The office is not a place for battles? No matter how! All calls from the “Let’s live together” series are doomed to failure, because our basic equipment includes struggle, psychologist Tatyana Muzhitskaya believes. But do we always understand what underlying causes lead to conflicts, and can they be minimized?
Just yesterday, peace-loving colleagues today suddenly begin to growl like tigers, although there were no signs of aggression. Prepared negotiations are falling apart at the seams before our eyes, and the agreement flies into the basket. At a meeting, all of a sudden, for no apparent reason, everyone present breaks into a cry, and then cannot explain what has come over them. What causes violent skirmishes and how to avoid them?
Psychologies: Can’t work without conflicts? Is it impossible to agree?
Tatyana Muzhitskaya: What are you! Work conflicts in companies where there are at least two people are inevitable, otherwise it is an inanimate system. Wrestling is included in our basic package. Most often it is associated with territory and hierarchy.
Here is a real situation: a sales manager and a project manager come to negotiate. They are told: “Go to the meeting room, take whatever cups you want, sit down where it is convenient.” One took a gray cup and sat down on an ordinary chair. And another chose a mug with the inscription «I love London» and took the only leather chair. It was the chair of one of the directors, who sat opposite during the negotiations (which in non-verbal language means opposition), and the mug belonged to the head of the HR department, who bombarded the guests with tricky questions.
The negotiations failed. One project manager went to the next meeting, took a gray cup, sat down on a chair. The presentation did not change in content, it was only printed differently. The project was accepted: «Well, that’s another matter!» This is something that no one ever talks about — just think, a cup, an armchair … It is usually believed that conflicts in organizations are related to authority, resources, deadlines.
A huge number of conflicts arise much earlier than the issuance of tasks. We unconsciously, at the level of an animal, consider something to be our territory. When this is encroached upon, we get annoyed and look for where to throw out our anger.
In the office, appliances, furniture are state-owned, even the common space is open space. What is there to share?
Oh, a lot! Business passion for open space, on the one hand, leads to openness. On the other hand, it gives rise to hidden conflicts.
Example: employees of a consulting company travel around the cities, and they do not have their own tables, everything is in common. And a specialist of the highest level, with two European diplomas, tells me: “I worked at the table for two months, considered it my own, and suddenly a colleague flew in at night and took it. According to the rules, everything is fair, but I can’t help myself — this guy annoys me terribly, and it takes a lot of effort for me to return to the constructive channel in the conversation.
A huge number of conflicts arise due to the fact that many people confuse a request with a demand.
Another example. In an IT company, you need to leave a clean workplace behind. But surely someone will «accidentally» forget a pen or diary — we also mark the sunbeds in the resorts with towels. And we get angry if someone occupied our sunbed, despite the sign.
Working in open space, especially for beginners, is fraught with conflicts. Someone is talking loudly on the phone, someone has perfumed himself with strong perfume, and this causes absolutely animal irritation in us. We do not realize where it came from, but we are looking for a way out for this and, as a rule, let off steam in working matters.
And colleagues like to take a stapler or pen without asking. And we get angry before we even know it’s bullshit. There is no respect for boundaries in our culture, hence a lot of unnecessary tension. And we still have a lot to work on.
How to reduce this tension?
Listen to yourself: where did this emotion come from? Like in kindergarten, sign your things. Explain your position. Accept that this chair and table is the site of a Workplace innovation company, and you just took it today. If this is an office with cabinets, then knock on the door and enter with permission.
Ask: “Can I take your employees?” It is to ask, not to notify or demand. If I am approached with a request, she assumes the following: «I understand that you may have your own tasks and that you can agree or refuse.» I ask from the bottom up. A huge number of conflicts arise due to the fact that many confuse a request with a demand that is pronounced «from top to bottom.»
And if such a tone is permissible for the boss, then hostility immediately flares up between “equal in rank” colleagues. «Why are you talking to me like that?» — this is rarely said aloud, but something begins to boil inside.
