Managers and Managing

Topic 12. Organizational Conflict and Negotiation

Organizational conflict is the discord that arises when the goals, interests, or values of different individuals or groups are incompatible and those individuals or groups block or thwart each other’s attempts to achieve their objectives.

Types of conflict:

• Interpersonal conflict is a conflict between individual members of an organization, occurring because of differences in their goals or values;
• Intragroup conflict is a conflict that arises within a group, team or department;
• Intergroup conflict is a conflict between groups and teams;
• Interorganizational conflict is a conflict that arises across organizations.

Sources of conflict:

• Incompatible goals and time horizons;
• Overlapping authority;
• Task interdependencies;
• Incompatible evaluation or reward system;
• Status inconsistencies.

Conflict management strategies:

Strategies focused on individuals:

• Increasing awareness of the sources of conflict;
• Increasing diversity awareness and skills;
• Practicing job rotation or temporary assignment;
• Using permanent transfers or dismissal when necessary.

Strategies focused on the whole organization:

• Changing an organization’s structure and culture;
• Altering the source of conflict.

Negotiation is a method of conflict resolution in which the 2 parties in conflict consider various alternative ways to allocate recourses to each other in order to come up with a solution acceptable to them both.

Distributive negotiation is adversarial negotiation in which the parties in conflict compete to win the most resources while conceding as little as possible.

Integrative negotiation is a cooperative negotiation in which the parties in conflict work together to achieve a resolution that is good for them both.