EngineerHer

I had an exciting week last week. I appeared on the Irish Times’ Women’s Podcast and was a panellist on the Engineers Ireland International Women in Engineering Day event. It was the final question at the Engineers Ireland event that prompted this post. Because, no matter how good I am, I couldn’t answer the question about conflict resolution in 30 seconds or less.

Instead, I spoke about the pinching trick I’ve mentioned in previous posts. And I got a lot of interest in that trick. Worrying amount really. But it is massively useful.

What is conflict resolution?

I could start with “what is conflict” but that could derail things entirely for the post. For the purposes of this post, we are going with conflict being any sort of disagreement or misalignment between two parties in the workplace. Alright?

Resolution then is a means of moving forwards from that point. Now I’ve been reading a lot about conflict resolution in the workplace and there appears to be four broad categories of root cause.

• Communication issues
• Cloudy or unclear expectations
• Time pressure
• Lack of clarity around roles and responsibilities

And, if we’re honest, the conflict resolution path for each is slightly different.

Communication issues

This one is both relatively simple and disgustingly complicated to sort out.

It usually involves, well, clear communication.

Now, I’m going to offer some advice here. When it comes to conflict resolution – it rarely happens when emotions are running high. Whether it’s anger, fear, frustration… it doesn’t matter.

So take a step back. Reach out a few hours later, or even the next day, suggest a face to face if at all possible. Coffee and cake doesn’t go astray either. The ancient human tendency to meet for food as a peace making endeavour works. Sharing salt, breaking bread, hospitality laws… these happen all over the world and it’s deeply ingrained in most of us.

I’d advise starting off with a 1-2-1 meeting. Try and get to the core, the heart of the disagreement.

“I wanted to have a chat about X. It appears there’s been some miscommunication somewhere along the lines”.

“I didn’t fully grasp your needs at the last meeting.”

“I think we got off on the wrong foot at the meeting last week. Can we reset and start again?”

The idea here is to get to heart of the miscommunication. Establish what the other person expected or anticipated. See where things went off track. Don’t react -seriously, I know this can be ridiculously hard, but trust me. If you can stay calm here, it will help immensely.

Start by establishing what the other party expected. Get clear on this.

Then you can outline what you expected. It might be that once you start talking the misalignment or disagreement is fairly small, but in the heat of the moment, got blown up. This isn’t unusual, don’t worry. But the conversation afterwards, trying to establish where the communication went wrong, is vital.

If a simple chat establishes that the conflict isn’t that big or that there is no real conflict once the miscommunication is corrected, then that’s grand.

It might be that you need to move on to one of the other methods of resolution once the miscommunication is cleared up though.

Cloudy or unclear expectations

Now, this is extremely closely related to communication issues. In fact, I’d view it as a subset of communication issues. But setting clear expectations is a great way of avoiding conflict.

So, how does one set clear expectations?

Well, be, very, very clear. Clear delineation between areas of responsibility. Clear expectations on outcomes for projects.

Honestly SMART is a great technique for setting expectations: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, time bound.

Yes, I know, it’s a means to set clear goals. But expectations are extremely close to goals and by forcing yourself to sit down and trying to fit your expectations into this framework, it will force you to become clear around your expectations.

This can be for a team or individual. But it’s worthwhile.

Time pressure

Now, look, we’re engineers, there’s no escaping time pressure on occasion. But still, we can always mitigate. Conflict can arise here because of conflicting time pressures and honestly, I’ve never yet gotten to a place where two pressures were exactly the same in terms of importance and urgency.

There are a few options to consider here:

• Delegate one of the urgent tasks
• De-prioritise one of the tasks
• Escalate and ask for help
• Consider how important each task really is
• Consider the background to each task

The goal here is to get the tasks done without major upset, but also without driving one team into the ground. Or hospital. Yes, there are times when we all put in the hours on a given project. That’s a choice we make, to keep things going. But there are times when it’s not possible.

These days, I have a firm priority list in my head: home and family first, then work. And even within that, there are differing levels of priority. So for example, finishing a procedure that needs to be approved in 3 weeks time versus seeing my niece? Niece hands down. (There is very little that my niece doesn’t beat, to be fair!)

You are allowed to prioritise your own health and well being over work as well. One late night, or even a full week of late nights, probably won’t have long term effects. Months of late nights? Entirely different story.

Equally, work vs a normal night at a home might have a different result to work vs your child’s birthday.

Being clear on your own personal priorities makes time pressures much easier to navigate.

Roles and responsibilities

Lack of clarity here can lead to one of two outcomes. And both lead to the need for conflict resolution.

1. Two people are doing the same work, but slightly differently and getting frustrated that someone else is re-doing work they’ve already done.
2. No one is doing something kinda vital and things get dropped.

Again, communication and clear expectations here are vital. And, a quick conversation between the parties involved would probably clarify things fairly quickly.

Conflict resolution process

There are a number of steps to conflict resolution (but it probably won’t surprise you to realise they all pretty much involve being clear and communicating…)

1. Address the conflict. You’d be amazed how many groups try to ignore conflict and let it fester. The best way to deal with it, in my opinion, is to nip it in the bud and address any conflict at the earliest opportunity.
2. Get very clear on the source of the conflict. Don’t depend on the rumour mill here, get the data, the facts, from the people involved. Check your sources and double check your sources. Ideally, get the people involved to talk to you and get their opinions first, then look for supporting evidence.
3. Get the concerned parties in a room and talking. It can help to talk to each individually first. Seriously, this can allow them to get all the emotion and frustration out of the way, so that when they sit down with the other party (or parties) to the conflict, everyone can sit down and discuss the matter in a constructive way.
4. Find a solution . Preferably in that face-to-face meeting. By this stage you have engaged with all parties, gotten extremely clear on the root cause of the issue and now is the time to sort things out. (We really are following the basic problem solving method here, in case anyone is noticing the similarities)
5. Monitor the situation. Have some follow up conversations, either individually again, or with all parties involved. Make sure the communication is continuing, and not faltering again. Keep the expectations of clear communications high and in people’s mind.

Anything else?

You’ll probably have noticed “communication” is usually at the heart of conflict and conflict resolution. Clear communication is absolutely vital in any relationship, including professional ones, and the more high pressure the situation, the more important it is!

So take your time with comms. Now, just throwing a “good morning” someone’s way shouldn’t require a major planning campaign, but for anything more serious, consider planning out the comms.

Whether it’s a new project, setting up a new team, engaging with a new part of the company, engaging a new vendor… communication, communication, communication. I once had a manager tell me I couldn’t possibly communicate with him too much. OK I might have taken that one to extremes, but still. The point stands.

And it’s always ok to allow people some time to compose themselves, calm down, take some breaths, whatever is needed. Conflict resolution rarely happens at full volume. Unless you’re in a noisy environment – and even then…

Take the steps you need to notice yourself. Then you can start getting to the root cause of the problem. It could come down to someone’s bad mood. And it does. It could come down to the room being hot and stuffy, and allowing people to take a break can work wonders. An open window and some fresh air helps reduce emotions if you can’t do anything else.

And you are entirely allowed to call people out for being emotional. I mean, I’m not suggesting yelling at someone that they’re raising their voices, but a suggestion that the whole group take a break to allow people to get some air will usually let people know…

Most of all, look after yourself. It’s extremely difficult to resolve a conflict if you, yourself, are not feeling grounded and centred. Take your time. Go have a cry. Get out a punching bag. Work out the emotions. Then… come back and start the resolution steps.

Communication, communication, communication. Honestly, it’s the way to go”