UNIT WEEKLY or MINOR ASSIGNMENT DETAILS-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Discussion: Forgive and Forget?

1. A common saying in our culture is to “forgive and forget.” Do you think this is possible? Desirable? Why or why not?

2. Can anything and everything be forgiven?

3. Even if you apologize in a conflict, can you really "take something back" (words or actions)? What are the effects of this behavior on the relationship?

4. What is the relationship between apologies and forgiveness? Do you need the first to have the second?

5. What does it mean to say that forgiveness is a process? What does it mean to say that forgiveness is a decision? Compare and contrast these views.

6. Why do you suppose it’s so difficult to forgive people in our culture? Why do we have a cultural hang up that says forgiveness means the transgression is “okay?”

7. Must involved parties communicate in order for forgiveness to be effective or achieved? What, if any, limitations are posed by not talking with others (those who’ve harmed you or those you’ve harmed)?

8. What gender differences, if any, have you experienced regarding forgiveness?

9. How is forgiveness perceived and achieved in other cultures? Compare and contrast these viewpoints with U.S. culture.

1. Explain the statement, "The goal of all intervention is to transform the conflict elements." Choose an example to illustrate the idea.
2. What are the effects of siding with one of the conflict parties?
3. What are cautions to remember when you are considering being a third-party helper?
4. What are the interpersonal advantages and disadvantages of adjudication?
5. Explain how negotiation functions in the forms of third-party intervention.
6. What are some principles of dispute system design?
7. Discuss some definitions of forgiveness. What are key components of forgiveness?
8. What are differences between forgiveness and reconciliation?
9. What is the problem with the phrase "forgive and forget?"
10. Compare and contrast the ideas of "forgiveness as decision" and "forgiveness as process," giving your own opinions based on the ideas presented.
11. In what ways is forgiveness both intrapersonal and interpersonal?
12. How do gestures function to lay the groundwork for further change?
13. What makes apologies ineffective or inappropriate?
14. What makes self-forgiveness so difficult?
15. Why is conflict prevention important?
16. What are some core values that lead to prevention of conflict? Discuss those most important to you.
17. How can avoidance spirals be prevented?
18. What can you do if you habitually avoid becoming more effective in conflict?
19. How can escalation spirals be de-escalated or prevented?
20. Reproduce the major steps of an expanded problem-solving sequence.

Effective conflict management is one aspect of interpersonal therapy, a well-researched counseling technique for dealing with depression.

People in conflict may be fearful, angry, resentful, hopeless, or stressed.

It is common and normal for partners to have conflicts or disagreements.

Couples who stay together enter conflict gently, make repairs along the way when they wound each other, avoid criticizing and blaming, and avoid criticizing each other where they know it hurts.

Common responses to abuse are hyper-vigilance, difficulty relaxing, withdrawal at the first sign of tension or conflict, floating away, or disassociating, and not knowing or expressing what one really wants.

85% of workers reported conflicts at work, which is particularly common due to cultural diversity and gender equity issues.

Ongoing, unresolved workplace conflict also has negative effects that reach far beyond the principal parties.

Ignoring workplace conflict sets destructive forces in motion that decrease productivity, spread the conflict to others, and lead to lessened morale.

When we allow two or three different ideas to be true all at once, we are exercising first-rate intelligence.

Holding onto paradoxical thinking means you can help mediate conflict in groups, families, and the world.

We might define ourselves as being "in conflict" of varying intensities, many times a day or week.

Their conflict results from their particular communication choices.

The Chinese language the character for conflict is made up of danger and opportunity.

Welcome opportunity for change. I Chin teaches to remain clearheaded, inwardly strong, and ready to meet his or her opponent halfway.

Conflict exists whenever incompatible activities occur an action which prevents, obstructs, interferes with, injures, or in some way makes (resolution) less likely or less effective.

Conflict is present when there are joint communicative representations of it.

Parties decide whether they will act as relatively interdependent agents or relatively independent agents.

People usually engage in conflict over goals that are important to them.

No one ever says anything nice. They don't even know we're here.

Goals are perceived as incompatible because parties want (1) the same thing or (2) different things.

The scarcity, or limitation, may be apparent or actual.

Interference, or the perception of interference, is necessary to complete the conditions for conflict. Conflict is associated with blocking, and the person doing the blocking is perceived as the problem.

Being blocked and interfered with is such a disturbing experience that our first "take" is usually anger and blame. The difference in intent and impact. You do not know what other people are thinking unless you enter into honest dialogue. You don't know their intention without dialogue. You can't read minds. Conversation is the best approach.

The first moments of a conflict interaction--the critical start-up--can set the scene for a constructive or a destructive conflict.

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Many times, one person will criticize to get the other person's attention.

Some people seemingly can't help adopting a devil's advocate or contrary point of view. For them, conversation is a battle of wits. They enjoy the game of "batting ideas around" and are often very good at the performance. The pursuit of mutual understanding may seem boring and unchallenging.

Men consistently stonewall more than women do.

Stonewalling is an attempt to signal withdrawal from communication while in fact, still being present in the conversation, but in a destructive way.

In fact, a measure of the dominant group's success and security is often its ability to suppress conflict, to keep it hidden, unobtrusive, and unthreatening to the group's position of power. In a situation of unequal power, in which a myth of harmonious relationships is se forth, the subordinate person is put in charge of maintaining harmony.

Escalatory spirals bring about a cascade of negative effects, self-perpetuating dynamics in which the (1) behaviors, (2) perceptions of the other, and (3) perceptions of the relationship continue to disintegrate (with each party viewing one self as not responsible for any of it).

Avoidance patterns reduce the chance for productive conflict. Patterns of avoidance also create and reflect destructive conflict interaction. Both parties then become less invested in the relationship.

Gottman studied, the destructive sequence consisted of criticizing, defensiveness, stonewalling, and contempt. Thus, avoidance can be viewed within the overall spiral of conflict as leading to eventual dissolution of a relationship.

Reciprocity of negative emotion can lead to destructive conflict. Three kinds of reciprocity can be identified in communication: (1) low-intensity emotion is responded to in kind (e.g., anger is met with anger), (2) high intensity emotion is met in kind (fury is met with fur), and (3) low intensity emotion is met with high-intensity emotion (hurt is met with rage).

Escalating negativity on the part of men can lead to violent interactions. Small request or complaints were "batted back" regardless of their merit. In a companion study of 130 nonviolent couples, 80 percent of the men who did not accept any influence from their wives ended up divorced.

Retaliation runs rampant in destructive conflicts.

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• Have meetings to discuss issues.

• Use good listening skills when someone has a concern.

• Deal with people directly.

• Say openly what they are feeling.

• Help resolve conflict.

• Regular interaction is important.

• Dirty tricks such as sulking are not allowed.

• Strong feelings are seen as normal and are allowed.

Conflict is a bargaining table.
Conflict is a tide (ebb and flow).
Conflict is a dance.
Conflict is a garden.
Conflict resolution as quilt making.

Two fundamental aspects are important in all conflicts: (1) communication behaviors and (2) the perceptions of those behaviors. We can think of the study of conflict as a view through a lens, like the lens of a camera, or through prescription glasses. The lens model specifies that each person has a view of (1) oneself, (2) the other person, and (3) the relationship.

Perceptions of an attributions about behaviors are at the heart of the conflict process.

We try to make sense out of a behavior by looking for causes.

We attribute causes of our behavior to external factors (My daughter was sick)

We attribute causes of others' behavior to internal dispositions (She wants her own way.)

Gender effects and gender filters are due to communication differences tradition.

All conflicts are about two issues: power and self-esteem.