Here’s a classic fight. Head of the sales department: “Why hasn’t Samara received a shipment from me yet?” Head of the logistics department: “Why are you telling me about Samara just now, and not two weeks ago?” Both have not solved the problem, both are tense. Everyone perceives an attempt to talk «from above» as a collision with their own territory, which only warms up the conflict and does not solve the problem.
Output? Learn to negotiate: “You and I have a common problem, apparently, both of us didn’t think through something, didn’t agree on something. What can we do now to get our products in Samara?”
Many people are now working remotely. Perhaps this helps to minimize conflicts?
No, there begins its own battle for the hierarchy — by whose rules we will play. The first one writes: “Comrades, in order to draw up a report, we need data from each department for three days.” The second replies: “Actually, this is not what is needed for the report at all.” Third: “Ready to provide data. Does anyone need it?» Fourth: “We provided everyone with this data earlier. Why are we on this mailing list?
None of the answers are to the point. And all the answers are from the series “We are higher in the hierarchy. And who are you here? The words “actually” in any text immediately cause the other side to want to argue. It’s even easier in the office: they glanced at each other and moved on. And in correspondence, this wave rises, and it is not clear how to pay it off.
Go to any parent chat and see what kind of battle begins when you need to choose a gift for girls on March 8th. Everyone immediately post their expert opinion. “Actually, girls should be given hairpins.” “In fact, girls don’t need hairpins, what nonsense!” Any group dynamic involves a battle over who in the hierarchy will make the decision.
So it’s a never ending story…
It will be endless if the organizer of the discussion provides freedom from the «Let’s decide something» series. This immediately sparks a battle over who will propose the rules and who will ultimately decide. Those chats where it is written: “As the chairman of the parent committee, I inform you that we have decided to give the teacher a certificate and a bouquet worth 700 rubles, work effectively. Who does not agree — give something of your own.
Same story in meetings. If they are on an abstract topic: “About the situation at the plant”, then no problem will be solved and a battle for the hierarchy is guaranteed or just a drain on the accumulated tension. The task must provide a result. For example, if the chief designer gathered technologists to figure out what the mistake is and why the marriage is going on, then the problem is likely to be solved.
That is, without a task, the meeting is useless?
Interaction in companies of any level occurs along three axes: the axis of tasks, the axis of relations and the axis of energy. In my corporate life, I have seen many meetings that take place not because there are tasks, but because they once decided: every Monday at 10:00 you should be at the “morning formation”. When there is no clear task, relationships and energy immediately come into force. People begin to measure who is what.
Sometimes conflict is the only way to raise the energy in the team, and some leaders use this, not knowing other ways — to lead everyone to the goal, distribute tasks, motivate. It is much easier for them to divide and rule.
Every time you enter any situation of working interaction, you need to understand: what is my goal? What do I want in terms of tasks, relationships and energy? What do I want to get out of here?
When we are right, we feel higher in the hierarchy, which means we have more power, whether in a family or a team.
If I came with a bypass sheet to the “fireman”, and he asks me: “Why didn’t you give me a report?”, Then I can fall for his provocation and start explaining to him who he is, but I can say: “ Here is my equipment, I handed it over. Sign the bypass.»
Otherwise — along the axis of tasks — it can turn out like Gogol’s Ivan Ivanovich and Ivan Nikiforovich: one wanted to ask the other for an old gun, but they quarreled over nonsense for many years.
What if we can’t agree?
When the degree along the energy axis goes off scale, you can apply the «Consent without consent» technique. For example, your department thinks we did a bad job, but ours thinks we did a good job. Agreement is reached in one sentence. “As far as I understand, you and I do not have a common opinion about the quality of work. Do you agree? People say, «Well, yes.» At this moment, ardent opponents turn into adequate interlocutors with whom one can already talk about tasks.
The bloodiest battles are fought for being right. Why do we foam at the mouth prove that we are right? Because when we are right, we feel higher in the hierarchy, which means we have more power, whether in a family or a team. This is often an unconscious battle, and in my trainings, for example, we learn to bring it into awareness. A phrase that often ends a conflict: «Yes, I guess you’re right.» It’s easy for me to say this, but a person will not go out of his way to prove me right.