Types of Conflict, Lesson 2. The objectives for this lesson are, describe the different types of conflict, identify the sources of conflict, explain the levels of conflict. We can take a deeper dive into destructive conflict by looking at Daniel Katz' theories. Katz' theories divides the source of conflict into three categories, economic, value, and power. While Katz' study of the source of conflict is on a broader scale, I believe we can make an argument that is solid to use in the work environment. Let's begin with economic conflict. Economic conflict is basically a situation where the sources are scarce. These sources can be many different things, they can be office supplies, they can be display fixtures, or company products. When the sources are scarce in an organization, employees tend to hoard these resources. Because they never know when access to them will become available. So, you might find individuals actually standing by and watching. While their team members look for resources and are unable to find them. But they will not provide their team the support necessary by sharing the resources that they've hoarded. This is clearly a dysfunctional behavior and what ensues when this practice takes place is additional conflict between the teams, peers and managers. Value conflict is between ideals, and principles, and preferences. This is very difficult to sort out between individuals because values are something that we all carry to the work environment. Many individuals in the work environment may mirror the values of the organization, and some of the values that the individuals hold very dear may be opposite to what the environment supports. So when individuals bring their own personal values into the work environment, and expect other individuals to behave within their definition of values, a conflict can ensue. Because as you can imagine, not everyone always has the same set of values. So if these values, principles, or preferences are taken to extreme, where individuals expect everyone to behave such as they do, believe such as they do, or follow the same philosophies such as they do. You'll have discord and it'll be a source of conflict. Power and control is another interesting factor in destructive conflict. When you think about power and control, you may imagine an individual you've worked with on a team, in a department or maybe a division. Power is very passionate to some individuals. Power is something that some people feel defines who they are. Maybe a title, maybe control over a team or a project, solicits a power position that can be very dysfunctional, and then of course cause destructive conflict. Let's take a team setting, where an individual takes the power in always being the first to speak. Overpowering individuals in a dialog are enforcing their situation or their position or their decision to the rest of the team. It can also happen when an individual takes over or control of a work unit where no one's appointed them this position. But they've decided to be the one that does take the lead role even though it's not supported by anybody else on the team. Power is something that's very common in a work environment and I'm sure you've experienced it and have already experienced the source of conflict that it can cause. Interpersonal conflict is between individual. So, it can be something that is specific to two individuals, not necessarily an individual to a team. So, maybe it's a situation where two individuals just don't get along, or they can't seem to have a civil conversation. It can be something that they have brought to the work environment. They may actually have been best friends at one point in time. And then some event has taken place to separate them and to cause their inability to work together in a professional way. When individuals bring interpersonal issues to the work environment, conflict not only exists between the two of them but it also can be very dysfunctional for the team that they work in. You may have worked in an environment where you've heard individuals say, Suzy and Billy, they just don't get along. And it's been a long time since they've been able to. So, if this type of behavior is allowed to exist, the conflict ensues, and it's a perfect example of destructive conflict. When you're talking about the levels of conflict, role is also something that is very important. If the roles are not defined clearly between the team members, as to who is the leader or the followers, who are the peers, who are the decision makers, or who are the resources to go to, you will have issues with the level of conflict. Because if I don't know who I am to go to for decisions, then no decisions are made. This can not only be between individuals, it can be between groups and divisions as well. So defining roles in a team is more than just applying a title to an individual. It's actually outlining the responsibilities and the position that they play within the team. Another level of conflict can be intergroup. So it can be two divisions or groups of people, that might be fighting for resources. Might be fighting over who's playing which role in a project. But when it becomes intergroup, you can have issues with respect to marketing and sales. They could be fighting over who's responsible for the lack or generation of a sales volume. Is it the sales team? Or is it the marketing group that isn't providing the sales team the right materials, to sell the product, which then of course affects the revenue. So Intergroup is very critical to ensure that groups don't become siloed, and only interest in their own success or their own performance. You have to really think about cross-functional teams in order to ensure that this level of conflict does not exist. Multi-party, it's between companies. It can also be thought of as mergers and acquisitions. When you bring in a new company into an organization, it can be very critical in determining how is a company going to be absorbed into the parent organization. Individuals, when mergers and acquisitions happen. If they are the surrendering party, then it's very personal to them. They can have history that they bring that maybe they've been with the organization for a ten year period of time, and they don't like the idea that this is happening. There's a lot of emotion that goes on through this time and you can have a lot of conflict that ensues. It goes back to the things that we've been talking about. Roll, it goes back to power. It also can be value driven. So it can also, quite frankly, be economic. So when you're looking at levels on conflict and focusing on multi party companies, or the example that we're giving, mergers and acquisitions. It's very important to understand the levels of conflict that can play in this type of action and to ensure that you at least acknowledge that this can take place. Intercultural conflict is something that is expanding in our workplace for two reasons. One, because we have a very diverse workforce. And, two, because most companies are global and they're interfacing on a global footprint. So when you're looking at inter-cultural conflict. It's more complex, and it will take a whole module to describe it. And that will be in one of our courses for intercultural conflict, which is referred to as Intercultural Conflict and Conflict Resolution, Course 3. And that concludes Lesson 2.