One study shows experienced managers manifesting no gender differences in style, but "among participants without managerial experience, women rated themselves as more integrating, obliging, and compromising than did men. Women tend to see the self-in-relationship.

Useful Perceptions and Behaviors:

• Interdependence rather than power over others.

• Mutual empathy as the basis for understanding and communicating.

• Relational self-confidence instead of separate self-esteem (autonomy)

• Constructive conflict instead of domination.

• Staying engaged with others while in conflict.

• Valuing separate knowing and connected knowing.

• Utilizing both report talk and rapport talk.

• Continuing dialogue when there is disagreement.

Cultural effects and cultural filters

About 150 different languages are spoken in the US.

By 2010, 85% of those entering the workforce will be women, minorities, and immigrants.

Asian cultures often frown upon self-expression if it does not further the needs of the group.

The US generally is an individualistic culture.

Collective cultures resolve disagreements through avoidance or accommodation, resulting in considerable face saving.

Note the comparison of individualist and collectivistic cultures on page 58. Collectivistic cultures rely on inferred meaning, while individualistic cultures rely on literal meaning.

People in conflict pursue goals.

Topic: What does each person want?

Relational: Who are we in relationship to each other during our interaction?

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Who am I in this particular interaction? In each conflict interaction, individuals either save face or lose or damage face.

Indicators that attempts to save face are being employed:
1. Claim unjust intimidation.
2. Refuse to step back from a position.
3. Suppress conflict issues.

In productive, ongoing relationships, several kinds of communication will help people restore their lost face or prevent further loss of face. You can increase flexibility and problem solving if you:
1. Help others increase their sense of self-esteem.
2. Avoid giving directives.
3. Listen carefully to others and take their concerns into account.
4. Ask questions so the other person can examine his or her goals.

Retrospective goals emerge after the conflict is over. People spend a large part of their time and energy justifying decisions they have made in the past. Retrospective goals give us clarity.

Goal Clarity
1. Solutions go unrecognized if you do not know what you want.
2. Only clear goals can be shared.
3. Clear goals can be altered more easily than vague goals.
4. Clear goals are reached more often than unclear goals.

Often people create difficulty by assuming that their goals cannot be attained--that the other party will stand in their way.

Collaborative Goals
1. Short, medium, and long-range concerns are addressed.
2. Goals are behaviorally specific.
3. Statements orient toward the present and future.
4. Goals recognize interdependence.
5. Collaborative goals recognize an ongoing process.

Power tends to be seen as
1. designated (power given by your position)
2. distributive (either/or power) comes from your ability to achieve your objective. A characteristic of destructive conflict is that parties start thinking and talking about power.
3. integrative (both/and power) stress joining forces with someone else to achieve mutually acceptable goals. Both parties have to achieve something in the relationship. The great fallacy, especially of political thinking in regard to power, is to elevate threat power to the position of dominance.

We each need enough power to live the life we want. We want to influence events that matter to us. We want to have our voices heard, and make a difference. We want to protect ourselves against perceived harm. We want to hold in high esteem ourselves and those we care about. We do not want to be victimized, misused, or demeaned. No one can escape feeling the effects of power--whether we have too much or too little.

Power functions on a broader basis than either/or thinking. Disputes become power struggles if the parties allow them to be defined as such. Conceptually, the alternative to framing disputes as power struggles is to place power in a position subordinate to rights and needs.

Rights & Needs
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 Power

Some people are so antagonized by any discussion of power that they may deny that power and influence are appropriate topics for discussion. We often try to convince others and ourselves that control is not part of our interpersonal patterns. Reluctance to talk about power emerges as power denial

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• Deny that you communicated something.
   

• Deny that something was communicated.
   

• Deny that you communicated something to the other person.
   

• Deny the situation in which it was communicated.

Excluding situations of unequal physical power and use of violence, power is a property of the social relationship rather than a quality of the individual. Power is not owned by an individual but is a product of the social relationship in which certain qualities become important and valuable to others. Power lies in the relationship of the person of his/her environment.

Power is not owned by an individual but is a product of the social relationship in which certain qualities become important and valuable to others. our dependence on another person is a function of (1) the importance of the goals the other can influence and (2) the availability of other avenues for you to accomplish what you want.

One way to reduce power others have over you is to change your goals.

Communication plays a very important role in working out interdependence. People try to persuade others that they are valuable, that they need to be connected, and that the other's needs can be met best in a constructive relationship with the person doing the persuading.

Your power currencies depend on how much your particular resources are valued by the other persons in a relationship context. Power depends on having currencies that other people need.

Resource control often results from attaining a formal position that brings resources to you.

Interpersonal linkages are your network of friends and supporters. People often obtain power based on whom they know and with whom they associate. Whenever you band together with another to gain some sense of strength, this coalition can be a form of power.

If you can lead a group in a decision-making process, speak persuasively, write a news release for your organization, serve as an informal mediator between people who are angry with each other, or use tact in asking for what you want, you will gain power because of your communication skills.

Expertise currencies are involved when a person has some special skill or knowledge that someone else values.

People are often unaware of their own sources of productive power, just as they do not understand their own dependence on others. Desperation and low-power tactics often arise from the feeling that one has no choice, that no power is available.

Power accrues to those departments that are most instrumental in brining in or providing resources which are highly valued by the total organization.

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• are in a position to deal with important problems

• have control over significant resources valued by others

• are lucky or skilled enough to bring problems and resources together at the same time

• are centrally connected in the work flow of the organization

• are not easily replaced

• have successfully used their power in the past.

Power is especially difficult to assess when influence is exercised covertly, or in hidden ways.

People who look the most powerful to outsiders often are less powerful than they appear.

1. A taste for power and the restless pursuit of more power as an end in itself.

2. The temptation to illegally use institutional resources as a means of self-enrichment.

3. False feedback concerning self-worth and the development of new values designed to protect power.

The devaluing of the less powerful and the avoidance of close social contact with them.

Powerless can corrupt. It is the person who feels powerless who turns to the last resort--giving up, aggression, or violence. Too much losing does not build character; it builds frustration, aggression, or apathy.

In severe, repetitive conflicts, both parties feel low power, and they continually make moves to increase their power at the other's expense.

Lower-power parties will sometimes destroy a relationship as the ultimate move to bring about a balance of power.

Collaboration and the constructive realignment of power is usually best for all concerned, with the following conditions:

• The high power person is not abusing power.

• One person is not lying.

• The long-term gains are worth the effort.

Competitive power has its place and is useful when crucial needs of one party are at stake. Competition can lead to collaboration.

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The more you struggle against someone, the less power you will have with that person. Power against is usually eventually blocked and diminished. Power over human beings is very complex. Other human beings can answer back, fight back, obey or disobey, argue and try to exercise influence as well, so we might as well cooperate with each other so we can both be effective. The both/and perspectives well as the power to the partnership perspective assumes that you all want to accomplish your goals and that you need each other to do that. Since it is the other who is blocking you (and you blocking him or her), integrative power moves beyond the tug-of-war and to a new plane of relationship.

In productive communication, you stop directly interfering with each other and actively assist the other in getting what he or she wants, and the communication between you serves a transcendent function. With cooperation you actually create more power than the two of you could have created separately. Shared power is not a weak, tentative approach--it is powerful and energetic, and it requires great skill.

1. Restraint. Higher-power parties can limit their power by refusing to use all the currencies they have at their disposal.
2. Focus on interdependence; Power to the unit. Higher power individuals usually try to minimize interdependence; therefore, lower-power individuals need to point out how the conflict parties are more related than it might appear. Power in enduring relationships is not finite.--it is an expandable commodity. The focus shouldn't be the singular amount of power each one has but the balance of power between them. later, as each develops more power, the other's power rises approximately equally. The absolute amount of power may change, but the crucial issue is the comparative dependence that people have on each other.
3. Power of calm persistence. Lower power people in a conflict often can gain more equal power by persisting in their requests. Change results from careful thinking and from planning for small, manageable moves based on a solid understanding of the problem. Sometimes only calm, clear persistence increases an individual 's power enough for him or her to be heard and dealt with.

