Disagreements and Strategies

There was a team conflict with colleagues about four years ago,   that has taught me to really think through conflict for a resolution. The conflict was around the matter of everyone finishing their own assignments and not imposing on others.  However, the real matter was having enough courage to have a crucial conversation.

Because there were four people involved and our supervisor had to be brought into the matter, we all worked with the Diversity team (HR) to take layers off of the problem.  The first strategy was the 5 Why’s (because there is a reason for everything). The example question was “why are people not working their own assignments?” Those questions then lead to other whys from the string of answers. This strategy uncovered the intent of the person, not the behavior. The last strategy was making a list of what we all had in common to remember the mutual goal, that strategy minimized the conflict and zoomed in more on how we could help each other’s more.  

 Oh, there was one more strategy, we took a personality test and shared the results of our personality type, our greatest strengths and the areas that we struggle with. That strategy uncovered areas we didn’t notice about ourselves and how others liked to be treated.  Coming up to speed, I can see how the NVC (in a new perception) played a part ( hearing one’s  point of view) and the 3R’s  facilitated by the diversity person as guidelines. .