“Learn effective conflict resolution in the workplace, tailored to the unique context of Armed Forces. Understand various conflict types, from task to relationship conflicts, and explore the key factors differentiating military and corporate environments. Discover strategies like active listening, embracing Theory Y leadership, and addressing employees’ fundamental needs—appreciation, affiliation, autonomy, and status—for conflict prevention and resolution. Navigate conflicts with insight and harmony.”
Conflict is a disagreement that arises when two or more parties perceive a threat to their interests, needs or concerns. Conflicts is not always a problem. Conflict is the symbol of different opinions and different perspectives which can lead to growth and upliftment. So, conflict is not the real problem, the real problem is the unmonitored and unresolved conflicts. Armed Forces essentially means a country’s Army, Navy and Air Force.
The topic is “How to deal with conflicts at workplace in context of Amred Forces”. And for those who have noticed that the spelling of ‘Armed’ is not correct, this is the first and basic cause of generation of a conflict i.e. pointing out mistakes with the intention just to show you know the solution.
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Types of conflicts at workplace?
There are some major types of conflicts i.e.
i. Task conflict: It is a disagreement about the task or goals. It is a ‘What to do’ conflict.
ii. Process conflicts: One person wants to do a task in one way while someone wants to prefer a different approach. Process conflicts reflects conflicts about how to accomplish a task, who is responsible for what or how things should be done. One can agree about the task but disagree on how to perform it. It is a ‘How to do it’ conflict.
iii. Role ambiguity: If a Manager/Employer/Trainer does not clearly assign work tasks to the employees, they may tend to do the desirable task and run away from the least desirable task. It can indirectly cause process conflicts.
iv. Relationship conflicts: Sometimes employees/ trainees have trouble working with some person just because they don’t like the person. These conflicts can arise from interpersonal differences, motivations, assumptions, traits, etc.
v. Change: Indeed, it is been said the change is not possible without a conflict.
Other reasons are values and worldviews, resources, uncertainty, misinformation or irrelevant information, structure of organization. Understanding conflict is very critical to manage it.
Managing conflicts in the armed forces requires understanding the unique dynamics of this work environment. Key differentiating factors include the emphasis on benefiting others, the importance of helping fallen colleagues, prioritizing trust over individual performance, and fostering a sense of compassion and camaraderie among team members.
What differentiates Armed Forces and Corporates?
Armed Forces are most certainly one of the biggest organizations of the Nation and it still manages to run in harmony with no or least conflicts. The best way to learn how to deal with conflicts at workplace in the context of armed forces is to learn about the differences between armed forces and corporates. The very first thing to notice is that our workplaces are different itself. The workplace of armed forces is the base or battlefields. There are very high stakes in their workplace. What is it at stake is the most important thing for every person – Life. So, the things to learn are;
- Benefitting others: The Army persons got in their profession knowing that they won’t get rich, knowing that they have to do certain sacrifices, knowing that there may be ‘Job Security’ but not ‘Life Security’, knowing that most of their efforts will go into the benefit of others. Most people attach the Armed Forces by ‘Aggression’ but we have to understand there is a reason why they also called as ‘Defense’ forces and they are driven by Service whereas Corporates are driven by Competition.
- Helping the fallen: Armed forces are biggest organizations which recruits their personnel from all over the country. There can be many different states, religions, languages, cultures, perspectives, strategies, etc. in one room, but they have one thing in common, when they are physically and emotionally exhausted, when they have absolutely nothing to give, every one of them is able to dig deep inside themselves to find the energy to help the guy next to them. They commit themselves to take care of each other, this makes a great team (a team without conflicts)
- Performance Vs Trust: Simon Sinek once asked his NAVY Seal friend how do you recruit or promote NAVY Seals (American NAVY Seals are one of the most Elite Armed forces of the world). He answered, “we simply draw a graph. Performance on ‘Y’ axis and Trust on ‘X’ axis. Nobody wants Low performer with Low trust and obviously everybody wants High performer with High trust. But the catch here is we will hire Medium-Low or sometimes Low performer with High trust rather than High performer with Low trust. We simply ask a question to ourselves while recruiting ‘I can trust you with my life, but can I trust you with my money and my wife?’”. While recruiting and promoting one has to focus to employees trust more than performance, which connects to the next point.
