Exam 11: Understanding and Managing Workplace Conflict

When people experience relationship conflict,they tend to increase their reliance on communication with the other party.

Communication is a potential source of conflict because:

Although forcing is one of five interpersonal styles of conflict management,it should never be used to manage conflict.

Buffers tend to resolve conflict by reducing the level of interdependence between the conflicting parties.

Maintenance employees and drivers at ABC Bus Company were constantly bickering with each other.However,the conflict subsided when another bus company opened for business to compete with ABC and ABC executives warned employees that the competitor could force lay-offs at ABC if productivity and customer service didn't improve.Which of the following conflict management strategies was operating here?

Incompatible goals,differentiation and ambiguous rules are:

Improving communication and understanding should occur:

Increasing resources and creating more precise rules for the allocation of those resources represent two ways to increase conflict.

Negotiators tend to be more successful when:

Which of the following actions does NOT emphasize superordinate goals to reduce conflict?

The preference for arbitration or mediation in work disputes partly depends on cross-cultural values.

What effect does making concessions have on negotiations?

Constructive conflict is less likely to turn into relationship conflict when team members:

A few years ago,a clothing manufacturer was expanding rapidly,so the CEO hired several executives from large corporations.Unfortunately,the new executives clashed with the current executives regarding business strategy.The CEO explained: 'We ended up with an old team and a new team and they weren't on the same wavelength.' Identify the source(s)of conflict in this situation and identify two strategies to minimize this conflict in the future.

If conflict was eliminated,organizations would be more productive.

NewTel is a telephone company with a policy of filling positions through promotions rather than hiring from outside.Until recently,the company had a strong engineering focus and tended to promote people into senior executive positions from the engineering areas.Consequently,almost all of the company's 14 senior executives joined the company over 20 years ago in junior engineering positions.There is increasing pressure on NewTel to become more marketing and service oriented,so four people were hired one year ago from consumer products and retail firms to fill new senior executive positions in marketing and service management.The external hires were necessary because employees were not sufficiently qualified.Now there are signs of tension among senior executives,particularly during budget deliberations where there is limited discretionary spending on new corporate activities.The four new hires have been frustrated in their attempts to have the company put more money into marketing and customer services instead of technology investment.What conflict management strategies could be applied at NewTel to minimize dysfunctional conflict among these senior executives?

A major game software firm experienced conflict between the young Internet-savvy employees who designed the games and the older computer-illiterate executives who ran the company.The company hired coordinators who could work with the executives but were computer literate and therefore respected by the development staff members.By hiring these coordinators as liaisons between the executives and employees,the company would:

Relationship conflict refers to conflict between individuals,whereas constructive conflict refers to conflict between departments and organizations.

To be more effective,managers should:

Moderate levels of conflict produce improved decision-making.