Management Scenario

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Management Scenario: Mediating between the members of the team

One who gives instructions, guidance, and direction and provides leadership to a group of workers to get some specific objectives is called the team leader. A team leader also examines the working capacities of his members of the team. Generally, a team leader is responsible for giving reports to his manager about the performance and achievements of his team. The key purpose for the post of team leader is to provide leadership and give direction to the efforts of the individual members of the team. A team leader is responsible for assembling the efforts of his members of the team to accomplish the task. It is the responsibility of the team leader to design a strategy that can help him to achieve the objectives. Each member of the team should be assigned the task according to his abilities and aptitude. A team leader is also assumed to monitor the work progress and determine timelines for the completion of a task. Any instruction from the upper-level management to workers is generally given through the team leader.

During the routine working of the team, a team leader has to face many problems. He has to face many workers in his team who are hard to handle. The grace of a team leader is to deal with such workers with great kindness and do not allow them to get him down. In the working environment, a leader has to face any pressure, like time management or some bad news from the outer world. A good team leader always stays calm and motivated in the presence of such pressures. Another common and hazardous problem that a team leader has to face in his routine work is the problem of conflict between members of his team. There can be different types, and there can be different reasons for such conflicts. In any team, many members belong to different socio-economic backgrounds and possess different personal temperaments. Such differences often lead to giving birth to a conflict among the members of the team. It is the responsibility of the team leader to resolve any conflict among his member fellows. Conflicts among the members of a team, regardless of the true nature of the conflict, are mostly dysfunctional. Conflicts can slow down the pace of work by demoralizing other members of the team.

Generally, any organization has to face two types of conflict among its employees/team members. Some conflicts are related to tasks and there can be a difference of opinion among the members of the team related to the relative importance of different ideas. Such type of conflict is called the Task Conflict and there are no personal characters of the employees involved in it. Task conflict can be considered as a good conflict and it can enhance and dynamism the productivity of the team. The other type of conflict can be some personal conflict in its nature. These conflicts can damage the relationship and communication among the members of the team. Such types of conflicts are called bad conflict and these conflicts can damage the output of the team.

I am given a situation where I am the team leader of an advertising team and one member of my team Linda has some issues because she has to give up a portion of her weekend consecutively for three weekends due to assignments. Now, this weekend, she has to give up her weekend because of the black-tie affair. She asked other members of the team to represent the team in this event, but all members have some excuses. Linda has a severe issue with Robert, whom she asked to represent the team but he refused by saying that he has other plans with family. Linda told me about her conflict with Robert. Now, being the leader of the team, I have to negotiate and mediate the conflict.

If there arises any conflict, then the goal of a team leader should not be to eliminate the conflict because it is almost an impossible thing. The real objective of a team leader should be to minimize the harms of the conflict so that such a conflict cannot affect the overall performance of the team. First step of mediating conflict among the members of a team is to diagnose true nature of the conflict. Either it is a task-oriented conflict, or a personal and relationship cantered conflict. A conflict is a relationship cantered conflict if the dispute is about the demands for impartiality, feelings of anger and accusations of harm. So, if I look and try to diagnose the true nature of the conflict between Linda and Robert, it seems like a relationship conflict. Linda has to sacrifice her weekends continuously because no other member is willing to share her burden.

After diagnosing the true nature and reasons of nature, the next task for a team leader is to decide either he should mediate between the parties or not. Or in other words, is mediating beneficial or not. The true purpose of a team leader is to resolve the conflict to restore the productivity of his team. In the given situation, being a team leader, I feel that I can mediate the conflict that arises between Linda and Robert.

The first step of meditation is to stabilize the setting. So, I will call both Linda and Robert into my office to resolve the issue. First, I would ask Linda to explain the issue whatever the issue she had with Robert. After listening to the whole story form Linda, I will ask Robert to clarify his point of view. From the given situation, I can understand that Linda has a genuine issue because she has to sacrifice her weekends consecutively for the 3rd week. Robert also has a valid point that on that particular weekend, he already had a plan with the family. First, I will get point of views of Linda and Robert about the conflict. The second step of mediation is to help Linda and Robert to communicate each other and try to reach on some solution. During the communication between both of them, I will remain impartial and detached. I will ask both Linda and Robert to try to figure out some agreement that can be acceptable for both of them. If both parties cannot reach on a single point, then I being a team leader would try to help them negotiate over their demands. This step of negotiating both parties is the 3rd step of mediation, and usually, both parties reach on some common point after negotiation ADDIN ZOTERO_ITEM CSL_CITATION {"citationID":"6L0IVsQz","properties":{"formattedCitation":"(T. Baldwin et al.)","plainCitation":"(T. Baldwin et al.)","noteIndex":0},"citationItems":[{"id":829,"uris":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/GKTAYTKH"],"uri":["http://zotero.org/users/local/s8f0QVnP/items/GKTAYTKH"],"itemData":{"id":829,"type":"chapter","title":"Resolving Conflict Through Negotiation and Mediation","container-title":"Managing Organinzational Behaviour","publisher":"Business and economics","publisher-place":"New York, NY","edition":"2nd edition","event-place":"New York, NY","author":[{"family":"T. Baldwin","given":"Timothy"},{"family":"S. Rubin","given":"Robert"},{"family":"H. Bommer","given":"William"}],"issued":{"date-parts":[["2008"]]}}}],"schema":"https://github.com/citation-style-language/schema/raw/master/csl-citation.json"} (T. Baldwin et al.). The last step of mediation is to clarify the agreement before both parties.

The conflict between Linda and Robert was over the issue that Linda had to work on three consecutive weekends because Robert had a plan with his family. To resolve this issue, first, I tried to figure out the full situation independently. I decided to mediate between Linda and Robert to resolve the issue after assessing the situation. I called both of them in the office and asked Linda first to explain her point of view. After listening to her story, I asked Robert to explain his views. Then I asked both of them to try to figure out a solution that can be acceptable for both of them. Linda was demanding no weekend assignment for the next whole month. While Robert was agreed that he would be available for any assignment on weekends. After some negotiation, both of them agreed to the point that for any weekend assignment, they would be available at alternative weekends.

Work Cited

ADDIN ZOTERO_BIBL {"uncited":[],"omitted":[],"custom":[]} CSL_BIBLIOGRAPHY T. Baldwin, Timothy, et al. “Resolving Conflict Through Negotiation and Mediation.” Managing Organizational Behaviour, 2nd edition, Business and economics, 2008.