What is the nature of conflict in
organizations?
How can conflict be managed?
What is the nature of negotiation in
organizations?
What are alternative strategies for
negotiation?
Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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Conflicts are disagreements that occur in
social situations.
 Substantive
 A disagreement over goals, and the means for
their accomplishment.
 Emotional
 Interpersonal difficulties that arise over feelings
of anger, mistrust, dislike, fear, and resentment.
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"If I had a formula for bypassing trouble, I would not pass
it round. Trouble creates a capacity to handle it.
I don't embrace trouble; that's as bad as treating it as an
enemy.
…But I do say meet it as a friend, for you'll see a lot of it and
had better be on speaking terms with it."
—Oliver Wendell Holmes
Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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Levels of Conflict in Organizations
Interpersonal
Intrapersonal
Intergroup
Can be
caused by
rivalries;
personality
differences
Pressure from
incompatible
(internal)
goals or
expectations
Causes are
substantive
(competition
for resources)
or emotional
Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Interorganizational
Competition
for market
share
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Functional conflict
 Results in constructive, positive benefits to
individuals, the group, or the organization.
Dysfunctional conflict
 Destructive to an individual or team.
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Potential benefits of functional conflict
 Surfaces important problems so they can be
addressed.
 Causes careful consideration of decisions.
 Increases information available for decision
making.
 Provides opportunities for creativity.
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Potential outcomes of dysfunctional conflict
 Diverts energies.
 Hurts group cohesion; erodes trust.
 Creates overall negative environment.
 Can decrease work productivity and job
satisfaction.
 Can contribute to absenteeism and job
turnover.
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Culture and conflict
 Culture and cultural differences must be
considered for their conflict potential.
 Cross-cultural sensitivity and respect for
differences helps defuse dysfunctional
conflict.
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Conflict resolution
 Situation in which the underlying reasons for
a given destructive conflict are eliminated.
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Conflict antecedents
 Underlying reasons or conditions from which
conflicts are likely to develop.
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Perceived conflict
 When the antecedents become the basis for
substantive or emotional differences between
people or groups.
Felt conflict
 Conflict experienced as tension that motivates
the person to take action to reduce feelings of
discomfort.
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Manifest conflict
 Conflict can be manifested in actual
behaviors that attempt to remove or correct
conflict antecedents.
 Failure to resolve antecedents results in
suppression of the conflict - only to reemerge at a later time, or in another form.
Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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Causes of conflict
 Vertical conflict
 Occurs between hierarchical levels.
 Horizontal conflict
 Occurs between persons or groups at the same
hierarchical level.
 Line-staff conflict
 Involves disagreements over who has authority and
control over specific matters.
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Role ambiguity conflicts
 Occur when the communication of task expectations
proves inadequate or upsetting.
Workflow interdependencies
 Occur when people or units are required to cooperate
to meet challenging goals.
Domain ambiguities
 Occur as misunderstandings over such things as
customer jurisdiction or scope of authority.
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Resource scarcity
 When resources are scarce, working
relationships are likely to suffer.
Power or value asymmetries
 Occur when interdependent people or
groups differ substantially from one another
in status and influence or in values
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Indirect strategies:
Reduced interdependence
 Adjusting the level of interdependency
among units or individuals when
workflow conflicts exist
 Decoupling, buffering, and linking
pin strategies address specific
organizational situations.
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Appeal to common goals
 Focusing the attention of potentially
conflicting parties on one mutually desirable
conclusion.
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Hierarchical referral
 Problems are referred up the hierarchy for
more senior managers to reconcile.
Altering scripts and myths
 Superficial management of conflict by using
behavioral routines that become part of the
organization’s culture.
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Cooperative
Accommodating
Unassertive
Collaborating
Compromise
Avoiding
Assertive
Competing
Uncooperative
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Lose-lose conflict
 Nobody gets what he or she wants;
underlying reasons remain unresolved.
Strategies include:
 Avoidance.
 Accommodation- playing down differences.