• Identify the individuals on the phone by name and ask for them when you call back.

• Stay pleasant and calm. State clearly what you want, and ask for help in solving the problem.

• Follow the rules even if you think they are ridiculous.

• Write simple, clear memos summarizing what you want, what you have done, and when you expect a response.

• Tell them all the steps you took to try to get a response from them.

• Avoid taking out your frustration on low-power individuals in the organization.

People in low power positions should adopt the following moves:
a. Speak up and present a balanced picture of strengths as well as weaknesses.
b. Make clear what one's beliefs, values, and priorities are, and then keep one's behavior congruent with these.
c. Stay emotionally connected to significant others even when things get intense.
d. State differences, and allow others to do the same.

5. Empowerment of lower power people by high power people. Sometimes it is clearly to the advantage of higher-power groups or individuals to purposely enhance the power of lower-power groups or individuals. Without this restructuring of power, working or intimate relationships may end or rigidify into bitter, silent, passive aggressive, and unsatisfactory entanglements. Currencies valued b y higher-power people can be developed by lower power people if they are allowed more training, more decision-making power, or more freedom.

6. Metacommunication --talk about the communication.

Balance is the key to success. To be effective people, we need to maximize our abilities, take advantage of opportunities, and use resources at our disposal so we can lead the kind of lives we desire. Yet within the confines of an ongoing relationship, maximization of individual power is counterproductive for both the higher power and lower power parties.

Style preferences develop over a person's lifetime based on a complicated blend of genetics, life experiences, family background, and personal philosophy. Developing a repertoire of diverse styles and tactics may require some stretching of your comfort zone.

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Conflict styles are patterned responses, or clusters of behavior, that people use in conflict. Tactics are individual moves people make to carry out their general approach. Scholars suggest there are between 2 and 5 conflict styles. Kilmann and Thomas define 5 styles within two dimensions: assertiveness and cooperativeness. Be sure to complete the "Measuring Your Conflict Style" and post an interpretation of your score.

In collectivist cultures, avoidance represents "indirect working through," but in individualistic cultures, avoidance represents "indirect escalation." In the avoid/criticize loop, you avoid brining up and issue to someone directly but spend a lot of time talking about them to others. The avoid/criticize loop is quite common in professional circles and the business world. It allows one to spout off and actively talk about others, but not join with them face to face and solve the problem.

If you spend all your energy criticizing, you expend negative energy, possible gather people to be on your side, and still stay in avoidance. When you criticize others, it looks like you are engaging in the conflict. But you are not. Criticism to someone else is only another feature of avoidance--you aren't making a direct request to the only person who can help you. What you do is poison the well, ruin another's reputation (and maybe your own), or spread negative energy. Often avoidance takes the form of what Brockriede termed "seduction," which Sillars would classify as a combination of joking, evasive remarks, and topic avoidance. The low-power person using seduction tries to charm or trick the other conflict party into going along with what he or she desires.

Avoidance tactics include: denial, evasive remarks, topic shifts, topic avoidance, noncommittal statements, noncommittal questions, abstract remarks, procedural remarks, friendly joking. Postponement as a tactic works best when several conditions are present. First of all, the emotional content of the conflict needs to be acknowledged while other issues are deferred to a later time.

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Verbal aggressiveness include attacks the self concept or character, ridicule, profanity. Verbal aggression is closely associated with physical abuse. Bully is "ongoing, persistent badgering, harassment and psychological terrorizing that demoralizes, dehumanizes and isolates those targeted.' The ultimate competitive tactic is physical violence. Tenets of violence:

1. Physical aggression is almost always preceded by verbal aggression.

2. Intimate violence is usually reciprocal.

3. Women and children suffer many ore injuries.

4. Victims of abuse are in a no-win situation.

5. Perpetrators and victims have discrepant narratives about violence.

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On is always influenced by others, and should be, when striving for cooperative goals. Look for ways to reframe what has happened and for more constructive options. People most often see themselves as trying to solve the problem but see others as using controlling or aggressive styles.
1. We tend to see ourselves as positives and others as negative.
2. Research demonstrates mixed results--some studies show differences between the genders and some show no differences.
3. Reporting bias is the underreporting of the amount of avoidance people actually use.
4. Measures are not process oriented.
5. Measures give the impression of consistency across settings, relationships, and time.
6. One's style of conflict is assumed to be a clear reflection of an underlying motivation--a stable personality trait.

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We decide our tactics based on the other person because of relational variables. Complementary patterns are tactics or styles that are different from one another but mutually reinforcing. Symmetrical sequences occur in conflicts when the participants' tactics mirror one another--both parties escalating.

People often get "frozen" into a conflict style rather than developing style flexibility. Each time they are in a conflict, they make the same choices. Problems with rigidity:
1. Does your current conflict response feel like the only natural one?
2. Does your conflict style remain constant across a number of conflicts that have similar characteristics?
3. Do you have a set of responses that follow a preset pattern?
4. Do others seem to do the same thing with you?
5. Do you carry a label that is affectionately or not so affectionately used to describe you?

Rhetorical sensitivity is the idea that people change their communication style based on the demands of different situations.

Conflicts often appear confusing, especially when you are a participant in them, and when feelings are running high.

Full assessment of a conflict can best be accomplished by:
1. assessing the working of the overall system
2. determining recurring patterns inside the system that are associated with conflict
3. identifying individual contributions to the overall system.

All conflicts follow patterns, predictable actions of communication and response. Often the structure of the conflict is only expressed indirectly or implicitly so that assessment approaches cannot be constructed by asking the parties, so you may use inductive approaches:
1. Identify specific system patterns.
2. Use metaphoric/dramatic analysis.
3. Draw coalitions.
4. Chart conflict triangles.
5. Identify system rules: rules used in this context means the underlying communication structure of the interaction.
6. List microevents: Microevents are repetitive communication patterns that carry information about the underlying conflict structure. These repetitive loops of observable interpersonal behaviors have a redundant outcome.
7. Make observations: As you try to understand complicated conflicts, remember to observe what happens--who says what, in what order, about what topics, and with what kind of nonverbal communication.
8. Conduct interviews.

Each communication system has an identity that is more than the sum of the individual players. System-wide styles have not been widely researched. Conflict can be occurring in the system because the participants disagree about the type of system they want. Various system patterns can be functional or not, depending on the needs of the situation.
 

Conflicts are created, reinforced, and best managed by focusing on the communication patterns within the system. A coalition is formed by more communication with some people, compared to others. When two people are "coalesced," they orient to one another, share more information, and feel closer than to others. When people feel excluded, they call the other people's coalitions "cliques."
1. Coalitions begin for good reasons.
2. Coalitions and counter-coalitions become self-justifying.
3. Coalitions become the problem.
4. Clarify coalitions by drawing them.
5. Coalitions predict future conflict. Heavy communicators--those who are central to passing and receiving messages from members--typically (1) resist being moved out of that central role and (2) at the same time complain about the "overwork," or effort involved in keeping the system happy. Those close to the authority and power complain about the isolates, or less central people, "not doing their job." Those who do not have the ear of the authority and are more peripheral will describe the "treatment" they get as negative and unwarranted.
6. Change a system by softening the coalitions. In a healthy system, everyone can talk with everyone else.

