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Unit 14: Conflict and Negotiation

Introduction Notes

Conflict is inevitable and universal phenomenon of our individual, team and organizational
life. Life is a never ending saga of conflict. Remember the time when you were a small child and
had to choose between a tricycle and a cricket set or say, a set of dolls and a new frock for a
birthday present. That was probably your first exposure to a conflict situation. Of course, this is
a simplistic example of a conflict, but has life been the same since? Probably not. Think back and
recall how each succeeding conflict in your life over the years has been increasingly complex.

Conflict has occupied the thinking of man more than any other theme. It has always been
widespread in society but in recent year it has generated a lot of interest and has become the
focus of research and study. We are living in the age of conflict. Everyday the choices available
to us regarding any decision are increasing in number. You may have wanted to become a
manager, an entrepreneur or a computer scientist. On the other hand, your father might have
wanted you to become a doctor, a lawyer or a chartered accountant. Thus you faced a conflict not
only at an intrapersonal level, in terms of the various choices confronting you, but also at an
interpersonal level – your choice vs. your father’s choice of a career for you.

Management today is faced with the awesome responsibility of ensuring optimum level of
growth and productivity in an environment that is full of conflicting situations. A survey suggests
that the modern man spends over 20 per cent of his time handling one form of conflict or the
other. Top and middle level managers in the same survey have pointed out the importance of
conflict management skills. We hope that the knowledge you will gain from this unit will equip
you better to manage conflict situations more deeply at your workplace.

14.1 Conflict is Everywhere

Conflict is not confined at the individual level alone but is manifesting itself more and more in
organizations. Employees have become more vociferous in their demands for a better deal.
Various departments in an organization face a situation full of conflicts due to a number of
reasons like goal diversity, scarcity or resources or task over-dependence etc.
From organizations that are divided by their strategies and roles to local communities that are
divided by race, economics, religion, or politics; from homes torn apart by chronic feuds between
parents and children, siblings, or in-laws to countries that are torn apart by civil strife. At a
superficial level, conflicts can be categorized into ‘hot’ (strong emotions, loud voices, visible
tension) and cold (suppressed emotions, tense silence, invisible stress). Although hot and cold
conflicts are as different as summer and winter, they both have destructive consequences if
handled poorly. They produce chronic inefficiency in our organizations, strife in our
communities, and turmoil in our lives. Even if we went to live alone, like a hermit on a mountain
top in total self-sufficiency, we would still carry in our memory all the previous experiences of
conflict.
These conflicts are real. They are unavoidable. And they are not going away. So the question
each of us faces is, “How to deal with it?” In our day-to-day life conflicts are only increasing and
becoming more complex and intractable.
Just as differences are deepening in the communities where we live, so they are in the
organizations where we work. Today more than sixty-three thousand trans-national companies
operate globally with over eight hundred thousand subsidiaries spanning the planet. They
employ more than 90 million people and produce 25 per cent of the world’s Gross National
Product (GNP). Unlike forty years ago, when 60 per cent of the world’s top global companies
were American, now only a third is. In less than a generation, the number of business people
working across geographic borders has skyrocketed.

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