HERDSA 1996: Black - when conflict comes to a head

When conflict comes to a head

Barbara Black
Centre for Staff Development
The University of Western Australia

The dilemma to be explored is how staff developers can best meet the needs of heads of department in the development of conflict resolution skills. At UWA, many heads of department have indicated that they would like to have the opportunity to develop their skills in this area, staff complain that their head of department is unable to handle conflict effectively, and senior university administrators who end up handling badly managed conflict confirm that heads of department need to have well-developed conflict resolution skills. Despite the clear need for staff development in this area, past experience has been that few heads of department have attended central conflict resolution workshops.
The challenge for the Centre for Staff Development is to develop a staff development 'activity' which will suit the needs, time constraints and learning styles of heads of department, and will encourage 'the ones who really need it' to participate. To this end a study was carried out which involved interviewing a small but representative sample of heads of academic departments and heads of administrative sections. Interview questions were designed to elicit information about the types of conflicts departmental heads encountered and found difficult to deal with, the skills they perceived they needed to develop, the form of training they preferred, and how to best market the training so that it appealed to heads of department. The outcomes of this study will be described in the paper, as well as our attempt to meet this staff development need.

Introduction

Question: Why can't staff development give me the conflict resolution skills I need when I need them and surely they can cover this in an hour given I'm so busy?

An ongoing challenge for staff development units is to provide appropriate, effective staff development activities for the wide range of staff who work in universities, particularly for heads of department who lead and manage others. This paper will describe the Centre for Staff Development's approach to meeting the developmental needs of heads of department in the area of conflict resolution. To date our approach has included carrying out a study of departmental heads' staff development needs in dealing with interpersonal conflicts, as well as a pilot staff development activity for this group. The paper also raises questions for discussion during the investigation session.

Background

The Centre for Staff Development (CSD) offers central workshops on conflict resolution which are open to all staff, but in which heads of department have shown little interest. This is despite an acknowledgment by many departmental heads they would like to develop skills in better managing conflict; complaints from staff in some departments that the head is lacking in conflict resolution skills; and many instances of senior university administrators becoming involved in resolving conflicts that were not managed effectively or were not dealt with at the departmental level. This situation has raised a number of questions for CSD about why heads of department were not taking advantage of existing workshops. Were they too long? Scheduled at unsuitable times? Seen to not address the needs of staff in leadership positions, such as heads of academic departments? Scorned because they were seen to be 'little courses'? Did departmental heads know of their existence? It seemed that the most appropriate way to have these questions answered was seek the views of the target group.

The study

The study took the form of individual interviews with a small but representative sample of heads of department, which included five heads of academic departments from different faculties and three heads of administrative departments. Of the eight interviewees, four were male and four were female. Interview questions sought to determine the skills needed by heads of department in resolving interpersonal conflicts; the types of conflicts they found the most challenging; their preferences in terms of learning activities; and how best to market a suitable staff development activity so that heads of department would be encouraged to participate. It was recognised before carrying out the study that a traditional workshop might not be the most appropriate format for developing skills in resolving conflict and that another approach might be more suitable for this group.

Preferred type of learning activity

Given that it was anticipated that heads of department would not choose a 'little course' as a means of developing conflict resolution skills, it surprising that most interviewees indicated their preference was for interactive workshops. Workshops designed for heads of department and other staff in similar positions were seen to provide opportunities to talk conflicts through with peers, to receive other departmental heads' suggestions for resolving them, and to find out how others handled similar problems. One head of department said she found hearing others' problems comforting in a way, as they made hers seem 'not so bad'!

One of the very clear messages coming from the interviews was that workshops should be kept as short as possible, i.e. two or three short sessions of approximately two hours each, with optional additional sessions for those interested.

Another surprise, given the commonly held belief amongst higher education staff developers that heads of department do not like role-plays and prefer more analytical activities such as case studies, was that most interviewees suggested using role-play as a learning activity, provided the role-plays were based on situations similar to those encountered by heads of department.

'Didactic stuff' (a term used by one interviewee) needed to be kept to a minimum during workshops. Discussion of conflicts experienced by departmental heads and practice of skills emerged as being among the preferred means of improving one's ability to resolve interpersonal conflicts. Videos of the 'how-to-do-it' and 'how-not-to-do-it' variety were also seen to be helpful, provided they were relevant to university situations.

In addition to interactive workshops, one-to-one assistance was seen to be helpful to complement or as an alternative to workshops for those who had neither the time nor the inclination to attend them, or for those who needed help with a particular problem when it arose. Interviewees indicated that this form of assistance should be provided by those in the organisation who could act as a sounding board for heads of department, who knew relevant policies and procedures and who could provide coaching in dealing with a particular issue. It became quite clear during the interviews that departmental heads appreciated the opportunity simply to talk through the conflicts they had to deal with. While one-to-one assistance is available from various sections of the organisation, heads of department were not often aware of the existence of this type of assistance.