1. Try to change the other party, usually highly unsuccessful.
2. Try to alter the conflict conditions. If you can increase scarce resources, alter the nature of a problematic interdependence, change perceptions of incompatible goals, or make some other alteration in the conflict elements, you will be able to change a conflict.
3. Change your own communication and/or perceptions: The humility option. Change what you do and what you think about the other will quickly and profoundly affect the conflict elements in the relationship. Unilaterally change your own communication without a quid pro quo expectation. You change before the other person changes.

What if the other person won't cooperate? You can decide to disengage, if you have the option to do so. You can appeal to a higher authority.

Zone of Effectiveness
Low productivity occurs when interpersonal conflicts are not identified or openly expressed to the other party. At the other extreme, with few restraints on conflict expression, a runaway destructive conflict spiral damages all.

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1. Alters the escalatory conflict spiral and halts destructive behavior.
2. Allows for self-discovery: When you use restraint, you have the time to explore sources of power you can use and to consider your own needs and goals for the particular conflict.
3. Allows for more creative conflict management options than either party could generate singly; each individual is induced into innovation.
4. Prevents you from taking actions that you would later regret or have to justify.
5. Makes productive use of energy that was previously being diverted into frustration.
6. Allows trust to build when trust has broken down.

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Avoidance can lead to a downward spiral of avoidance or escalation. Failure to take action keeps you stuck.

• You feel that the other "wouldn't like it" or is so fragile he or she would fall apart if you brought up the issue.

• You feel that you don't have the "right" to bring up the issue or engage the other.

• You feel that you lack the skills to deal with the conflict.

We negotiate to make decisions that are acceptable to everyone concerned. Human services administrators spend 26% of their time negotiating.

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Each culture designates areas that are off-limits to negotiation and areas in which negotiation is acceptable.

When we have the power, we all too often use it to take shortcuts to get what we want. We exercise such control not only to help or protect others, or out of genuine need, but out of "fear, insecurity, vengeance, vanity, habit, self-will, boredom, and laziness.

Persons using dominance often escalate the cycle by not listening to the needs of others, numbing themselves to injustice, focusing only on their own needs and tasks, making light of others' needs, trivializing and minimizing the needs of others, and blaming the victim.

Argument is "reason giving" trying to convince others of your side of the issue.

Interpersonal argument, done properly, may in fact be the heart and soul of modern-day interpersonal problem solving and conflict management.

In constructive conflicts, arguments focus on levels of discourse what will move the conflict toward resolution.

Competitive negotiators assume that the conflict is win/lose.

The distributive bargainer is not concerned about a future relationship with the other party and is trying to maximize gain and minimize loss.

Disadvantages to a competitive approach:

• Has a strong bias toward confrontation.

• Works against responsiveness and openness to opponent.

• Encourages brinkmanship.

• Increases difficulty in predicting responses of opponent.

• Contributes to an overestimation of the payoffs of competitive actions.

Assumes that the parties have both (1) diverse interests and (2) common interests and that the negotiation process can result in both parties' gaining something.

One of the assumptions of collaborative, or integrative, negotiation is that polar opposites are not necessarily in conflict.

• The negotiating world is controlled by enlightened self-interest.

• Common interests are valued and sought.

• Interdependence is recognized and enhanced.

• Limited resources do exist, but they can usually be expanded through cooperation.

• The resource distribution system is integrative (joint) in nature.

• The goal is a mutually agreeable solution that is fair to all parties and efficient for the community.

Expanding the pie encourages collaborative outcomes. Expanding the resources alters the structure of the conflict.

Logrolling is when one offers to "trade off" issues that are the top priority for the other. Cost cutting minimizes the other's costs for going along with you. Bridging invents new options to meet the other side's needs.

1. Separate the people from the problem.

2. Focus on interests, not positions. Understanding the difference between positions and interests is the central aspect of the principles negotiation approach.

• Parties have multiple interests.

• In conflict situations, we usually misread the other's interests.
   

• In disputes, relational and identity interests are always present, often under the surface.

3. Generate a variety of possibilities before deciding what to do.

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4. Insist that the result be based on some objective standard.

As long as predetermined goals benefiting the self are pursued, the underlying assumptions:

• Self-interest

• Competitiveness

• Rationality

• An individualistic focus

• The exchange model

These underlying assumptions limit the transformative potential of negotiation. The transformative approach to negotiation rests on

• Community concerns.

• Cooperativeness

• Subjectivity.

• Intuition.

• Emotion.

Competitive and Collaborative Phases

Most inexperienced bargainers automatically assume a competitive stance regarding negotiations since they believe that "toughness" can only be achieved through competitive tactics.

Many conflicts require the use of a competent third party who does not have a vested interest in a specific outcome. The goal of all intervention is to assist in a transformation of the conflict elements.

• Change the expression of conflict.

• Alter the degree of interdependence between the parties.

• Change their perceptions or their goals so they are no seen as incompatible.

• Balance the power.

• Modify the actual or perceived scarcity of resources.

• Adjust the actual or perceived interference by the opposing parties.

Avoid taking sides. Refusing to take sides can result in your readiness to be an effective change agent.

When someone has been trained in a specific third-party roe, and when that person is specifically requested to perform conflict resolution or reduction or reduction procedures, we refer to the process as formal intervention. Paid third parties: Counseling, mediation, legal interventions, or organizational consultation.

Adjudication is a process in which parties present their case before a judge or jury. Adjudication as a form of conflict management has a number of positive features. In the case of abused or neglected children, a state agency can bring the parents before a court to determine their suitability for continued parenting. The children's representative, a guardian ad litem, acts as their agent.

A second positive feature of adjudication is that it provides rules for fairness, such as the admission of evidence.

Third, the use of professionals to speak for the conflict parties is an advantage for parties who need assistance in preparation or presentation of their case.

Disadvantages of Judicial System:

• It has been overused and, as a consequence, is overburdened and misused.

• Conflict parties no longer make their own decisions.

• The adversarial system operates on a win/lose set of conflict assumptions tat encourages escalation tactics.

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When the parties contractually agree to arbitration, the arbitrated judgment is enforceable in court. This process is called finding arbitration; the judgment is final. Voluntary, or nonbinding, arbitration is sometimes used when the parties will not agree to binding arbitration. In arbitration, both parties enter into arbitration voluntarily. It keeps one party from using passive aggressive or impasse tactics on the other--sooner or later the issue WILL be resolved. In many case, the arbitrator has special training in the content area of the dispute, such as in contract arbitration.

Arbitration does have some limitations. It tends to resolve conflicts solely on a content basis. It does not address the relational or face-saving aspects of the dispute.

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Mediators help the parties negotiate so they can reach agreement. The mediator is a neutral party who does not try to push the parties to a specific decision. The process assumes that conflict is inevitable and resolvable.

Limitations:

• Not all conflict parties will agree to work through their conflict with the "enemy."

• Mediation may not be appropriate for certain types of relationships.

• When one person has been abused, she may not be able to speak up with enough authority in mediation to generate options, argue for her perspective, and avoid being manipulated.

• For some disputes, involvement in mediation is not worth the effort.

Peer mediation: These programs train students, teachers, and administrators in constructive conflict resolution, teach mediation skills to peer mediators, and provide mediators for disputes ranging from playground difficulties to teacher-student problems.

Family mediation is not a replacement for the legal process but an adjunct to it.

Mediation steps:

• Entry

• Diagnosis

• Negotiation

• Agreements

• Follow-up

1. Focus on interests.

2. Build in "loop-back" procedures that encourage definitions to return to negotiation.

3. Provide low-cost rights and power backup procedures.

4. Build in consultation before, feedback after.

5. Arrange procedures in a low-to-high-cost sequence.

6. Provide the motivation, skills, and resources necessary to make the procedures work.

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Sometimes our best efforts to prevent conflict or engage in it constructively fail and we are left feeling betrayed, deceived, embittered, or isolated.