 Compromise- giving up something valued.
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Win-Lose conflict
 One party achieves its desires at the
expense and to the exclusion of the other
party’s desires.
 Competition - force, skill, or domination
 Authoritative command – quick and decisive
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Win-Win conflict
 Achieved by a blend of both high
cooperativeness and high assertiveness.
 Collaboration or problem solving
o Stresses gathering and evaluating information in
solving disputes and making choices.
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Think of a conflict you had with a coworker…
 Was it handled directly or indirectly?
 How was it resolved? Think about the
technique that was used.
 Has the conflict re-appeared?
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Negotiation
 The process of making joint
decisions when the parties
involved have different
preferences and goal
expectations.
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Substance goals
 Outcomes that relate to content issues.
Relationship goals
 Outcomes that relate to how well people
involved in the negotiations are able to work
with one another once the process is
concluded.
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Effective negotiation factors:
 Quality– all sides are satisfied.
 Harmony– good interpersonal relations.
 Efficiency-optimal use of time and resources.
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Negotiation and ethics
Negotiation is all about meeting one's interests –
this often sets up a dilemma: my interests vs.
his interests.
 To maintain good working relationships, all
participants should strive for high ethical
standards.
 Focus more on finding common ground, and less
on self interest.
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Lying is an overt form of unethical behavior in
organizations and in negotiations. But there are
many more subtle forms.
For example: illegal or unethical veiled threats, any sort
of bribes, kickbacks, corruption, preventing others
from participating, or making public negative
statement about them, belittling their effectiveness,
threats or negative future actions, ruining someone's
reputation without cause, etc.
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Two-party
negotiation
• Manager negotiates directly
with one other person.
Group
negotiation
• Manager is part of a group
whose members are
negotiating.
Intergroup
negotiation
• Manager is part of a group that
is negotiating with another
group.
Constituency
negotiation
•Manager negotiates with other
persons, and each represents a
larger group.
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 Distributive
negotiation
› Focuses on positions
staked out or
declared by the
conflicting parties
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 Integrative
negotiation
› Sometimes called
principled
negotiation
› Focuses on the
merits of the issues
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Distributive negotiation
 “Who is going to get this resource?”
 “Hard” distributive negotiation (win/lose)
 Each party holds out to get its own way.
 “Soft” distributive negotiation (lose/lose)
 One party is willing to make concessions.
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Bargaining zone
 Range between one party’s minimum
reservation point and the other party’s
maximum reservation point.
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Integrative negotiation
 “How can the resource best be used?”
 Less confrontational than distributive
negotiation.
 Allows a broader range of alternative
solutions to be considered.
 A win-win solution is possible.
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Foundations of Integrative negotiation
1. Attitudes
 Willingness to trust, share information, and ask
concrete questions.
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2. Behaviors
 Separate the people from the problem.
 Keep emotions in check.
 Focus on common interests to find solutions.
 Avoid premature judgments.
 Compare solution to your baseline criteria.
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3. Information

Each party must know what he or she will do
if an agreement can’t be reached.

Each party must determine what is personally
important in the situation.

Each party must try to understand the other’s
interests.
Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
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“Fixed Pie” is a myth
•The pie can be expanded
• Consider that it may not be a pie,
more like a Bundt cake.
Escalating
Commitment
•Taking a stand forces sticking to it.
•Avoid fall into this trap by being a
good self-monitor.
Overconfidence
•Always try to understand the
merits of the other party’s position
as well.
Too much telling and •Seek to be understood, but also,
to understand.
not enough active
listening
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Third party negotiations
A neutral third party works with persons
involved in a negotiation to help them
resolve impasses and settle disputes.
 Arbitration
 A third party acts as a “judge” and has the power
to issue a decision that is binding on all disputing
parties
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Mediation
 A neutral third party tries to engage
disputing parties in a negotiated solution
through persuasion and rational argument
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