and attitudes, and social factors all contribute to the creation of conflict.

• Fact 1: People do not always see eye to eye.

• Fact 2: Your team members may fall out with themselves, with you or with other people in different teams.

• Fact 3: Some may express hostility towards the organization.


So what causes conflict in the workplace?


MSc/ PG Diploma in Construction ManagementUnderstanding Conflict - Five Layers

•Misunderstandings - these occur by accident and arise from misconceptions about what is said or intended, they are fairly easy to resolved once recognised.

•Differences in values and beliefs - as people have their own principles and sets of values differences can lead to disagreements about organizational objectives and decisions. These are often witnessed when organizations undergo a merger.

•Differences of interest and ambition - Groups and individuals have different interests and ambitions, which result in competition for limited power, status and resources within organizations, in turn this can lead to conflict.


•Feelings and emotions - these can also be intertwined with conflict, and often are disguised as “the principle of the matter”. Conflict can arouse strong emotions that lead to further conflict and once emotions are aroused, the sense of proportion can be lost and the conflict escalate.

• Interpersonal differences - for what ever reason some people have difficult in working with others and conflict can arise from such personality clashes.

Understanding Conflict - Five Layers


Conflict can arise from numerous sources within a team setting and generally falls into three categories: communication factors, structural factors and personal factors.

• Barriers to communication are among the most important factors and can be a major source of misunderstanding. Communication barriers include poor listening skills; insufficient sharing of information; differences in interpretation and perception; and nonverbal cues being ignored or missed.

• Structural disagreements include the size of the organization, turnover rate, levels of participation, reward systems, and levels of interdependence among employees.

• Personal factors include things such as an individual's self-esteem, their personal goals, values and needs. Varney, G. H. (1989). Building productive teams: An action guide and resource

book. San Francisco, CA: Josey-Bass, Inc.

Understanding Conflict - Five Layers

MSc/ PG Diploma in Construction ManagementUnderstanding Conflict – the symptoms

Conflict does NOT always express itself in angry voices and bloodied noses!!

People who choose to ignore one another are often doing more damage to the organization, if not themselves.

MSc/ PG Diploma in Construction ManagementUnderstanding Conflict – Example symptoms

From your own experience do you have any examples of seeing conflict and how was this seen / demonstrated

MSc/ PG Diploma in Construction ManagementUnderstanding Conflict – Example symptoms

• Tears, raised voices, aggressive horseplay, physical fights

• Statements expressing negative feelings – jealousy, distrust, derision, fear, dislike – about a group or individual

• Individuals being prevented from getting the rewards that are normally given to people who have performed as well as they have

• People choosing not to pass on useful information to others


• Tears, raised voices, aggressive horseplay, physical fights

• Statements expressing negative feelings – jealousy, distrust, derision, fear, dislike – about a group or individual

• Individuals being prevented from getting the rewards that are normally given to people who have performed as well as they have

• People choosing not to pass on useful information to others

• Individuals refusing to talk to one another – or doing so only with say icy formality, sarcastic remarks or open aggression

• People setting up barriers – being unavailable or approachable only through their own private rules and procedures

• People being off ‘sick’ or otherwise absent more frequently than seems normal

• Low morale and poor productivity especially if the people concerned blame others

Understanding Conflict – Example symptoms


Managing conflict may take up a large slice of your managerial time.

It may also prevent you with some of your most testing and stressful problems.

Having said this, conflict is unavoidable in organizations - it is a normal by-product of people trying to work together.

Since people differ among themselves – you can’t expect them to agree all of the time!!



Conflict may result in:

• Poor communications

• Interpersonal friction

• Intergroup rivalry and jealousy

• Low morale and frustration

• Widespread use of arbitration, appeals to higher authority, and inflexible attitudes



The tactics of conflict include:

• Withholding information from others who want it

• Distorting information in order to get own way

• Empire building such as imposing rules, procedures, restrictions or official requirements on other groups in order to bolster own importance

• Office politics – by passing formal channels of communication by establishing informal contacts and friendships with people of importance

• Fault-finding in the work of other departments



You will not be able to totally eliminate conflict – so feel satisfied if you can:

• Limit the number of outbreaks.

• Minimize the scale of each outbreak.

• Stop it from spreading too far.

• Prevent it from doing irreparable harm to individuals or to the organization.

• Make the conflict yield benefits.


MSc/ PG Diploma in Construction ManagementPreventing Conflict

The best way to manage conflict is to prevent it arising.

You can do this to some extent by promoting collaboration and trust within your team – and by preventing any individual from advancing his or her own interests at the expense of other peoples.


The best way to manage conflict is to prevent it arising.

You can do this to some extent by promoting collaboration and trust within your team – and by preventing any individual from advancing his or her own interests at the expense of other peoples.

Preventing Conflict

How could do you this is practice?


• Don’t make decisions that will affect people’s work without consultation first

• Don’t criticize anyone’s work unless you can make practical suggestions as to how they might improve it

• Don’t make personal attacks on people behind their backs, and

• Discourage other people from doing so

.