Forgiveness often follows an effort, more or less determined, to alter the terms of a relationship that has become the source of disappointment, hurt, frustration, or harm.

Faulkner: Forgiveness is giving up the idea of a better past.

Interpersonal forgiveness can be seen as the decision to reduce negative thoughts, affect, and behavior, such as blame and anger, toward an offender or hurtful situation, and to begin to gain better understanding of the offense and the offender.

It also implies willingness to accept the other into one's moral community so that he or she is entitled to care and justice.

Forgiveness acknowledges the truth about what happened and the consequences that followed. Forgiveness doe not excuse or condone the behavior or actions of another.

Forgiveness is not indifferent about justice. It might very well hold someone to account, seek restitution or a form or reparation while releasing the resentment that often accompanies a protracted conflict or violation.

Forgiveness is not a sign of weakness.

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Forgiveness requires an act of imagination because it invites us to consider a future that is not merely a reaction to the past. Forgiveness requires movement.

Forgiveness is a process undertaken by one person in relation to another, with or without interaction with that person. Reconciliation is a process of reestablishing relationship, renewing trust, settling differences so that cooperation and a sense of harmony are restored.

Sometimes people in positions of greater authority or power expect those with less power to forgive because this release of another in the form of forgiveness preserves the imbalance of power.

Forgiveness, if chosen, should never obligate a person.

Forgiveness is a decision and process. The process can include the uncovering phase, the decision phase, the work phase, and the outcome phase. Possible acts: The offended party recognizes the offender's shame and/or regret. A ceremonial act follows in which both parties recognize that a decision to forgive has taken place.

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Avoid getting stuck. If we do not get caught in this eddy of resentment and revenge, we may get caught in an eddy of depression and withdrawal. See the eddies as resting places, have a keen sense of timing, and watch for a person's own motivation to return to the flow of life.

Seeing forgiveness as an internal process helps a person recover that lost sense of autonomy. We may proceed without waiting on subsequent action, communication, or acknowledgment from the person who caused the injury. We cease to be the prisoner of someone else's actions. We reclaim ourselves as the active center of our own choices. The fact of our interrelatedness requires that we pay attention to the interpersonal dimension of forgiveness.

People who have been harmed by others are more willing to renegotiate a relationship when they know the following three things:

• that there is essential agreement as to the nature of the violation

• that the other person d the hurt and pain that the violation caused

• that the offending person will make an apology for the hurt and pain that the violation caused.

We may visit someone who caused us harm, attend their musical performance, graduation, wedding, or thesis defense. Very often a touch signals the shift away from resentment, putting a hand on someone's shoulder, for example. Historically speaking, a handshake is such a gesture. It signals that the open hand does not contain a weapon. A small gift is a highly communicative act--presenting a vase of flowers, offering a glass of water, sending a humorous cartoon or sketch, offering a ticket to a concern may communicate at least as effectively as words that something has been released and that the door is open.

1. Do I really understand what hurt or offended the other person?

2. Am I conscious of what I did?

3. Do I intend to change so that the injury or transgression won't be repeated? Am I prepared to make some kind of restitution if that is requested?

4. Do I mean what I say?

5. Is the apology for me, the other person, or the relationship?

6. Can I apologize without also adding justification for my actions?

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It also can be very hard to receive it after we have done the harm. Accepting forgiveness requires that we shift our attention from the fear of retribution or guilt over something we have done wrong to the possibility of freedom from this fear.

A person hoping to receive forgiveness must wait for the gift of forgiveness to come from the person who has been harmed.

Self-forgiveness presents some major challenges.

Forgiving oneself can be particularly difficult because it first requires that we reconcile two different images of ourselves: the person we think we are and the person who caused someone harm. As long as we withhold forgiveness from ourselves, then we can't possibly be the person who did this deed. To accept forgiveness, whether from someone else or from oneself, is a form of admission that , yes, we are both these people--the one who finds such actions abhorrent and the one who did them. Self-forgiveness requires that we see these two selves clearly and help them recognize and accept each other, extending compassion to each until the self becomes less divided. We must be willing to extend empathy and compassion to ourselves from self-punishing tendencies, without denying accountability.

Reconciliation is the process of repairing a relationship so that the reengagement, trust, and cooperation become possible after a transgression or violation. When it is safe, reconciliation is about the spanning of the chasms between people. It is about the bridges that people build, one stone at a time, sometimes from one side, occasionally from both. Shriver asserts that the cable is woven of four strands: truth, forbearance, empathy, and a commitment to remain in a relationship because of our essential interdependence.

1. Truth.
Nothing obstructs the effort to repair a relationship as much as the experience of having your own sense of truth denied.

2. Forbearance
To forbear means to refrain from revenge or punishment after someone has hurt us or transgressed against us. Resentment enacted is revenge, then is self-defeating.

3. Empathy
Empathy is rooted in the realization that the one who hurt us is at least human and needs our kindness.

4. Commitment to the Relationship out of Awareness of Our Interdependence
Commitment may be hardest to understand, yet it is the most crucial. A sense of how what happens to one affects the rest places responsibility on us to work things out with one another.

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We subjugate the memory of past harm to the hope of a new future. In the face of conflict or injury, we see our mutual vulnerability, our inevitable interdependence, and the need for compassion so all of us may transcend the injuries of the past.

Core values that underlie constructive and peaceful conflict resolution include: kindness, compassion, and respect for others, avoid distancing and objectifying people.

Learn from history.

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To prevent destructive avoidance when working with avoiders:

Put them at ease. Use a calm voice, friendly ad open nonverbal actions.

Provide safety. I won't raise my voice or interrupt you.

Change the mode of communication. If using emails, talk face to face.

Frame the conversation as relationship-building. "I have a suggestion for how you could help our relationship." or "Our project needs some help. Would you be willing to talk with me about our. . . ?"

For de-escalating spirals:

Set and keep ground rules for interaction.

Limit the issues instead of expanding them.

Look for ways to reframe the other's behavior in positive ways.

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1. Schedule talks--don't spring the on unsuspecting people.

2. Talk about tough topics in private, one-on-one with the person involved.

3. Be direct and specific, leaving no room for doubt.

4. Use all the skills of respect and kindness.

5. Assume the best, not the worst.

6. Only use humor when appropriate and when the other person seems up for it.

7. Offer to actively help solve the problem.

8. Thank the person for the talk.

1. Identify the problem (not the problem person).

2. Determine the causes and stressors.

3. Clarify everyone's perceptions of the problem and stressors.

4. Identify shared goals, needs, hopes, and desired outcomes.

5. Generate as many options as possible without editing at this stage.

6. Reduce the number of options.

7. Choose the best solution(s).

8. Develop "doables" or stepping stones to specific actions.

9. Decide how to implement the solutions, the timeline, and the evaluation needed.

10. Make clear agreements that benefit everyone.

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• Gather information or advice from others.

• Initiate a conversation as opposed to avoiding it.

• Approach the other party as soon as possible without brooding.

• Employ a calm, cooperative style of communication, using an information tone while listening.

• Treat the other party fairly and with respect.

• Maintain the privacy of the conversation.

The criteria for inclusion in the book consisted of three deciding factors:

1. Each CEO led a company that was a market leader and/or that outperformed its peers.
2. Each of the CEOs leadership strategies stood the test of time.
3. Each of the CEOs contributed to the body of management knowledge.

Traits

1. Instill an "outside-in" perspective into the company.

Sam Walton once said, "Every time Wal-Mart spends one dollar foolishly, it comes out of our customers' pockets." "There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else."

