Resolving Project Conflict Project Management
Conflict in Project Teams – Hints for Project Managers
As a project manager, skills in resolving hostile or negative conflict are a must-have. Conflict can have a serious negative effect on project delivery and tends to arise when team members with different backgrounds, skills and objectives have different views. It must be tackled quickly as and when it arises. Left untreated, conflict can cause team members to become disengaged, affecting teamwork as a unified whole.
What causes conflict?
Project team members will tend toward a particular style of operation and these styles can be categorized in broad terms:
Competitive team members are often clear in what they want to achieve and will stand firm to achieve their goals.
At the other end of the scale are those that prefer to avoid any sort of conflict at all and are happy for others to take decisions, accepting those decisions without question.
Between these two extremes, there are collaborative personalities who will work cooperatively with the aim of keeping the team happy but are comfortable also asserting themselves.
Ways to avoid conflict…
Attack is often said to be the best form of defense! By tackling conflict before it happens, you can potentially avoid uncomfortable situations that could otherwise cause problems within the project lifecycle.
- Understand the different types of team members and try to keep the team unified with aims and goals that are consistent.
- Help the team to build strong working relationships with each other.
Ways to resolve conflict…
As the project manager, you can force the situation to the chosen outcome. In this case, you direct the conflict and choose who will lose.
Alternatively, a compromise can be negotiated, where the conflicting parties agree to a solution which involves a concession by each.
Tips in resolving conflict…
- As a manager, take a positive and assertive approach. Conflict needs to be handled as a professional difference of opinion rather than a personal argument. All parties need to feel that they can discuss the problem without it being a personal attack on any individual.
- Help conflicting parties to understand the wider picture. Sometimes conflict can arise because a team member takes too-narrow a view on a situation. Highlighting the wider context can help them see and consider how they can still accomplish their own objectives without undermining those of their colleagues.
- Establish the facts surrounding the conflict situation, then negotiate and agree the way forward in clear terms that all parties are happy with.
It’s worth bearing in mind that conflict within a project team isn’t always negative. Provided it is handled correctly, some levels of conflict can provide an opportunity for team members to develop both personally and professionally.
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