Quotes About Conflict

If team members are never pushing one another outside of their emotional comfort zones during discussions, then it is extremely likely that they're not making the best decisions for the organization.

People who don't like conflict have an amazing ability to avoid it, even when they know it's theoretically necessary

Conflict is about issues and ideas, while accountability is about performance and behavior.

Conflict is nothing more than an anxious situation that needs to be resolved.

Why matrix organizational structures became so popular I'm not really sure. There is certainly an element of flexibility and collaboration suggested by them, but in reality they are forums for confusion and conflict. They have certainly not contributed to the breakdown of silos; they've merely added an element of schizophrenia and cognitive dissonance for employees who are unlucky enough to report into two different silos.

Employees know that they ultimately pay the price when their manager doesn't get along with or cooperate with managers of other departments, leaving the staff to navigate the treacherous and bloody waters of organizational politics.

The leader is going to have to be ready to not only light the fuse of good conflict but to gently fan the flames for a while too.

From interviews and orientation to performance reviews and compensation decisions, "the three virtues," as they came to be known, were to be regular topics of conversation. And, of course, there was plenty of hands-on, practical training around the five behavioral manifestations of teamwork: trust, conflict, commitment, accountability, and results. Those courses had become much more effective with participants who shared the three underlying virtues.

This failure to build trust is damaging because it sets the tone for the second dysfunction: fear of conflict. Teams that lack trust are incapable of engaging in unfiltered and passionate debate of ideas. Instead, they resort to veiled discussions and guarded comments.

Meetings are boring because they lack drama. Or conflict. This is a shame because most meetings have plenty of potential for drama, which is essential for keeping human beings engaged. Unfortunately, rather than mining for that golden conflict, most leaders of meetings seem to be focused on avoiding tension and ending their meetings on time.

Avoiding the issues that merit debate and disagreement not only makes the meeting boring, it guarantees that the issues won't be resolved. And this is a recipe for frustration. Ironically, that frustration often manifests itself later in the form of unproductive personal conflict, or politics.

The truth is, the only thing more painful than confronting an uncomfortable topic is pretending it doesn't exist. And I believe far more suffering is caused by failing to deal with an issue directly—and whispering about it in the hallways—than by putting it on the table and wrestling with it head on.

I see a trust problem here in the lack of debate that exists at staff meetings and other interactions among this team.

Damn it. I had to respect Michael Casey. I had really hoped that I could keep loathing him.

When people who don't trust one another engage in passionate debate, they are trying to win the argument. They aren't usually listening to the other person's ideas and then reconsidering their point of view; they're figuring out how to manipulate the conversation to get what they want.

Because when a team recovers from an incident of destructive conflict, it builds confidence that it can survive such an event, which in turn builds trust.

Another way to understand this model is to take the opposite approach—a positive one—and imagine how members of truly cohesive teams behave: They trust one another. They engage in unfiltered conflict around ideas. They commit to decisions and plans of action. They hold one another accountable for delivering against those plans. They focus on the achievement of collective results.

To make meetings less boring, leaders must look for legitimate reasons to provoke and uncover relevant, constructive ideological conflict. By doing so, they'll keep people engaged, which leads to more passionate discussions, and ultimately, to better decisions.

During the next two weeks I am going to be pretty intolerant of behavior that demonstrates an absence of trust, or a focus on individual ego. I will be encouraging conflict, driving for clear commitments, and expecting all of you to hold each other accountable. I will be calling out bad behavior when I see it, and I'd like to see you doing the same. We don't have time to waste.

Ironically, most leaders of meetings go out of their way to eliminate or minimize drama and avoid the healthy conflict that results from it. Which only drains the interest of employees.

And so a leader of a meeting must make it a priority to seek out and uncover any important issues about which team members do not agree. And when team members don't want to engage in those discussions, the leader must force them to do so. Even when it makes him or her temporarily unpopular.

The lack of conflict is precisely the cause of one of the biggest problems that meetings have: they are boring

Let me assure you that from now on, every staff meeting we have will be loaded with conflict. And they won't be boring. And if there is nothing worth debating, then we won't have a meeting.

Meetings are boring because they lack drama. Or conflict. This is a shame because most meetings have plenty of potential for drama, which is essential for keeping human beings engaged.