If there is a situation where there are plenty of conflicts at the workplace then not only will it be physically exhausting but also emotionally disturbing, irrespective of whether you are directly or indirectly involved.
You need to discover a certain way to mediate any conflict growing in your workplace after following a certain set process and also by asking the relevant questions.
Sayed Sayedy is a well-known Germany-based mediator. As a trainer and coach, he helps in developing the necessary confidence to mediate so that you can deal with various conflicts that must be brewing up within your workplace.
Mediation process to resolve conflict at work
As a manager, if you are dealing with a certain conflict in your workplace then you must have a suitable strategy for approaching and defusing the disagreement. Surely, you also can mediate effectively the conflict by using the following process:
- Do proper scheduling, planning, and room setup – If you can get the right people at the right time in the right place then it will be a very good first step for creating a problem-solving environment.
You need to do some amount of leg work to decide who is involved in that conflict. Thereafter, you need to put a little effort to create a very inviting environment.
- Start with greeting all the parties and start the discussion process – It will be the next step to set ground rules, and briefly discuss the role that you will play just as a neutral facilitator.
Let both parties understand that you are open to help them in resolving their differences and in every way you must tell them that this conflict, as well as its resolution all, belongs only to them.
- Share your perspectives – Refining your art of reframing and reflecting can help you to identify your core values, can neutralize any emotional language, and also demonstrate that patiently listening to point of view of each other will be far more productive as compared to listening to rebuttals.
- Start building an agenda together – Now create an agenda after listening to the perspective of each employee so that the list of topics to be discussed include everyone’s issue.
- Negotiate – Now give all employees a certain space to brainstorm so that everyone makes proposals for solutions that can benefit both parties and that can create remedies and lasting solutions.
- Hold private meetings – By meeting privately with each employee will offer you an opportunity to obtain certain sensitive information, reframe their statement to demand, apologize for playing any negative role, or acknowledge a few positive aspects.
- Write down the agreeing points with details – Whatever has been agreed must be written down in detail and nothing should be left for imagination. So writing an agreement will mention the boundaries with certainty.
- Monitor follow-through – If any signs are noticed that a few things need to be further tuned then praise all the employees for whatever positives have been obtained and then coach them on a few next steps.
This last process may continue a few more times till the conflict is fully resolved.