MGMT-464: Chapter 10 - Managing Conflict and Negotiations

Negotiation

A give-and-take decision-making process involving two or more parties with different preferences.

Dialectic method

A method managers use to foster a structured debate of opposing viewpoints prior to making a decision.

Flextime

(Also known as flexible scheduling) Giving employee flexible work hours that allow people to come and go at different times, as long as they work the normal number of hours. Either when work is expected to be completed (deadlines) or during which particular hours of the day.

Compromising style

A give-and-take approach with a moderate concern for both self and others.

Conflict processes

Members' interactions aimed at working through task and interpersonal disagreements.

What Is Conflict?

• Occurs when one party perceives that its interests are being opposed or negatively affected by another part. • It is inevitable and may be cultivated. • It can have both positive and negative outcomes. • Organizations can have too much or too little conflict. • It may be either functional or dysfunctional. • Conflict is a pervasive part of the human experience, and it produces undesirable consequences such as absences, avoiding work-related events, quitting, terminations, and project failures. • Managing conflict effectively is essential for individual, departmental, and organizational effectiveness. • Conflict has both positive and negative consequences, and thus it is important to avoid the negative side of conflict while also gaining from its positive outcomes. • One party perceives its interests are being opposed or set back by another party. • Sources of conflict and issues can be real or imagined. • A lack of fairness, perceived or real, is a major source of conflict at work.

Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR)

• The benefit of ADR is that it uses faster, more user-friendly methods of dispute resolution, instead of traditional, adversarial approaches such as unilateral decision making or litigation. • ADR has enjoyed enthusiastic growth in recent years due to lower costs and speed. • ADR methods vary with respect to difficulty and expense.

Dysfunctional conflict

Conflict that threatens an organization's interests

Ethics in Negotiations

Ethics in negotiations • The success of negotiations is influenced to a large extent by the quality of information exchanged. • Telling lies, hiding key facts, and engaging in other potentially unethical tactics erodes trust and goodwill, both vital in successful negotiations. • Table 10.9 describes "dirty tricks" that are sometimes used in negotiations. o Lies o Puffery o Deception o Weakening the opponent o Strengthening one's own position o Nondisclosure o Information exploitation o Maximization

Dominating style

Exhibiting a high concern for self and low concern for others.

Integrating style

Interested parties confront the issue and cooperatively identify the problem, generate and weigh alternatives, and select a solution.

Personality conflict

Interpersonal opposition based on personal dislike or disagreement.

Conflict

Occurs when one party perceives that its interests are being opposed or negatively affected by another party.

Work-family conflict

Occurs when the demands or pressures from work and family domains are mutually incompatible.

Obliging style

Showing low concern for yourself and a great concern for others.

Distributive negotiation

Usually involves a single issue—a "fixed pie"—in which one person gains at the expense of another.

Effectively Managing Conflict (1 of 2)

What is programmed conflict? • Conflict that raises different opinions regardless of the personal feelings of the managers • Gets contributors to either defend or criticize ideas based on relevant facts rather than personal preference or political interest • Two programmed conflict techniques with proven track records are devil's advocacy and the dialectic method.

Integrative negotiation

Where an agreement can be found that is better for both parties then what they would have reached through distributive negotiation.

D

Which of the following statements about conflict is NOT true? a) Dysfunctional conflict threatens an organization's interests. b) People avoid conflict due to a fear of damaging relationships. c) Functional conflict can promote creative problem solving. d) All conflict is negative. e) Organizations can suffer from either too little or too much conflict.

Best Anti-Bullying Strategies (1 of 2)

• Develop a workplace bullying policy. • Encourage open and respectful communication. • Develop clear procedures. • Identify and model appropriate behaviors. • System for reporting bullying. • Identify and resolve conflicts quickly and fairly—avoid escalation. • Determine the situations, policies, and behaviors likely to cause or allow bullying to occur. • Provide training to employees regarding how to manage conflict. • Clear consequences for engaging in bullying. • Monitor and review employee relationships with particular attention to fairness. The Internet and particularly social media have created new avenues and weapons for bullies at school, at work, and in our social lives through cyber bullying. Virtual bullying is more common than face-to-face bullying, although the two often co-occur. Not only do face-to-face and cyber bullying directly harm the targeted person, but the fear of future mistreatment amplifies this effect. Employers should create policies to prevent and address virtual incivility, and employees should follow best practices for appropriate e-mails and social media use.