Staff development needs

Interviewees indicated that workshops should include activities which develop skills such as active listening and negotiation, as well as the ability to adopt a conciliatory and problem-solving approach to dealing with conflict; these skills tend to feature in 'standard' conflict resolution workshops. Issues which emerged as requiring particular attention included dealing with differences in the power and status of the parties in conflict; dealing with 'difficult people', who included those who were aggressive, manipulative, or who had psychological problems; and coping with the emotional aspects of conflict, both the head of department's own reactions, and displays of strong emotions by the other party. Another important issue which emerged was the development of skills and confidence in confronting the other party about his or her behaviour in a frank but non-aggressive manner. Mediation was also seen to be a useful skill.

Encouraging participation in the staff development activity

According to those interviewed, the most effective way of making heads of department aware of and interested in staff development in the area of conflict resolution was to send information directly to them in the post. A flier describing conflict situations with which departmental heads could relate appeared to be the best way of encouraging them to attend the workshop, and an eye-catching title for the activity, devoid of management jargon, was suggested. One interviewee said that the flier had to appeal sufficiently to the person who opened the head of department's mail so that he or she would put it in the head's 'action pile'!

Action taken by CSD so far

CSD's first opportunity to address this staff development need presented itself in first semester of this year. As our annual leadership programme for new and existing heads of academic departments was already scheduled for first semester, it was decided to include a short pilot module introducing conflict resolution. The module was one of six optional sessions included in the programme. Each module was two hours in length and scheduled from 12:00 noon to 2:00pm, a time slot which has in the past proved to be convenient for this group.

Designing a two-hour session on resolving conflict which was interactive and provided participants with key concepts, with opportunities for interaction and skill development, and with practical tools to take away was a challenge indeed. The session was designed to provide an overview of general concepts, such as conflict resolution principles (Bolton 1987, Fisher and Patton 1991); levels of conflict and possible points of intervention (Cornelius and Faire 1989); and adopting a 'win/win' approach (Fisher and Patton 1991). The session also provided an opportunity to discuss current conflicts: small group discussion of these conflicts was structured by a conflict mapping process (Cornelius and Faire 1989), with measures taken to protect anonymity and confidentiality during the discussions. The use of power bases (French and Raven 1960, Bogue 1994, Hogan 1992) was explored through discussion and an individual exercise. Time did now allow for practice of interactive skills, although the 'I statement' (Cornelius and Faire 1989) structure was introduced. Take-away reading included selected extracts from Bolton (1987), Cornelius et al (n.d.), Moses and Roe (1990) and Tucker (1993).

While the module appeared to be well received, feedback from participants on its usefulness is not available at the time of writing this paper, as the conflict resolution module will be evaluated at the same time as the rest of the programme, which is still in progress.

The ongoing dilemma

While the study was very useful in determining the staff development needs of heads of department in dealing with interpersonal conflict and their preferred way of learning skills in this area, a number of problems remain. How can an effective learning activity be designed to fit into the limited amount of time that heads of department have available or are prepared to make available for staff development? How might the effectiveness of a conflict resolution programme be evaluated? And how could 'the ones who really need it' be encouraged to attend workshops or seek one-to-one assistance?

References

Bogue, E. G. (1994). Leadership by Design: Strengthening Integrity in Higher Education. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

Bolton, R. (1987). People Skills: How to assert yourself, listen to others, and resolve conflicts. 2nd ed. Brookvale, NSW: Simon and Schuster.

Cornelius, H. and Faire, S. (1989). Everyone Can Win: How to Resolve Conflict. East Roseville, NSW: Simon and Schuster.

Cornelius, H., Faire, S., and Hall, S. (n.d.). Conflict Resolution: An Eight-Session Course - Trainer's Manual. 2nd ed. Chatswood, NSW: The Conflict Resolution Network.

Fisher, R. Ury, W., & Patton, B. (1991). Getting to Yes: Negotiating an agreement without giving in. 2nd ed. Sydney, NSW: Century Business.

French, R. P. and Raven, B. (1960). The bases of social power. In D. Cartwright and A. Zander (eds), Group Dynamics: Research and Theory. 2nd ed. (pp. 607-621). Evanston, Illinois: Row, Peterson and Company.

Hogan, C. (1992). Strategies for enhancing empowerment. Training and Management Development Methods, 6, 3.25-3.42.

Moses, I. and Roe, E. (1990). Heads and Chairs: Managing Academic Departments. St Lucia, Queensland: University of Queensland Press.

Tucker, A. (1993). Chairing the Academic Department: Leadership Among Peers. 3rd edn. Washington, DC: American Council on Education and The Oryx Press.

Author: Barbara Black, Centre for Staff Development, The University of Western Australia. Email: bblack@csd.uwa.edu.au Fax: (09) 380 1156

Please cite as: Black, B. (1996). When conflict comes to a head. Different Approaches: Theory and Practice in Higher Education. Proceedings HERDSA Conference 1996. Perth, Western Australia, 8-12 July. http://www.herdsa.org.au/confs/1996/black.html

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