Conflict - Avoid It With Clarity

One of the root causes of conflict is misunderstanding. The more clearly you can define your expectations, the less likely you are to must deal with conflict. The more clearly you understand your employees, the less likely you are to must deal with conflict. Here's a narrative about conflict that resulted from a lack of understanding and clarity and an observation about the way it might have been avoided.

A manager designated a project leader for a small but important application development project. The project leader immediately went to work on the development plan. They worked alone for several weeks and created a plan they was proud of. When they done the plan and introduced it to his manager, the manager assigned a team of developers to him. The developers reviewed the plan and introduced their changes at the first meeting. The project leader rejected all changes. The developers left the room in a clearly hostile frame of mind. Weeks went by without a single line of code being written. Each status meeting was a shouting match. The project leader thought it was a hate for him. The developers thought they was unreasonable. The manager made no work to select the reason for the issue. When an outside facilitator was brought in, it was immediately clear to them what had happened.

It might appear as if the solution is to fire the whole bunch of individuals who have been burning up company resources without accomplishing the task they got. The solution is preventive management and clarity from the outset. It is the responsibility of the top person to provide the clear guidelines that can avoid this type of conflict and to be aware when a project or their company is going in a wrong direction. This type of wasted work and time can be avoided with clear, concise communication of your expectations and an understanding of your employees' expectations. Don't get so far from the day to day operation that you miss warning signs.

The project leader was much like a parent and the project plan, developed alone and under pressure to perform and to show himself as a new project leader in this company, was much like his infant. The development team included individuals who had seniority in the company over the project leader. Their attitudes and their suggestions were made as in the event that they were correcting a less experienced team member. Their suggestions were much like telling anyone their infant is flawed and could use different colored eyes and hair. The project leader was offended at any suggestion of changes because they believed they had done his job correctly. The team was offended that their ideas weren't accepted when they believed they were helping an inexperienced project leader. These were all reasonable people with the skills needed to complete an important project quickly and effectively. All of them let their emotions get in the way of doing their jobs and their manager didn't intervene.