The opportunity of “Office Dramas”

Often managers and leaders can look to HR to fix office dramas.  It can be tempting for HR to step in and do just that.  However, the most effective solutions coming from HR using the conflict situation as an opportunity to build teams and enable resilience.  Ideally, HR should continuously provide effective tools and means for communication to the organisation.  When they do that, the leaders and managers can emerge from the conflict situation with sustainable solutions.

The role of HR

In order to fully take advantage of this opportunity, they key, as set out in the attached article is to build the organisation’s Early Resolution or “ADR” Strategy: HR will be instrumental in developing and co-ordinating a coherent Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) strategy covering both learning and development and dispute resolution.  Expertise in conflict resolution is key to develop this strategy well but essentially it include:

  • Auditing the organisation’s conflict including the cost to the organisation and the impact on its people
  • Developing a learning and development environment that supports early resolution. Ideally this will be in the form of staff training in early resolution skills and templates to resolve difficult conversations.  However, whilst it is true that the more comprehensive the training the better the impact, even light touch training on understanding conflict and a framework for difficult conversations can affect culture
  • Resolving current and historic disputes through a mediated intervention, reviewing future use of mediation and appointing your resolution team for early intervention.

Enabling Dynamic Solutions

One of the ways to enable dynamic solutions to the office drama is though the Conflict Resolution Game.  The key is enabling new ways to work through conflict situations within the culture of the organisation.  If you want to find out more, we are always happy to talk a situation through.  Alternatively, join one of our dynamic training sessions which provide an opportunity to network with HR and learning and development professionals as well as provide tools to turn around an unhelpful conflict culture once and for all.