Considerations When Choosing a Negotiation Approach

• Know who you are. o Personality matters in the negotiation process, with people with high levels of agreeableness being best suited for integrative negotiations. • Manage outcome expectations. o Skilled negotiators manage expectations in advance of actual negotiations. • Consider the other person's outcome. o It is important to consider the other person's outcome and if that party is satisfied. • Adhere to standards of justice. o It is important to adhere to standards of justice. • Remember your reputation. o You must remember your reputation and realize that winning at all costs often has significant costs.

Devil's advocacy

Involves assigning someone the role of critic

Incivility

Any form of socially harmful behavior, such as aggression, interpersonal deviance, social undermining, interactional injustice, harassment, abusive supervision, and bullying

Avoidance of Conflict

Avoidance of conflict can occur for myriad reasons—good and bad • Fear of rejection, harm, damage to or loss of relationships, desire to avoid saying the wrong thing By managing conflict, a number of desirable outcomes can emerge • Agreement • Stronger relationships • Learning We avoid conflict because we fear various combinations of: harm, rejection, loss of relationship, anger, being seen as selfish, saying the wrong thing, failing, hurting someone else, or getting what you want (i.e., fearing the consequences of success). Avoiding conflict doesn't make it go away; more likely the conflict situation will continue or even escalate. Instead of ignoring conflict, you may be well served to: • Stop ignoring a conflict by bringing both sides together to address the issues. • Act decisively to improve the outcome. • Make the path to resolution open and honest. • Use descriptive language instead of evaluative. • Make the process a team-building opportunity. • Keep the upside in mind.

B

Carol is the manager of the marketing department for Bells Corporation. She observed an employee group engaging in stereotyping other groups as being all alike. What is likely happening with this group? a) There are personality conflicts. b) The group has become too cohesive. c) The group succumbed to the contact hypothesis. d) The group views outsiders as friends. e) Group members do not view the group as a safe place to express opinions.

Approaches to Intergroup Conflict (2 of 2)

Climate: employees' shared perceptions of policies, practices, and procedures. Psychologically safe climate A shared belief held by team members that the team • Is a safe place to engage in risky behaviors, such as questioning current practices without retribution or negative consequences • Captures a sense of confidence that the team will not embarrass, reject, or punish someone for speaking up • When employees feel psychologically safe, they are more likely to speak up and present their ideas and less likely to take disagreements personally. Foster a psychologically safe climate by • Ensuring leaders are inclusive and accessible • Hiring and developing employees who are comfortable expressing their own ideas and are receptive and constructive to those expressed by others • Celebrating and reinforcing the value of differences between group members and their ideas

Functional conflict

Commonly referred to in management circles as constructive or cooperative conflict and is characterized by consultative interactions, a focus on the issues, mutual respect, and useful give and take.

Programmed conflict

Conflict that raises different opinions regardless of the personal feelings of the managers.

Causes of Conflict

Conflicts may arise due to: • Interdependencies • Incompatibilities • Overlapping or unclear boundaries • Competition over limited resources • Unreasonable or unclear organizational polices • Organizational complexity Escalation of conflict when: • Tactics change • Number of issues grows • Issues move from specific to general • Number of parties grow • Goals change Certain situations produce more conflict than others. By knowing the antecedents or causes of conflict, you and managers are better able to anticipate conflict and take steps to resolve it if it becomes dysfunctional. Table 10.1 lists many of the situations that tend to produce either functional or dysfunctional conflict. When conflict escalates, the intensity increases; people can then take positions that are increasingly extreme and hard to justify. Conflict escalation often exhibits these five characteristics: 1) Change in tactics from light to heavy tactics (i.e., from persuasive arguments, promises, and efforts to please the other side to threats, power plays, and violence). 2) Increase in the number of issues. 3) Issues move from specific to general. 4) The number of parties grows. 5) The goals change from "doing well" or resolution to winning and even hurting the other party.

Approaches to Intergroup Conflict (1 of 2)

Contact hypothesis • The more members of different groups interact, the less intergroup conflict they will experience. • Quality contact matters from the in-group's perspective. • The contact hypothesis has been recommended as a way to reduce intergroup conflict, but just increasing the amount of interaction across groups may be a naive and limited approach for overcoming stereotyping and in-group thinking. • Research indicates that contact matters, quality contact matters more, but both matter most from the in-group's perspective. • Intergroup friendships are desirable, but they are readily overpowered by negative intergroup interactions. • The top priority for managers faced with intergroup conflict is to identify and root out specific negative linkages between or among groups. Conflict resolution • Work to eliminate specific negative interactions. • Conduct team building to reduce intragroup conflict and prepare for cross-functional teamwork. • Encourage and facilitate friendships via social events (e.g., happy hours, sports leagues, and book clubs). • Foster positive attitudes (e.g. empathy and compassion). • Avoid or neutralize negative gossip resolution. • Practice the above—Be a role model.

