Five Steps to Build Better Team Relationships
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Building great companies takes building great relationships. Building great relationships in a team takes...conflict.
Sound counterintuitive! Especially in an economy where going out on a limb imposes a lot more risks than usual, who would want to add conflict to the equation?
It’s natural to avoid conflict. It’s what separated life and death for early cavemen; we have evolved but with that same wiring embedded in our psyche: “Keep things safe'' and “Don’t rock the boat.” In today’s world, avoiding conflict actually becomes a detriment in building the relationships teams need in order to work together and get things done.
The truth about conflict is that it’s a normal, natural occurrence that happens whenever two or more people are gathered to accomplish common goals. And it’s inevitable that somewhere along the process, people will bump heads. However, conflict doesn’t have to be a negative experience for your teams.
What I know to be true: Skillfully-managed constructive conflict can turbo-power creativity, innovation, productivity, and growth for your company.
Harness the power of constructive conflict
What’s the difference between a company rife with chaotic conflict, and one with innovative, block-busting, idea-bursting creative tension?
Conflict competency. This is that elusive space where not only is conflict normalized, but also the concepts of competing ideas and cognitive confrontation are coveted within a team. Conflict competence is a management skill that can be taught and built into the structure and culture of any organization.
Five steps to conflict competence for better relationships
These are crucial steps for you and your leadership team to understand, embed, and practice in order to begin to build more cohesive, productive and creative teams.
1. Practice the belief that conflict is normal.
When something is normal, it doesn’t get rejected immediately; in fact it can become a positive, productive part of organizational culture. Understand that disagreements can be a rich source of new ideas. This type of open communication and respectful exchange is safe and valued.
Ask: What is my team’s outlook on conflict? In what ways can I help everybody to operate with the same understanding that conflict is normal?
2. Analyze your conflict style.
Ultimately conflict is personal. It’s about how someone else’s personality meshes (or doesn’t) with our own; and the way we approach it is informed by our personalities, experiences and tendencies. We develop our own style. When we begin to notice what that style is, we begin to control an entire half of the conflict. Some common conflict styles include:
Avoiding
Accommodating
Compromising
Collaborating
Competing
Ask: Now that I’m aware of how I handle conflict, how can I avoid a negative confrontation and choose a more productive avenue?
One good answer—Step 3...
3. Know what “hooks” you.
We all have behaviors that push our buttons, such as the coworker who won’t stop asking questions that extend a meeting well beyond its time, the manager who asks for the status of something you’ve emailed them about twice already, or the boss whose tone when they ask for something makes you bristle. When we understand that everyone has “hooks,” and that you’re included in ‘everyone,’ we’re already better equipped to navigate a conversation toward a positive outcome.
When you begin to notice and understand the patterns of others around you, it becomes much easier to build positive interactions (constructive conflict) instead of knee-jerk reactions to foreseeable behavior (conflict run amok).
Ask: How can I learn to work with my “hooks”? In what ways can I help my team work with theirs so we can be more productive in our conversations?
4. Practice giving and receiving feedback and critiques.
Once you realize you’re in control of your half of the conversation, and are aware of the hooks around you, pay attention to your choice of words. When necessary, making a slight shift in manner can go a long way toward inviting a person to receive or give feedback in a useful way. Phrases such as, “Are you open to some feedback?” or “Would you mind if I suggested another way to look at this?” can open the door to positive growth, versus “Here are some ways to improve...” or “What were you thinking??”
Teach and adapt these communication skills in a way that feels comfortable to you and your team. Conflict-competent mechanisms for healthy critique and feedback can be built into the culture of the team or organization.
Ask: What language does each person on my team “hear?”
5. Understand how to approach difficult conversations.
Despite our best efforts, it is inevitable that situations will arise which need resolution through a “difficult” conversation. Conflict competency reframes that description from something tough, negative and to be avoided, into something proactive and productive. A “meaningful” conversation is one that allows both sides to be heard, maintains trust and respect, and moves both parties to an acceptable resolution.
Tips for a successful exchange:
Schedule the conversation in advance, and communicate its purpose clearly to the person/people involved.
Before you begin, set up agreements with the participants to ensure that all parties will feel safe, respected, and heard without repercussion.
Start the meaningful conversation with a positive mindset, while making sure every person (including you) adheres to the agreements the group created together.
Ask: How can I best prepare myself to lead a positive, productive conversation that will allow us to reach a meaningful outcome? Do we need to bring in a professional facilitator?
Acclimating your team to conflict competency takes an unavoidable aspect of interpersonal communication (conflict) and turns it into a positive routine. It also harnesses the power of constructive, creative conflict to build a culture in which diverse relationships and bold ideas mix together, communication is respectful and lively, and new ideas and efficiencies emerge.
How are you preparing your team to build stronger relationships through engaging with conflict?
Contact mark@resologics.com or check out https://bit.ly/3633dul
When we join a company, partnership or team, our expectation is that everyone involved will exhibit professional behavior toward us and each other. Instead, it’s highly possible that we may become one of the more than 60 million adults in the United States who are affected in some way by bullying behavior at work.
What kind of behaviors are we talking about? Our definition is any interpersonal behavior that causes emotional distress in others sufficient enough to impede their productivity or disrupt organizational functioning. It isn’t just a personality conflict — it’s a chronic pattern of disrespectful behavior.