3. Have an "evangelical leadership gene."
Evangelical leadership is characterized by ardent or crusading enthusiasm, being zealous, a leader who arouses fervent popular devotion and enthusiasm. The evangelical trait has little to do with personal magnetism and everything to do with devotion or commitment to a cause or idea. Gerstner was intensely focused on restoring an outside-in perspective. When the company gets into trouble somewhere down the road--and it happens to almost every company sooner or later--evangelical leadership once again becomes important to the success of the organization. One cannot be tentative. One has to be on the lunatic fringe.

Welch said that the best leaders are those who can articulate a vision and get others to execute it. His four Es of leadership: energy, energize, edge, and execute. You have to pretend you're 100% sure. You have to take action; you can't hesitate or hedge your bets. Anything less will condemn your actions to failure.

4. Understand the critical role of culture, and how difficult it is to bring about meaningful cultural change.

Authentic cultural change requires years, not months. The most important role of managers is to create an environment in which people are passionately dedicated to winning in the marketplace. Fear plays a major role in creating and maintaining such passion. Kellcher thought it crucial that employees have fun on the job, and he fostered a culture that encouraged good humor.

We tend to be very self-critical, and we look for what we can fix and what we can improve, and we do it fast." (Dell)

5. Adapt "Next generation" products, processes, or solutions.

Vision--the ability to anticipate emerging and future needs and to create products, services, and new technologies capable of satisfying those needs.

6. Implement the best ideas, regardless of their origin.

The trouble comes when you stop searching outside the company for answers because you think you already have the answers. Learn from competitors. You can learn from anyone, particularly the competitor across the street. Learning from competitors not only was fair, but was the job of every GE employee. Spread good thinking around the company.

7. Advance the leadership body of knowledge in some meaningful fashion.

Make all employees knowledge workers. People make the difference. Love learning. There is a great power in informality. Create a meritocracy in which the best ("A" players) excel and thrive. He saw that business is all about building the intellect of the organization.. Drucker once declared leadership to be "mundane, unromantic, and boring." I think that every one of the seven leaders in this book would disagree with Drucker on this point.

Place the customer at the epicenter of the business model. Dell's direct model of "mass customization" was forged through a "bottom-up" strategy based on customers' needs and preferences. The lesson is clear. Managers hoping to create successful brands cannot do it by imposing their own views (or, worse, the management committee's views!) on the marketplace. Somehow, someway, there needs to be a mechanism in place whereby the company learns to make the products that its target customers actually want.

Invite key customers in to speak to key units.

Use the Internet and other nonintermediated means to create an ongoing customer relationship. (two-way)

The company does best when it passes at least a significant percentage of savings on to consumers.

Get as many people as possible inside the company involved in satisfying customers.

Complete business units organized around different customer types, each with its own sales, service finance, IT, technical support, and manufacturing pieces.

Use a small-company mind-set. Get them to move faster, respond more quickly, and anticipate customer needs more effectively.

Don't forget about the potential customer.

When meeting with customers, make sure to use the time wisely by getting specific feedback about their needs and preferences.

Plan on conducting at least one customer survey each year.

Create a plan incorporating ideas for increasing customer involvement.

Create a boundary-less learning culture: someone, somewhere, has a better idea. Learn it and put it into action fast.

Welch achieved consistency.

Create a learning culture. Soak up good ideas from everywhere. Continuously learn. Translate learning into action. It is a badge of honor to learn from someone else. Constantly challenge everything you have. In a learning organization, employees are given access to critical information and are expected to seek out creative solutions to problems. The company and managers don't have all the answers. The hero is the one with the ideas. We celebrate ideas. We put them online. Remove roadblocks to productivity.

Set a definitive strategic direction, and make sure that the vision is articulated throughout the organization.

Make sure that there is a stated set of values to guide the company.

Change is continual. Paradox is a way of life. Passion for customers. Every person, every idea counts. Workers make suggestions to the bosses on how to improve processes and other important work flow issues, and managers had to say "yes," "no," or "I'll get back to you within this specific period of time."

Make speed, flexibility, and innovation a reflex.

Importing the best ideas should be a process.

To make sure that learning and intellect are shared throughout the organization, management needs to hold regularly scheduled meetings, reviews, training sessions, courses.

The high-involvement learning culture is "social architecture."

****Eliminate unnecessary layers of management, needless approvals, and anything else that slows the company down.

Roadblocks:

Bloated bureaucracy.
The past.
Getting the sequence wrong. The organization needs to be stable enough to focus on the task at hand instead of absorbed with fixing the problems plaguing the corporation.

A learning organization may require years, not months, to implement.

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Apply tourniquets before planning the future.

use every part of the company when you are rethinking corporate strategy or making other far-reaching changes.

Ask the customers where the company went wrong.

Finalize your vision before you implement any sweeping new plan.

Gerstner boldly decided that he would transform the culture "around three key attributes: marketplace obsession, speed, and teamwork."

Turn to an outsider for help.

Transform the prevailing mind-set from selling products to providing solutions.

Work on changing the culture before implementing any major new strategic initiative. If that isn't possible, then work on culture and strategy simultaneously.

If applicable, write down five to seven solution oriented products that your company can cerate within the next 3 years.

Develop an outsider's perspective.

Never insulate the company so much that it cannot believe in its own undoing. Instill a healthy amount of skepticism.

The difference between ordinary change and a strategic inflection point (SIP) is the magnitude of the potential effect on the business. 10x change--the change is 10 times that of the changes that the business has been accustomed to.

Complacency is the worst possible mind-set. It is much better to be fearful, skeptical, sharp-edged, on their toes.

Act before the vitality of the business has been sapped by the 10x forces affecting it.

If members of the management team--including you--feel that they are out of touch with what is really going on out there, this is a clue that things out there may be changing at a faster rate than you anticipated.

Encourage rigorous discussion and debate. Only by thrashing out the possible implications of what appears to be a strategic inflection point--a debate that should involve different managers at several levels--can an organization determine whether it is truly facing a 10x change.

You may need to discount the data and put more faith in your instincts, since strategic inflection points are mostly about the future, which in all likelihood is not yet measurable.

The dilemma is that you can't suddenly start experimenting when you realize you're in trouble unless you've been experimenting all along.

Gates views the Web as an information-sharing tool that can help turn every employee into a knowledge worker.

A digital nervous system is about creating a faster, more decisive organization.

Bottom-up strategic initiative would have been impossible in a company with an inflexible hierarchy.

Consider hosting company retreats to focus on key initiatives and to help the management correct its course.

It's the middle managers and employees, says Gates, who need accurate data the most, since they're the ones who are doing so much of the work. Gates urges companies to abandon their habit of hoarding information, and instead to teach their employees how to interpret, analyze, and act on that information.

There is a great deal of inefficiency in sharing information, particularly between companies.

Encourage any employee or customer to contact you directly via email.

Another key is ensuring that a company retains, and can quickly retrieve, the information that it accumulates. The corporate memory should be available on line, and access anything within seconds.

Make sure that it takes no more than 60 seconds to retrieve any document or file.

Make sure that your managers know that your goal is to create a knowledge-based organization in which the vast majority of essential information is available online.

Get in the habit of sending out companywide emails on a regular basis, keeping everyone informed on important initiatives. Make it clear that you welcome feedback and suggestions (both good news and, especially bad news) from everyone employee, regardless of level and location.

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Kelleher asked every employee to find a way to save the company just $5 a day.

Hire people because of their attitude. Everyone needs these traits:
cheerfulness, optimism, decision-making ability, team spirit, communication, self-confidence, and self-starter skills.

If you're an altruistic, outgoing person who likes to serve others and enjoys working with a team, we want you.

