9.1 Overview of conflict
Pruitt and Rubin (in Lewicki et al. 1994) define conflict as a perceived divergence of interest or a belief that the parties' current aspirations cannot be achieved simultaneously. This definition highlights the point that often conflict is a perceived divergence of interest; that is, in many cases conflict can be resolved if people are willing to look for commonalities and solutions for mutual gain.
Many of us see conflict as bad or resulting in ill-feeling between people. However, conflict can be either functional or dysfunctional. Dysfunctional conflict occurs when there is too much conflict or too little conflict and when people focus on differences in personalities rather than on the issues in the conflict. Organisations that experience too little conflict or inhibit conflict tend to have organisational climates characterized by apathy, lack of creativity and indecision or mistrust and suspicion. This is because people may fear or avoid sharing and constructively challenging each others' ideas. Those organisations with too much conflict may foster political infighting, dissatisfaction and lack of teamwork. A moderate level of conflict is ideal as it will tend to energise people to share ideas and challenge each other, to examine situations from various perspectives and to encourage mutual understanding (Kreitner & Kinicki 1995).
The causes of conflict are many. They include (Kreitner & Kinicki 1995):
- incompatible personalities or value systems
- competition for limited resources especially in a harsh economic climate
- inadequate communication
- interdependent tasks (for example, where one person cannot complete his or her task until others have completed their work)
- organisational complexity and departmentalisation (conflict tends to increase as the number of hierarchical layers and specialised tasks increase as, for example, when each area has different objectives and time lines)
- unreasonable or unclear policies, standards or rules
- time pressure
- role ambiguity (employees may be unclear about their role or duties in the organisation)
- change
- inequitable treatment.
There are many reasons why conflict may arise in an organisation but, as we have said, not all conflict is dysfunctional.
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