Free Workplace Conflict Essay Sample

A workplace conflict alludes to a conflict that occurs in the work environment that might affect the quality of work and the overall results. Most conflicts arise due to a clash of personalities among the employees in the organisation or due to different opinions about the tasks given in the office. The work environment usually dictates the type of conflicts that may arise at work. For instance, the managerial structure, financial milieu, or an abrupt change in the running of the organisation like a sudden increase in the amount of hours one is required to put in (Gwartney-Gibbs, & Lach, 2014).An example of a workplace conflict is leadership conflicts.
Leadership conflicts describe differences in personality traits between the organisation’s managers and the subordinates. Such situations often create interpersonal conflicts at the workplace. At times, the employees may feel bullied by the managers or might create the impression that hands-off supervisors have poor guidance. Managers with character tending towards perfectionism may set overambitious goals and will expect the staff to do their best to ensure the company achieves these goals (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). This type of behaviour may create conflict because the employees will almost likely fail to achieve these organizational goals. Employees who do not meet the targets of the organisation and get singled out may feel that the management is out to frustrate them and might not take too kindly to such. In other cases, one of the colleagues might be elevated to a senior position where he would be required to exert control over his former peers. His peers might not take him seriously which would cause conflicts.
In order to manage such conflicts, the management needs first to handle the differences in the personalities of the manager and other members of staff. The managers need first to garner and understanding between him and her and his or her subordinates. The basis for this is to allow managers to understand the perspective of the subordinate and for the subordinate to understand the perspective of the manager in the conflict. The managers should avoid converting conflicts into disciplinary hearings. That is when the managers assume that they are automatically right, and the subordinates are inherently wrong. Rather, managers should be willing to listen to their subordinates and allow them to raise ideas on how to resolve the conflict. According to research studies on workplace conflict, the most effective way of losing good employees is when managers do not accept that they can be wrong sometimes. If either the manager or the subordinate cannot understanding each other, then the organisation can try to shift the managerial structure and assign a new supervisor to the employee involved in the conflict. Sometimes, a good look at the company’s policies might single out the source of the problem especially if the conflict arises due to some policies.
Conflicts impact the organisation negatively, hence the need to try and come up with a resolution as soon as it comes up. A leadership conflict is especially damaging as it will cause the employee to stop performing at his best and, therefore, cause a decrease in the output of the company (Goetsch & Davis, 2014). Also, the conflicts might lead to psychological and emotional stress to both the employee and the manager. Emotional stress makes one not focus on the goals and the aspirations of the company that consequently would make the organisation perform poorly. Some conflicts might spread to involve other people other than the original principal parties (Gwartney-Gibbs & Lach, 2014). It would create division among members of the group with one faction supporting one individual and the other faction supporting another individual. Such scenarios usually occur when the conflicting parties are principals in the corporation. In such cases, the institution would bear the brunt of the conflict.
All in all, conflicts are part of life and represent democracy in the workplace. Some are healthy like those that challenge some policies that may be hurting the organisation. In such cases, an examination of the source of the conflicts might give rise to a positive outcome. However, there is need to resolve conflicts as soon as possible to avoid them stalling the progress of the organisation (Baillien, Bollen, Euwema & De Witte, 2014).

References

Baillien, E., Bollen, K., Euwema, M., & De Witte, H. (2014). Conflicts and conflict management styles as precursors of workplace bullying: a two-wave longitudinal study. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 23(4), 511-524
Goetsch, D. L., & Davis, S. B. (2014). Quality management for organizational excellence. New York: Pearson.
Gwartney-Gibbs, P. A., & Lach, D. H. (2014). Workplace dispute resolution and gender inequality. Sociological Practice, 10(1), 9.