Preventing Conflict


• Don’t make decisions that will affect people’s work without consultation first

• Don’t criticize anyone’s work unless you can make practical suggestions as to how they might improve it

• Don’t make personal attacks on people behind their backs, and

• Discourage other people from doing so

• Don’t allow cliques and in-groups to form within your team – especially if they think that they are superior and/ or want to score off others

• Reward people for being helpful and supportive of one another

• Constantly find ways to remind your people that success depends on them being a TEAM rather than a collection of individuals

• Don’t act on assumptions about how people feel – check with them first

• Don’t back people into corners from which they can’t escape without either admitting defeat or escalating the conflict

Preventing Conflict


Resolving conflict depends on the behaviour of the people involved,

. . . . and their responses can be one of five categories which reflect

• the balance between co-operation (attempts to satisfy the other person’s concerns)

• and assertion (attempts to satisfy your own concerns).

Model of Conflict behaviour


Co-operationHigh Low

High

Low

Forcing: satisfying own needs at the

expense of the others, usually results in

hostility and resentment

Collaborating: by seeking to find and

understand solutions for all parties

(a win/win strategy)

Avoiding: potential conflict is a common approach best used when the issue or

unimportant or when time is limited

Accommodating: satisfying the needs of

other parties at the expense of your own

needs

Assertion Compromising

Model of Conflict behaviour

See Self Assessment on Negotiation as part of this work package

MSc/ PG Diploma in Construction ManagementDealing with Conflict - Counselling

As a manager you will sometimes need to counsel a member of your team to help solve problem. This may be about the work itself or relationship among workmates (or it may relate to a person’s life away from work)

You may offer counselling because you recognize the symptoms of the problem - or the person may seek advice from you.

The focus will be not in telling them what to do but encouraging them to find the solution themselves.

Preparation is everything. Do not get drawn into a counselling unexpectedly - not unless you are sure you have plenty of time, privacy and knowledge about the issues concerned.

Otherwise make a date to meet later when you are prepared.


Irrespective of the general atmosphere, individuals can still take a dislike to one another, and they can think that other people are preventing them from getting what they want . . . So conflicts can arise.

Options open to you . . .

Dealing with Conflict - Counselling


Options open to you . . .

• Ignore the conflict and hope it will blow over

• Threaten the conflicting staff with some sort of punishment/ withdrawal of rewards

• Persuade them to cool their disagreements out of respect for the team’s harmony

• Support one side or the other

• Impose a compromise

• Buy people off – if you give up fighting for that I’ll give you something else instead

• Get the rest of the team to gang up on them and suppress the conflict



A word of caution . . .

1. Identify what the problem is

2. Decide how to solve it

3. Apply the solution and

4. Check that the solution has worked

The problem may be hiding others which go

undetected

Solving one problem can create others

Some problems have no entirely satisfactory

solution

May not have time and resources to develop

or implement ideal solution

There may be several possible solutions that

are difficult to chose from

BUT



In order to resolve their differences, Varney recommends bringing the parties together and, with the assistance of a third party, asking the following questions:

• What does the other person do that contributes to the problem?

• What do you want or need from the other person?

• What do you do that contributes to the problem?

• What first step can you take to resolve the problem?

Varney, G. H. (1989). Building productive teams: An action guide and resource book.

San Francisco, CA: Josey-Bass, Inc.



• Each party should be questioned while the other listens . . . asking questions only for clarification.

• Then the parties discuss a mutual definition and understanding of the problem. They should be allowed to express their feelings and get hostility out of their systems at this stage, but both parties must be willing to admit partial responsibility for the problem.

• This requires good listening, low defensiveness, and an ability to stay in a problem-solving mode.

• Agreement should be reached on what steps will be taken to resolve the problem, and should be put in writing in order to prevent later misunderstandings.



Another similar five-step approach to resolving conflict is to:

• Acknowledge that the conflict exists.

• Gain common ground by putting the conflict in perspective with the goals and purpose of the team.

• Seek to understand all angles of the disagreement, keeping in mind that understanding is different from agreement.

• Attack the issue, not each other. Channel anger and hostility into problem solving and action planning.

• Develop an action plan describing what each person will do to solve the problem.

Source: Fisher, K., Rayner, S., Belgard, W., (1995). Tips for teams: A ready reference for solving common team problems. New York:

McGraw-Hill, Inc.



Kezsbom makes three recommendations:

• More frequent and effective upward, downward, and team communications.

• More frequent meetings and status review sessions to increase communication between functions and minimize inconsistent perceptions of project goals and priorities.

• Increase human relations training and facilitate more active team-building efforts.

Source: Kezsbom, D. S. (1992).Re-opening Pandora's box: Sources of project conflict in the 1990s.

Industrial Engineering, 24 (5), 54 - 59.


MSc/ PG Diploma in Construction ManagementFinally . . . .

Organizations must be aware that conflict grows from differences, but so does innovation.

If project teams are properly trained in team-building skills, production and quality measures will increase.

No matter what kind of team it is, no method of managing conflict will work without mutual respect and a willingness to disagree and resolve disagreements.


School of the Built EnvironmentMSc Construction Management People Management in the Built Environment

Presentation 1: Conflict ManagementProfessor Simon Burtonshaw-Gunn

msc/ pg diploma in construction management conflict management and negotiation by professor simon...

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