Alternative Dispute Resolution

Forms of ADR • Facilitation: a third party informally urges disputing parties to deal directly with each other in a positive and constructive manner. • Conciliation: a neutral third party informally acts as a communication conduit between disputing parties. • Peer review: a panel of trustworthy co-workers hears both sides of a dispute in an informal and confidential meeting and may make binding decisions depending on the company. • Ombudsman: someone who works for the organization and is widely respected and trusted by his or her co-workers hears grievances on a confidential basis and attempts to arrange a solution. • Mediation: a trained, third-party neutral actively guides the disputing parties in exploring innovative solutions to the conflict to help the disputants to reach a mutually acceptable decision. • Arbitration: a third-party neutral makes final and binding decisions based on legal merits. Benefits of ADR • Speed • Lower cost • Confidentiality • Potential for win-win resolution

Work-Family Conflict (2 of 2)

Importance of balance to reducing conflict • Work-family balance begins at home. • An employer's family-supportive philosophy is more important than specific programs. • Balance requires flexibility, which is a key aspect of many efforts to eliminate or reduce conflicts. • Flexspace: when policies enable employees to do their work from different locations besides the office. • Flextime: flexible scheduling, either when work is expected to be completed (e.g., deadlines) or during which particular hours of the day (e.g., 10-5, or anytime today). • The value of most any type of flexible work arrangement can be undermined if the employee's immediate supervisor isn't supportive. • Importance of work-life family balance varies across generations.

Incivility and Bullying

Incivility: Any form of socially harmful behavior • Aggression • Interpersonal deviance • Social undermining • Interactional justice • Harassment • Abusive supervision • Bullying Bullying: Different from other forms of incivility • Most often evident to others • Affects even those that are NOT bullied • Has group-level implications

Five Common Conflict-Handling Styles

Integrating (problem solving) • Interested parties confront the issue and cooperatively identify the problem, generate and weigh alternatives, and select a solution. • Integrating is high in concern for others and high in concern for self. Obliging (smoothing) • People show low concern for themselves and a great concern for others. • Obliging is high in concern for others, but low in concern for self. Dominating • High concern for self and low concern for others, often characterized by "I win, you lose" tactics. Avoiding • Passive withdrawal from the problem and active suppression of the issue are common. • Avoiding is low in both concern for others and concern for self. Compromising • Give-and-take approach with a moderate concern for both self and others.

Emotions in Negotiation

Negotiation experts and researchers acknowledge that emotions are an integral part of the human experience, and they provide guidance on how to use emotions to your advantage. Emotions are contagious, and if you want the other party to be calm, creative, or energetic, then consider showing these emotions yourself. The following tips can help you prepare emotionally for an impending negotiation: Use emotions to your advantage. • Identify your ideal emotions: determine the ideal emotions that will best suit your objectives. • Manage your emotions: Manage your emotions and determine what you can do in advance to put yourself in the ideal emotional state. Take steps to promote positive emotions. • Know what your hot buttons are and manage them appropriately. • Keep your balance: Know when to break or redirect. • Identify your take-away emotions: Set your emotional goals of how you want to feel when you are finished negotiating (e.g., relieved, satisfied, etc.).

Negotiation

Negotiation may be thought of as a give-and-take decision-making process involving two or more parties with different preferences Distributive: Win-Lose • Distributive negotiation: usually involves a single issue—a "fixed pie"—in which one person gains at the expense of another. • This position-based, "win-lose" approach of distributive negotiation is arguably the most common. • Key Characteristics of Position-based negotiation o Adversarial o Focus on winning o Acquire the most value o Personal goal focused o Impose or sell you own position o Use salesmanship and manipulation o Choose between relationship and achieving goals o Yield reluctantly to other positions/interests o Outcomes are win-lose or compromise Integrative: Win-Win • Integrative negotiation: a host of interests are considered, resulting in an agreement that is satisfactory for both parties. • This kind of interest-based negotiation is a more collaborative, problem-solving approach. • Key Characteristics of Interest-Based Negotiation o Partner o Focus on challenge to be met o Create value for all parties o Solution focused o Find mutual interests and satisfaction o Make honest disclosure of respective interests o Emphasize relationship and substance o Be open and willing to yield o Win-win collaborative outcomes are possible

