The 1-7 December is National Anger Awareness Week, the British Association of Anger Management, aim to raise awareness this week and use it as an opportunity to identify anger as a disturbing social issue which needs to be addressed. They have produced a toolkit for organisations to download called Keep Your Cool Over Yule Kit. It consists of anger management activities, as well as tips on handling anger appropriately and calming strategies for defusing situations.
Managing conflict in the workplace
There is an enormous amount of attention being given to mental health awareness. When people are feeling stressed the impact can be far reaching, not only on their health both mental and physical, but their performance at work and home life too. The pressure that people feel can result in angry exchanges and falling out with colleagues. Conflict in the workplace should never be ignored as it will rarely resolve itself. For advice on managing conflict at work read our earlier blog here.
Mediation process
According to a report in 2015 by the Chartered Institute for Personnel Development (CIPD), employers spend an average of 19 days of management time dealing with individual Employment Tribunal (ET) cases.
When conflict occurs in the workplace it is often best dealt with by line managers and employees themselves. However, they may find themselves unable to resolve a conflict situation and it may escalate. In these cases, employers may try mediation, which is a voluntary process. Using an impartial third party, the mediator guides the parties involved in the conflict towards finding common ground to reach a mutual agreement, avoiding going down the route of more formal and costly processes of grievance and discipline procedures or ETs.
This process is flexible and less formal than grievance and disciplinary procedures. As previously mentioned it is voluntary and should provide the parties involved with a safe and confidential space to find solutions that are acceptable to all involved. A trained mediator should facilitate the process helping the parties to reach an agreement, however, any agreement should come from those involved in the dispute and not the mediator.
Why doesn’t mediation always work?
Mediation is often best used in the initial stages of conflict as an early intervention. It isn’t a solution for all conflict in the workplace, especially when issues have escalated and become more serious. For example, if an employee has asked for a formal investigation of discrimination or harassment, to offer them a mediation process isn’t appropriate, more formal channels will need to be used. If an employee has mental health issues and is very stressed or has learning difficulties it may then not be appropriate to have a joint meeting.
Some employees may simply say what they believe the other person or mediator wants to hear and nothing really changes. Instead the resentment and anger get buried. There will be times when people are unwilling or unable to settle an issue through mediation, when this is apparent mediation will not be appropriate.
Conflict management coaching
An alternative approach to mediation is conflict management coaching, this is a voluntary and structured process that helps people on a one-to-one basis, rather than involving each party together. Conflict management coaching develops an individual’s skills, knowledge and competencies to help them more effectively engage in and manage interpersonal conflict.
The process helps an individual to shift their thinking, perspectives, attitudes and behaviours, including how they view themselves and others when in conflict. It can either be based on a specific dispute or take a more general approach to conflict.
Conflict management coaching can help people to understand the opportunity conflict can provide them, to strengthen their relationships with themselves and others. When people accept the inevitability of conflict and understand their reaction to it, they can begin to deal with it more effectively. This type of coaching enables people to consider conflicts from different perspectives and empowers them to manage it more effectively.
Jackie Brooker, our Managing Director is a trained Cinergy® Conflict Management Coach. If you are interested in conflict management coaching then get in touch for a confidential discussion with how we can help.