- Efforts Vs Results: Most organizations nowadays have these awards like ‘Best Employee of the Month’, etc. awards for their employees. Now let’s imagine the scene of that day when this award ceremony is to be held, a group of 30 employees are seated in a conference room awaiting their boss. Boss comes with an envelope in his hand. Envelope gets teared in front of that 30 people. Boss utters one name out of it. The person whose name has been called upon walking to the stage while 29 others clapping. Now, it is important to praise the achiever but what is even more important is that paying attention to those 29 people standing behind. Because probably they are the reason why that person is on the stage receiving the award, by paying attention to that 29, I do not mean to motivate them to do better and by giving stupid speeches like “you can also share the stage next time if you work hard and grow.” But to recognize their efforts, and that cannot happen through giving them those consolation prizes which I call ‘sympathy prizes’. It can happen by an unending emphatical conversations with each employee.
- Colleagues Vs Brothers: One of the major pages that we can steal from Army books is ‘Compassion’. Compassion towards each other, towards nation, towards their mission. Arguably, you can hug more people in uniforms than you will ever hug in suits, you can cry with more people in uniform than you will ever cry with people in suits. To put it in a nutshell, we have colleagues and co-workers and they have brothers and sisters.
Strategies to Deal with Conflicts at workplace
- Listen: Nelson Mandela is a world renowned and accepted leader and this is why he is the most suitable case study for this point. Once a journalist asked Mandela “how did you become such a great leader?” Now, Mandela actually grew up as the son of a tribal chief and he said to this journalist “I remember as a boy, I would attend tribal meetings with my father and I always remember two things. First, they always sat in circle. And second, my father was always the last to speak”.
And this is what it means to be a great listener. It doesn’t mean that you don’t have the opportunity to speak. It means you allow others to speak before you, to allow others to feel heard. Even if you know the answer, simply walking into a room or in a meeting to impress everybody that you know the answer makes others feel bad and they wouldn’t want to help you in the future. Practice being last to speak when you are on a team. Great leaders don’t start the conversations, they end it.
- Leading by theory Y: Leader have a direct connection with conflict management. In CS Foundation, I studied theory X and theory Y by management scholar, Douglas McGregor. Theory Y simply explains that employees should be motivated by rewards and not by punishment.
For ex: An employee who is aspirant to be the best in the business and also gave the expected results in the past, but since last 3 months he is performing extremely unwell. Suppose a leader walks in and reviews him; “look you seemed bright, but you have been underperforming since 3 consecutive months. You better improve your performance otherwise I don’t see your future good in this organization” and instead leader says “Hey, I observed you are not performing well lately…, what happened? Is everything okay? Don’t worry about your underperformance, I know you will improve as per your potential.” In both cases, that employee will improve but in the latter case, he will feel secure, connected and of course as its bye-product, the chances of conflicts will be reduced significantly.
Key Factors for Conflict Resolution and Workplace Harmony
To sum up, everyone at workplace just requires four primary things on fulfillment of which, conflicts can be avoided and resolved at a great scale
i. Appreciation: If someone is feeling unappreciated, do something to make them feel more appreciated. This might simply involve some positive acknowledgement confirming that you understand their concerns.
ii. Affiliation: If someone doesn’t feel part of the team, do something positive that gives then a better sense of belonging.
iii. Autonomy: Although theory X of McGregor proves that people are passive and prefer to be led, they also want some freedom. If someone feels that their views are not respected, find ways to include them more in the decision-making process.
iv. Status: If someone feels that their role at work is being undermined, which is so often connected with a person’s sense of identity, focus on that.
Author Bio
Best and to the point Article, very much informative and relatable. Thank you for such content.