Work It Podcast: Dealing with the pain of workplace conflicts

Workplace conflicts can be a minefield, but when handled right, it sparks growth and resilience within teams. How should you navigate conflicts at the workplace and what are some healthy coping strategies? Tiffany Ang and Gerald Tan speak with Professor Sam Garg from the ESSEC Business School, Asia Pacific.  

Here's an excerpt from the podcast:

Gerald Tan: 
You mentioned earlier that using "liquid courage" (feeling bolder after a few drinks) or just addressing the conflict openly is not something that is effective. Why is it not?
 
Sam Garg: 
Imagine you've hired a new senior vice president, and then that person reports to the CEO. Before that, the now-underlings were reporting directly to the CEO. As you insert this person, what happens is these underlings now report to this new person, and the new person reports to the CEO. So, the original underlings, they still continue to have direct line to the CEO.

If the CEO says: "Okay, Gerald, the new Senior VP, and Sam, the original worker, let's go out together and sort it out." How do you think Gerald is going to feel? That this underling, Sam has a seat (at) the table? He reports to me, so why should we have a discussion as equals in front of the CEO? 

Having said that, in horizontal conflict, a variation of this works. Two people from different departments, Tiffany and Gerald, they are a bit in conflict; they stop talking to each other. If I'm the CEO, what would I do? I could take (you) out for "liquid courage", or what we find is the effective way: I go and talk to Gerald separately. I go and talk to Tiffany separately. I hear the concerns of each separately, and I also tell them that, look, other people also have ideas and points. You should go and talk. This is what we call private mediation. 
 
Tiffany Ang:
It's interesting that you brought out this example because I can see that happening, like you said, between two people of a similar status. What if we're talking about conflict amongst senior executives? What if it's two C-suite leaders duking it out? Who becomes the mediator?

Sam:
Again, there could be a little bit of hierarchy. If you have, let's say, (a) stalemate with the CEO, then what works is the structural crafting. So, you basically take out the other person, give them a temporary role, and see if you can make it work - they can add value there.