Imagine you are running a large, mission critical, cross-border project for your company. A lot is on the line. Investment, people’s time, competitive advantage, just to name a few. Each workstream is critical to the success of the overall project.
Let’s say that Chris who is in charge of the IT workstream is in a discussion with a colleague and peer named Cheryl who is in charge of corporate sales. They are discussing whether to implement a cloud-based approach or a regional server-based approach for deploying a new solution that is critical to the project’s outcome and that Cheryl’s people will be the main end users of.
As the discussion progresses, their ideas begin to diverge which in turn is ruffling feathers. Both Cheryl and Chris have some history between them and it’s difficult for each of them to give the other the benefit of the doubt regarding their intentions.
The conversation ends without agreement between them. Both are steeped in their respective positions. Chris believes a cloud-based solution is best so that updates can be made quickly and apply across the system instantly. The downside is that the cost of a cloud-based system is higher than Cheryl believes is necessary. She wants to leverage their existing regionally based server infrastructure to feed all subsidiary offices.
No sooner than their meeting ends, Chris is on the phone sharing his concern about Cheryl with his boss the company’s CTO. Chris describes his position and the pros it brings with it and attributes Cheryl’s position to being based on personal bias against him and in protection of her turf.
At some point in the near future, a choice is eventually made to go with the cloud-based solution and Cheryl finds out about Chris’ talks with his boss and the multitude of other discussions it provoked at the level of the CTO.
How do you think Cheryl feels? Is she going to want to work with Chris again? How will she complete her workstream’s mission that includes and requires IT? How will Chris complete his workstream’s mission that includes and requires corporate sales? The result will be increases in conflict, expenditures, stress and complaints. The result will also lead to decreases in productivity, trust, and focus.
Sound familiar?
When conflict arises between two people at work, the conflict exists in two dimensions; technical and human. Conflict within the technical dimension is the result of a difference in belief with regards to which option to take in a given situation. Should we hire Steve or Margaret? Should we close our store in Cleveland or in St. Louis? Is your strategy a good one or a bad one? Whose correct, Corporate or the field? These are examples of options that can create conflict. They become conflict when the two parties involved reach an impasse in their ability to make a choice. Neither can convince the other of their position. Each becomes entrenched in their belief and positions become firm.
Conflict in the human dimension refers to the emotions, attitudes, and beliefs that arise as the technical impasse is reached. These emotions, attitudes and beliefs can lead to mistrust of the other person and a lack of will to believe in their good intentions.
Having differences of opinion is not a conflict. When those differences become contentious and personal, that’s when they become a conflict that can have negative consequences. The best thing any of us can do is to avoid getting into a conflict in the first place.
So before getting to clean and impeccable escalation, let’s look at what it takes to not get there in the first place.
Inoculating Differences
Before conflict arises, there are things you can do to manage keep the differences of opinion from becoming contentious.
1. Get Curious
The first instance when differences arise, it’s best to get curious, not defensive. Inquire of the other person as to why they believe what they are saying. Ask about what facts they are observing and basing their opinion on. Ask them to explain how they interpret those facts. What assumptions are they making? What conclusions do they arrive at? Do your best to not only understand their point of view, but to understand why they have it. It is not necessary that you agree with them as you receive answers to your inquiries, only that you seek to understand.
2. Check Your Inferences
If along the way, you have inferences about something you believe may be true but is not being said, check with them if your inference is correct or not. Clarify your own assumptions by checking their validity with the other person.
3. Move from Position to Interest
As the other person’s position becomes clear it’s time to inquire about the underlying interest of their position. This can be done by asking, “What do you get if you get your position fulfilled? Why does your position matter to you? If for example a person’s position is that increased recruitment is the answer to improving the company’s capabilities in a certain area, their interest may be to increase competitive advantage. For them, increasiing recruitment is a means to that end. That being the case, it’s much easier to find solutions or resolution to differences at the interest level. It’s there that common ground can be found.
4. Share Your Perspective
Once the other person is satisfied that you understand their position and underlying interest, you can request that they hear your perspective. If your inquiry was sincere, they will feel disarmed and cooperative.
Share your perspective with them. Just as you inquired about observed facts, assumptions and conclusions, you can now share the same information so that they understand the rationale behind your point of view. And most important, share your underlying interest. Once in a place of interest, you can explore different options for achieving the same outcome. Success is much more likely and conflict can often be avoided. If however, this approach does resolve differences, you can then move on to clean escalation.
The answer to this situation and the hundreds and thousands of similar situations occurring throughout the business world each day, is learning clean escalation. It deals with both the human and technical dimensions of the conflict. Here’s how it works.
1. Try Inoculation of Differences First
Try to resolve the differences of opinion with regards to the decision to be made.
2. Face and Acknowledge the Conflict
If you cannot resolve the differences, state out loud that you believe the difference of opinion cannot be resolved due to strong beliefs in each person’s position. Recognize that the differences are not personal, nor a reflection of ultimate truth, but instead are sincere beliefs held by two well-meaning people.
3. Invite the Other Person to Jointly Escalate
Invite the other person to go with you to either a common manager responsible for both of you, or to each other’s manager to escalate the difference of opinion. The purpose of the meeting(s) will be to share both positions and ask the manager(s) to take a decision and break the impasse.
4. Accept Final Decision
Propose that both of you accept the final decision of your managers regardless of what the decision is, or whose position it ultimately favors.
5. Implement Joint Escalation
If the other person agrees, then you both arrange for the meeting(s) with your manager(s) and escalate the decision to their level of authority. While at that meeting, you both share that discussion has occurred and resolution was sought but not found and for this reason, both of you have agreed to escalate the decision and accept the outcome.
The result is a fair, clean, transparent escalation. With regards to the human dimension, emotions are kept under control and trust can increase between both parties. The focus of the escalation has been on the technical dimension i.e., the different opinions and the decision required.
If on the other hand, the other person refuses your proposal and does not want to arrange any meetings with your manager(s)...
6. Proceed with Full Transparency
You tell them that you will be escalating the issue without them, but that before doing so, you would much prefer that they attend with you. Your preference is joint escalation.
In this way, if they choose not to attend, it is their choice. No one has gone around their back. No deception is occurring. Clarity of your first desire to jointly escalate exists and transparency with regards to your actions is clear.
