Courtesy
More often than not, conflicts in workplace are treated as detrimental. If they appear, they are resolved immediately and sometimes not inspected later. Quick resolution is and will always be essential for the future of the organization. However, without a deep and intentional inspection of what could have led to the conflict, there are high chances of the issue reappearing, sometimes with greater force.
Here are some ways that examining conflicts extensively can help in organizational development:
Educational benefits
Conflicts in workplace are bound to happen. They follow the popular saying that, “what does not kill you makes you stronger.”
When they are examined extensively, they shed light on areas that may have been previously unseen, ignored, underestimated, or overestimated. To resolve, you must exercise your mind by welcoming new ideas, challenging your perspectives, combining and disintegrating concepts, and looking for new ways of approaching certain situations. This essentially expands your scope of understanding people, circumstances, needs, and the industry. Such knowledge is essential for future planning and management of a similar or closely related matter.
However, if the knowledge is inapplicable in a certain area, then the resilience deployed to overcome previous challenges will be invaluable.
To warrant recognition of each other’s efforts
As long as we believe that our colleagues are there to stay and to do whatever needs to be done, there is a possibility of taking their contribution for granted, even when they have gone to great lengths to ensure harmony and perfection.
Organizational development is the result of collective efforts and at any particular time, there are people who pull more weight than others, with and without knowing. Investigating the cause of a conflict and the steps taken to resolve, one can see the efforts put by each person and reward accordingly. Either or both recognition and reward go a long way in strengthening relations in the workplace. They are also great sources of motivation because if such people were to face similar or tougher issues in future, they would willingly contribute in the search for solutions.
To allocate resources properly
Conflicts appear due to inadequacies in some departments. A thorough investigation of the causes can reveal such so you can allocate both the physical and non-physical assets appropriately. Conflicts open your eyes to all the ways that you can combine physical and non-physical resources for the benefit of the organization.
Reduce the risk of suppressed ideas and emotions
It seems unlikely that executives would get into conflicts, especially after years of working together. However, areas of disagreements appear frequently than we like to admit, but they do not always entail wild outbursts. When they emerge, there is always the tendency to suppress ideas and emotions for fear of ruining one’s name or looking like a negative force in the company. There are times when, no matter how hard the emotions are suppressed, they erupt. Using a conflict as a compass to inner worlds of executives can reveal the suppressed ideas that can benefit the organization.
Allowing people to expressing their thoughts when disagreements emerge cultivates a sense of belonging. It also challenges one to examine the matters at hand from multiple angles and come up with well refined ideas.
Change can happen quickly
Resolving conflicts on surface level has never been an effective way of setting the organization for growth because the problem can strike and cripple operations. On the other hand, resolving from the root eliminates the problem completely or ensures that if it were to strike, it would not cause a lot of damage.
Opportunity to learn about others
The complexity of human reactions cannot be captured without changes from routine. When there are sudden or gradual changes, people react differently. Some become overly anxious, avoidant, pessimistic, and others excited at the opportunity to come up with new strategies. Therefore, with challenges, one gets an opportunity to learn about the diverse reactions, their role in the resolution and shape interactions in future. Such information is useful for leaders who manage different types of people on a daily basis.
Strengthen connection in the workplace
Oftentimes, conflicts bring people together so they can search for solutions. It is during such times that those who may have thought that they are outsiders feel their impact in the organization. If they do not realize, then it is a perfect time for them to be taught that competition, where necessary, is not against their colleagues but the outside world.
Prevent losses
Challenges pose risks to an organization. When resolved hastily, they may prevent reputational and financial losses at a certain time, but for long-term safety, you ought to look at the root cause. It is during this process of examining that you can realize other germinating matters that can cause risks if they were to remain unresolved. The findings assist in risk management and proper planning.
In conclusion,
Conflicts need not to be looked at as detrimental. They can help one to shape the path for an organization’s growth for the long and short term depending on how they are examined. This calls for all business leaders not to shelve challenges even after they have resolved them but to use them as reasons for extensive research to find a range of ways in which the organization can be set and grounded on a path to success.