For the Most Productive Teams, Just Add Conflict
Not super into workplace conflict?
That’s not surprising. As social animals, most of us care a lot more about being liked than about being right, especially at work where considerations of compensation and workplace hierarchies are at play. Conflict makes us feel uncomfortable and many of us tend to avoid it at all costs.
And when conflict does exist in our workplaces, it can feel overwhelming and all-consuming. Just take these stats from a recent CCP survey, which show that 29% of employees deal with workplace conflict “almost constantly” and 58% of them have thought about quitting because of it. The average time that U.S. employees spend weekly resolving disagreements is about 2.8 hours per week - 359 billion hours that are paid out to employees who are focused on disagreements rather than productivity.
So can we just avoid conflict?
Nope! The thing is, the right kind of conflict is actually a super important part of healthy communication in the workplace. Bestselling author Patrick Lencioni argues that lack of productive conflict is a key behavior that can hamper a team’s ultimate success. “In many situations, conflict is considered taboo, especially at work. And the higher you go up the management chain, the more you find people spending inordinate amounts of time and energy trying to avoid the kind of passionate debates that are essential to any great team,” Lencioni says.
It’s those passionate debates that do, in fact, make a difference. Without people sharing their insights and opinions, the work will continue “the way we’ve always done it,” whether that’s led to high success or not. In addition, productive conflict allows for double and triple checking of plans, projections, and ideas to address potential concerns and challenges before they occur.
How do we know if we’re conflicting productively?
Oh, you’ll know. But seriously, productive conflict does NOT look like a conflict culture where:
everyone is engaged in debates and arguments all of the time.
its the norm to question authority or put down others’ ideas.
team members debate every decision, no matter how important.
conflict is repetitive and does not lead to change.
Rather, teams who conflict productively are able to determine the most important areas of debate and drill down on those in an open exchange of ideas and information. When people conflict in this way, you’ll hear a lot of questions and a lot of “I” statements (i.e: I want to understand more.) versus “you” statements (i.e: You never explain yourself clearly!)
Fine, but how do we start?
A team that engages in productive conflict has explicitly created the space for team members to do so, without fear of being embarrassed, rejected, or punished for speaking their truth. Here are some tips to get started with creating just such a culture.
Tip #1: Foster a Sense of Psychological Safety
Psychological safety is a way of describing a team culture where all members of that team feel free to share their opinions without fear of retribution. Building this takes time and effort, but is the foundation upon which trust - and thus - productive conflict stands.
To do it, regularly encourage hearing from all voices. If you’re the leader of a meeting, for example, try not to end that meeting until all participants have spoken at least once. In addition, make a point not to interrupt others during conversation. If the manager does it, an interrupting norm has been established, which makes it easy for folks to shut one another down - not a great recipe for safety.
Tip #2: Create Conflict Norms
Productive conflict looks a little bit different everywhere it shows up, but one way to ensure that all team members are on the same page is to establish rules for conflict culture. To think about this, consider:
What communication channels should be used when managing conflict?
At what point is conflict raised to a higher manager?
Are there any times when conflict needs to be “paused” and dealt with later?
What is considered unacceptable in the conflict management process?
What steps are considered acceptable for conflict resolution strategies?
How will we hold one another accountable to these conflict norms?
This thinking can be done by the manager and then shared with the team for feedback, or collaborated on by the team together. However you establish these norms, ensure they are clear and agreed upon by all team members.
Tip #3: Rally Around a Solution
To be effective, conflict has to be in service of something. Whenever a topic is on the table, it should be very clear that the purpose in discussion is finding common ground. It can even be helpful to state it up front, “We are meeting today to poke holes in this proposal and get to clarity - our goal is to get it to a 90% draft where we all feel aligned and ready to meet the deliverables described here.”
By taking this approach, it’s much easier to guide people away from conflicts that have become too personal or too emotional. Remind everyone what you’re trying to do, and make sure your conversation stays solution-focused.
Tip #4: Keep Conflicting Styles in Mind
That same CCP survey we looked at earlier found that 49% of employees feel that conflict stems from individual personalities. This shows that the conflict is not being kept solutions-focused, but also points to a deeper challenge: we all have different communication styles, and sometimes those styles clash. Paying close attention to how the people on your team prefer to communicate will allow you to meet them where they are, and to encourage other teammates to do the same.
A great way to dive into your team’s conflicting styles is by learning about your DiSC profile. This self-assessment measures a person’s level of (D)ominance, i(nfluence), S(teadiness), and C(onscientiousness) and explores what that means about how they prefer to approach conflict.
Ultimately?
Productive conflict is king when it comes to creating an environment of learning, clarifying questions, and sparking healthy debate. If reframing conflict in this way feels complicated, we can help. Our “Increasing Comfort with Productive Conflict” training is research-based, practice-focused, and available for entire teams, or as a manager iteration. We also provide DiSC profile assessments and trainings around using and reading the results.
