Can we just get along?

 

I love it when I see a simple model that does so much to organize thoughts around extremely complex problems. This model represents a conflict resolution.  It goes like this:

In the far right hand upper square of Our Way we have a good state of people getting along. They are assertive. Assertive means you have permission to use your knowledge. You have the power to feel comfortable being assertive. You self esteem is good and you know your stuff. You are also concerned for the other party in your environment. They care about what you are doing and you care about what happens to them. In short you are cooperating and collaborating in what ever project you are doing. It is truly the sweet spot of where we want to be.

The other three squares are problem areas which have conflicts to be resolved.

Lets take avoidance, or the No Way square. How many times have we seen this? One party is overly assertive and does not have concern for the other party. The other party has no power to speak up or little self esteem to bring up contrary opinions, nor can they assert themselves. So the No Way party will nod heads and smile and say sure I'll do that. Then never do it and avoid the conflict. There is no cooperation, care or concern that failure will occur. This is the most difficult square to get people to move into the Our Way square. They have two factors to move.

Now let's move to the Your Way.  One of the parties lacks power to be assertive and cannot voice opinions. Some how the weaker party still thinks the other is concerned for their well being and will do what they want. They accommodate the assertive opposing party and have a partial cooperation. Feedback from the lower assertive party never makes it up to the top. As a matter of fact they may even withhold valuable feedback.  It plays out in real life when one party knows something will not work, but goes along with You Way only to stand by and watch it fail. This square is dangerous until the assertive party acknowledges the other has valuable knowledge to consider and provides recognition. That improves self esteem and the parties move toward the Our Way Square.

The last square is My Way. As the title suggests one party is powerful and assertive with no concern or care for the other party. It is truly my way or the highway. This square hands out orders and unilateral commands. It disregards the other parties knowledge and power to communicate their concerns. However the other party is capable of being assertive as well. This is where sparks really fly. Two parties capable of speaking up and asserting them selves in the conflict. However both parties have no concern for the well being of the other. Sounds like divorce doesn't it? Usually in My Way the leading party will win and get their way. To resolve this conflict (other than divorce) the two parties must begin to care about the concerns of each other. Once concerns can be negotiated, the parties can move toward Our Way.

Sometimes we never totally move to the Our Way square and conflicts settle in to compromise. There remains non optimum concern for each other and there remains problems with assertiveness and self esteem. All the parties in the conflict do not want to budge on sharing knowledge or information that would totally resolve conflicts. So the parties never move to the Our Way square.

Our Way is the optimum sweet spot. How do you resolve your conflicts? How are you moving your positions to Our Way?