Work-Family Conflict (1 of 2)

Occurs when the demands or pressures from work and family are mutually incompatible TABLE 10.3 Negative Consequences of Conflicts Between Work, Family, and Other Life Domains Work Interferes with Family • Job satisfaction • Intentions to quit • Absenteeism • Performance Family Interferes with Work • Marital satisfaction • Family satisfaction • Family-related strain • Family-related performance Potential Outcomes • Life satisfaction • Health problems • Depression • Substance use or abuse Work-family conflict: occurs when the demands or pressures from work and family domains are mutually incompatible. Work-family conflict can take two distinct forms: work interference with family and family interference with work. Hostilities in one life domain can manifest in other domains as a result of the spillover effect. Since it may not be possible to avoid or remove conflicts completely, people need to manage or balance demands between the different domains of their lives.

C

Pablo, the COO at Happy Travel Agency, read some posts on Facebook concerning employees who were bullied at the agency. Pablo would like to correct the situation. He should do all of the following EXCEPT a) consider what it is like to be bullied. b) develop a workplace bullying policy. c) send an e-mail to all employees that names the employee being bullied and demands that it stops. d) communicate the social media policy to all employees. e) provide training to employees in conflict resolution.

Avoiding style

Passive withdrawal from the problem and active suppression of the issue.

Conventional Forms of Conflict

Personality conflicts • Relational or interpersonal: interpersonal opposition based on personal dislike or disagreement o Particularly harmful o Critically important to identify and remedy these conflicts • Personality conflicts are common and can be troublesome since personality traits are stable and resistant to change. • Personality conflicts that are ignored or avoided often escalate. Intergroup conflict: conflict among work groups, teams, and departments is a common threat to individual and organizational effectiveness. • Conflict states: shared perceptions among team members about the target (i.e., tasks or relationships) and intensity of the conflict. • Conflict process: the means by which team members work through task and relationship disagreements. • Cohesion and "in-group thinking" Conflict processes and how teams manage their differences matter, and processes are at least as important as the source of the conflict. Group cohesiveness can turn a "group" into a "team," but excessive levels can impact the team's ability to think critically. Research has identified challenges associated with increased group cohesiveness. Managers cannot eliminate in-group thinking, but they certainly should not ignore it when handling intergroup conflicts. The contact hypothesis, conflict reduction, and creating a psychologically safe climate have been recommended as ways to handle intergroup conflict.

Effectively Managing Conflict (2 of 2)

Programmed conflict techniques Devil's advocacy • Assigning someone the role of critic • Devil's advocacy alters the usual decision-making process by assigning an individual or group to criticize the proposal and having the critique presented to key decision makers. • It is a good idea to rotate the job of devil's advocate so no one person or group develops a strictly negative reputation and to promote skill development. Dialectic method • Fostering a structured debate of opposing viewpoints prior to making a decision • This method alters the usual decision-making process by generating a counterproposal based on different assumptions and having the advocates of each position present and debate the merits of their proposals before key decision makers. • Drawbacks of the dialectic method technique are that winning the debate may overshadow the issue at hand, and this method requires more skill training than does devil's advocacy. Important to use to actively stimulate functional conflict when necessary, such as when the risk of blind conformity or groupthink is high

Psychological safety climate

Refers to a shared belief among team members that the team is a safe place for interpersonal risk taking and captures a sense of confidence that the team will not embarrass, reject, or punish someone for speaking up.

Alternative dispute resolution (ADR)

Resolution that uses faster, more user-friendly methods of dispute resolution, instead of traditional, adversarial approaches (e.g., unilateral decision making or litigation)

D

Scottie Pet Food Company appointed an employee who is widely respected and trusted by his coworkers to hear grievances and arrange a solution. What is this form of ADR called? a) arbitration b) peer review c) facilitation d) ombudsman e) conciliation

Conflict states

Shared perceptions among members of the team about the intensity of disagreement over either tasks or relationships.

Flex space

Such as telecommuting, occurs when policies enable employees to do their work from different locations besides the office (coffee shops, home, or the beach)

Contact hypothesis

Suggests that the more members of different groups interact, the less intergroup conflict they will experience.

Zone of possible agreement (ZOPA)

The range of possibilities you are willing to accept.