Introduction
Conflict comes up when two people share different opinions regarding the same topic. Taking an example of two staff members working in the same office, with one holding a higher rank than his counterpart, we may experience heightened levels of hostility from the lower-ranked employee, if he feels that his senior is overworking him unfairly.
This kind of situation occurs regularly in workplaces factoring in the enormous amounts of stress levels and exhaustion.
Controlling organizational conflict
To put an end to such misunderstanding in the office, the individual roles should be clearly established beforehand by the senior member of staff who overlooks the whole working body of staff members. This categorizes the duties that should be allocated to specific member on a specified level of practice.
However, if two staff members seem to disagree on their shared responsibilities working on the same deck, or in the same line of work, then the supervisor should intercept and consider each person’s opinion on the task at hand.
Where possible, the task should be handled by both on equal capacity to enhance the level of understanding; the more the two work together, the higher the chances they will get to learn each other’s character.
Given a situation where there is query beyond understanding, the supervisor could put the employees on different schedules so that the first handles the current task and the other employee postpones his duty to enable the first to work at that time. It would however be advisable to separate two rival employees from the same working station.
Generally, employers and senior supervisors should do whatever they can to avoid employee conflict based on office politics. Any defiant employee who seeks to incite others should be advised to desist from negatively influencing the working staff.
However, some level of conflict is ok for competing employees. The managers in this situation cold use it to their advantage by allowing the competition to carry on while sustaining a high degree of behavioral management. A de-escalation strategy could work to harmonize the competing parties in case the conflict heats up to a hostile level (Lewicki et al, 2009).
It is quite fundamental to maintain clear communication lines within the organization as assumptions may build up and destroy employee relations from unmanaged conflict
The three conflict initializing factors include, office politics, assumptions that pass un-clarified, and healthy competition.
The different roles of the Executive director as compared to the Board Chairman
The Board chairman presides over the organization’s corporate meetings with or without the presence of the executive officer. He can preside with the powers of the executive or just as the highest-ranked corporate board officer. He is usually the head of the board of directors, ad he determines the broader perspective of the company.
In short, he carries the organizations future vision and key criteria. He is different from the executive director at certain instances. For instance, the executive director can make decisions for the company acting as the director of marketing, finance or even the director of operations.
The director is also deemed liable by tax firms under their laws, and he is a fulltime member of the organizations employed staff. The director cannot supersede the Chairman’s directives, but he can call for a consideration at the committees meetings in review of a conflicting idea (Black, 2011).
References
Black, K. (2011). What is a Chairman of the Board? Retrieved from Wisegeek: https://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-a-chairman-of-the-board.htm
Lewicki R. J., L. Roy, Barry B., D. Saunders. (2009). Negotiation: Readings, Exercises, and Cases. New York: McGraw Hill.