Make a list of the traits that are most important to you and your organization, and make sure that candidates measure up in terms of those characteristics before making them a job office.

Profit is a by-product of service.

When asked if he feels that the issue of culture is often overlooked in times of stress, Kelleher responded with a resounding yes.

Maximum of four layers of management between the CEO and front-line supervisors. Push responsibility down into the field as much as possible.

Focus upon the world of competitors, customers, and societal changes rather than upon an inside general office world, sometimes composed primarily to slavish devotion to forms, protocols and procedures.

Use ad hoc groups to solve problems.

Set deadlines on decision making--within two weeks.

Value ideas on their merits, rather than on the status, relationship, or credentials of those who submit them, and invite everyone to submit those ideas directly to the top (there is none--just us).

Give management personnel problems to solve in areas other than those of direct responsibility and give employees the opportunity to learn others' jobs; learning, empathy, and unit are most often the results.

Be firm, have fun, enjoy people, tolerate mistakes, take risks, and share sacrifices.

Have a customer (internal and external) representative at your highest office level who is kept informed of all deliberations and proposals on all subjects affecting your internal and external customers.

Honor excellence in spirit as well as performance.

Title and position are unimportant, leadership qualities are all-important.

If you are not on fire about what you're doing, why you're doing it, and the people who do it with you, then you can't kindle their minds, hearts, and devotion to a cause.

Assume that there is something you can learn from even your worst competitors.

"I think my constant fiddling and meddling with the status quo may have been one of my biggest contributions. . . . . I have always been driven to buck the system, to innovate, to take things beyond where they've been. . . . I have always been a maverick who enjoys shaking things up and creating a little anarchy." Walton

Consider giving some of your best people new and unexpected assignments or challenges.

Walton had obsession, patience, courage.

Once you have the formula for your industry, work on improving it.

He bought unusual items and sold them by the carload.

Allocate a certain amount of time each and every week to study what your competitors are doing, as well as study any other business that might yield good ideas.

Hire for attitude, not necessarily experience

Where do we go from here?

The content of this course has the power to change your life. Knowing research-tested principles is not enough, however, because we must be able to apply the information. In order to provide closure to your learning process, you will want to contemplate how you will use the information as you review the concepts studied so far. This page contains ideas presented throughout the course. While there is no intent to "cover" everything, hopefully some key topics will help trigger your memory and creativity. At this point, you will want to make sure you are able to synthesize information together and apply new skills to potential conflict situations in your personal and professional life.

Why study conflict?

Effective conflict management is one aspect of interpersonal therapy, a well-researched counseling technique for dealing with depression.

People in conflict may be fearful, angry, resentful, hopeless, or stressed.

It is common and normal for partners to have conflicts or disagreements.

Couples who stay together enter conflict gently, make repairs along the way when they wound each other, avoid criticizing and blaming, and avoid criticizing each other where they know it hurts.

Common responses to abuse are hyper-vigilance, difficulty relaxing, withdrawal at the first sign of tension or conflict, floating away, or disassociating, and not knowing or expressing what one really wants.

85% of workers reported conflicts at work, which is particularly common due to cultural diversity and gender equity issues.

The scarcity, or limitation, may be apparent or actual. Interference, or the perception of interference, is necessary to complete the conditions for conflict. Conflict is associated with blocking, and the person doing the blocking is perceived as the problem. Being blocked and interfered with is such a disturbing experience that our first "take" is usually anger and blame. Escalatory spirals bring about a cascade of negative effects, self-perpetuating dynamics in which the (1) behaviors, (2) perceptions of the other, and (3) perceptions of the relationship continue to disintegrate (with each party viewing one self as not responsible for any of it).

Avoidance patterns reduce the chance for productive conflict. Patterns of avoidance also create and reflect destructive conflict interaction. Both parties then become less invested in the relationship. Gottman studied, the destructive sequence consisted of criticizing, defensiveness, stonewalling, and contempt. Thus, avoidance can be viewed within the overall spiral of conflict as leading to eventual dissolution of a relationship.

All conflicts are about two issues: power and self-esteem.

Indicators that attempts to save face are being employed:
1. Claim unjust intimidation.
2. Refuse to step back from a position.
3. Suppress conflict issues.

In productive, ongoing relationships, several kinds of communication will help people restore their lost face or prevent further loss of face. You can increase flexibility and problem solving if you:
1. Help others increase their sense of self-esteem.
2. Avoid giving directives.
3. Listen carefully to others and take their concerns into account.
4. Ask questions so the other person can examine his or her goals.

The more you struggle against someone, the less power you will have with that person.

In productive communication, you stop directly interfering with each other and actively assist the other in getting what he or she wants, and the communication between you serves a transcendent function. With cooperation you actually create more power than the two of you could have created separately. Shared power is not a weak, tentative approach--it is powerful and energetic, and it requires great skill.

1. Restraint. Higher-power parties can limit their power by refusing to use all the currencies they have at their disposal.
2. Focus on interdependence; Power to the unit. Higher power individuals usually try to minimize interdependence; therefore, lower-power individuals need to point out how the conflict parties are more related than it might appear. Power in enduring relationships is not finite.--it is an expandable commodity. The focus shouldn't be the singular amount of power each one has but the balance of power between them. later, as each develops more power, the other's power rises approximately equally. The absolute amount of power may change, but the crucial issue is the comparative dependence that people have on each other.
3. Power of calm persistence. Lower power people in a conflict often can gain more equal power by persisting in their requests. Change results from careful thinking and from planning for small, manageable moves based on a solid understanding of the problem. Sometimes only calm, clear persistence increases an individual 's power enough for him or her to be heard and dealt with.

• Identify the individuals on the phone by name and ask for them when you call back.

• Stay pleasant and calm. State clearly what you want, and ask for help in solving the problem.

• Follow the rules even if you think they are ridiculous.

• Write simple, clear memos summarizing what you want, what you have done, and when you expect a response.

• Tell them all the steps you took to try to get a response from them.

• Avoid taking out your frustration on low-power individuals in the organization.

5. Empowerment of lower power people by high power people. Sometimes it is clearly to the advantage of higher-power groups or individuals to purposely enhance the power of lower-power groups or individuals. W

6. Metacommunication --talk about the communication.

Conflict styles are patterned responses, or clusters of behavior, that people use in conflict.

Avoidance of conflict often leads to a cycle that is self-perpetuating.

A competitive, or "power over," style is characterized by aggressive and uncooperative behavior--pursuing your own concerns at the expense of another. Competitive tactics can be employed in an assertive rather than an aggressive manner.

Compromise is an intermediate style resulting in some gains and some losses for each party. Compromise is not collaboration. When compromising, parties give up some important goals to gain others.

Accommodation does not assert individual needs and prefers a cooperative and harmonizing approach. The individual sets aside his or her concerns in favor of pleasing the other people involved. One may gladly yield or do so grudgingly and bitterly.

Collaboration demands the most constructive engagement of any of the conflict styles. Shows a high level of concern for one's own goals, the goals of others, the successful solution of the problem, and the enhancement of the relationship. Involves not a moderate level of concern for goals but a high level of concern for them I

All conflicts follow patterns, predictable actions of communication and response. Often the structure of the conflict is only expressed indirectly or implicitly so that assessment approaches cannot be constructed by asking the parties, so you may use inductive approaches:
1. Identify specific system patterns.
2. Use metaphoric/dramatic analysis.
3. Draw coalitions.
4. Chart conflict triangles.
5. Identify system rules: rules used in this context means the underlying communication structure of the interaction.
6. List microevents: Microevents are repetitive communication patterns that carry information about the underlying conflict structure. These repetitive loops of observable interpersonal behaviors have a redundant outcome.
7. Make observations: As you try to understand complicated conflicts, remember to observe what happens--who says what, in what order, about what topics, and with what kind of nonverbal communication.
8. Conduct interviews.

1. Try to change the other party, usually highly unsuccessful.
2. Try to alter the conflict conditions. If you can increase scarce resources, alter the nature of a problematic interdependence, change perceptions of incompatible goals, or make some other alteration in the conflict elements, you will be able to change a conflict.
3. Change your own communication and/or perceptions: The humility option. Change what you do and what you think about the other will quickly and profoundly affect the conflict elements in the relationship. Unilaterally change your own communication without a quid pro quo expectation. You change before the other person changes.

1. Separate the people from the problem.

2. Focus on interests, not positions. Understanding the difference between positions and interests is the central aspect of the principles negotiation approach.

3. Generate a variety of possibilities before deciding what to do.

4. Insist that the result be based on some objective standard.

Many conflicts require the use of a competent third party who does not have a vested interest in a specific outcome. The goal of all intervention is to assist in a transformation of the conflict elements.

• Change the expression of conflict.

• Alter the degree of interdependence between the parties.

• Change their perceptions or their goals so they are no seen as incompatible.

• Balance the power.

• Modify the actual or perceived scarcity of resources.

• Adjust the actual or perceived interference by the opposing parties.

Avoid taking sides. Refusing to take sides can result in your readiness to be an effective change agent.

Mediators help the parties negotiate so they can reach agreement. The mediator is a neutral party who does not try to push the parties to a specific decision. The process assumes that conflict is inevitable and resolvable.

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Mediation steps:

• Entry

• Diagnosis

• Negotiation

• Agreements

• Follow-up

Faulkner: Forgiveness is giving up the idea of a better past.

Interpersonal forgiveness can be seen as the decision to reduce negative thoughts, affect, and behavior, such as blame and anger, toward an offender or hurtful situation, and to begin to gain better understanding of the offense and the offender. It also implies willingness to accept the other into one's moral community so that he or she is entitled to care and justice. Forgiveness acknowledges the truth about what happened and the consequences that followed. Forgiveness does not excuse or condone the behavior or actions of another.

Forgiveness is not a sign of weakness.

Forgiveness requires an act of imagination because it invites us to consider a future that is not merely a reaction to the past. Forgiveness requires movement.

Forgiveness is a process undertaken by one person in relation to another, with or without interaction with that person. Reconciliation is a process of reestablishing relationship, renewing trust, settling differences so that cooperation and a sense of harmony are restored.

Sometimes people in positions of greater authority or power expect those with less power to forgive because this release of another in the form of forgiveness preserves the imbalance of power.

We may visit someone who caused us harm, attend their musical performance, graduation, wedding, or thesis defense. Very often a touch signals the shift away from resentment, putting a hand on someone's shoulder, for example. Historically speaking, a handshake is such a gesture. It signals that the open hand does not contain a weapon. A small gift is a highly communicative act--presenting a vase of flowers, offering a glass of water, sending a humorous cartoon or sketch, offering a ticket to a concern may communicate at least as effectively as words that something has been released and that the door is open.

1. Do I really understand what hurt or offended the other person?

2. Am I conscious of what I did?

3. Do I intend to change so that the injury or transgression won't be repeated? Am I prepared to make some kind of restitution if that is requested?

4. Do I mean what I say?

5. Is the apology for me, the other person, or the relationship?

6. Can I apologize without also adding justification for my actions?

Forgiving oneself can be particularly difficult because it first requires that we reconcile two different images of ourselves: the person we think we are and the person who caused someone harm. As long as we withhold forgiveness from ourselves, then we can't possibly be the person who did this deed. To accept forgiveness, whether from someone else or from oneself, is a form of admission that , yes, we are both these people--the one who finds such actions abhorrent and the one who did them. Self-forgiveness requires that we see these two selves clearly and help them recognize and accept each other, extending compassion to each until the self becomes less divided. We must be willing to extend empathy and compassion to ourselves from self-punishing tendencies, without denying accountability.

Reconciliation is the process of repairing a relationship so that the reengagement, trust, and cooperation become possible after a transgression or violation. When it is safe, reconciliation is about the spanning of the chasms between people. It is about the bridges that people build, one stone at a time, sometimes from one side, occasionally from both. Shriver asserts that the cable is woven of four strands: truth, forbearance, empathy, and a commitment to remain in a relationship because of our essential interdependence.

1. Truth.

2. Forbearance

3. Empathy

4. Commitment to the Relationship out of Awareness of Our Interdependence

To prevent destructive avoidance when working with avoiders:

• Put them at ease. Use a calm voice, friendly and open nonverbal actions.

• Provide safety. I won't raise my voice or interrupt you.

• Change the mode of communication. If using emails, talk face to face.

• Frame the conversation as relationship-building. "I have a suggestion for how you could help our relationship." or "Our project needs some help. Would you be willing to talk with me about our. . . ?"

1. Schedule talks--don't spring the on unsuspecting people.

2. Talk about tough topics in private, one-on-one with the person involved.

3. Be direct and specific, leaving no room for doubt.

4. Use all the skills of respect and kindness.

5. Assume the best, not the worst.

6. Only use humor when appropriate and when the other person seems up for it.

7. Offer to actively help solve the problem.

8. Thank the person for the talk.

http://www.allposters.com

1. Identify the problem (not the problem person).

2. Determine the causes and stressors.

3. Clarify everyone's perceptions of the problem and stressors.

4. Identify shared goals, needs, hopes, and desired outcomes.

5. Generate as many options as possible without editing at this stage.

6. Reduce the number of options.

7. Choose the best solution(s).

8. Develop "doables" or stepping stones to specific actions.

9. Decide how to implement the solutions, the timeline, and the evaluation needed.

10. Make clear agreements that benefit everyone.

• Gather information or advice from others.

• Initiate a conversation as opposed to avoiding it.

• Approach the other party as soon as possible without brooding.

• Employ a calm, cooperative style of communication, using an information tone while listening.

• Treat the other party fairly and with respect.

• Maintain the privacy of the conversation.

-----Course preparation and all visuals from Microsoft Front Page. http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX010858021033.aspx ----- Course materials quoted or closely adapted from Wilmot, W. W., & Hocker, J. L. (2007). Interpersonal conflict. (7th ed.) New York: McGraw-Hill. -----

SELF CHECK-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

UNIT 2 Interests, Goals, and Power
Quoted or closely adapted from Wilmot & Hocker (2007).

1. Explain the statement, "The goal of all intervention is to transform the conflict elements." Choose an example to illustrate the idea.
2. What are the effects of siding with one of the conflict parties?
3. What are cautions to remember when you are considering being a third-party helper?
4. What are the interpersonal advantages and disadvantages of adjudication?
5. Explain how negotiation functions in the forms of third-party intervention.
6. What are some principles of dispute system design?
7. Discuss some definitions of forgiveness. What are key components of forgiveness?
8. What are differences between forgiveness and reconciliation?
9. What is the problem with the phrase "forgive and forget?"
10. Compare and contrast the ideas of "forgiveness as decision" and "forgiveness as process," giving your own opinions based on the ideas presented.
11. In what ways is forgiveness both intrapersonal and interpersonal?
12. How do gestures function to lay the groundwork for further change?
13. What makes apologies ineffective or inappropriate?
14. What makes self-forgiveness so difficult?
15. Why is conflict prevention important?
16. What are some core values that lead to prevention of conflict? Discuss those most important to you.
17. How can avoidance spirals be prevented?
18. What can you do if you habitually avoid becoming more effective in conflict?
19. How can escalation spirals be de-escalated or prevented?
20. Reproduce the major steps of an expanded problem-solving sequence.