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Management by Agreement

Preventing Conflict

by Stewart Levine

December 2005

As I move into the holiday season I find things quickening – moving faster and feeling the exuberance that comes from the joy of engaging with other people, and the need to complete year-end projects. Although most everyone is in a good mood, the level of energy, expectation and engagement is operating at an amplified level. To remove the stress of having to read another dense article and to give you some key tips I have discovered through banging my own shins I’m pleased to present some practical advice you can put to good use immediately in all of your professional and personal relationships. I hope you find them useful. Please accept my best wishes for a warm, happy, and healthy holiday. Thank you for reading, and giving me the opportunity to write this column!

Keys to Preventing Conflict

Conflict happens. Mostly it’s “structural.” It happens without any bad intention. Conflict and disagreements occur because of different perceptions and observations; different interpretations placed on the meaning of things; different feelings people bring to situations; and different desired outcomes. The key to preventing conflict and achieving desired outcomes is to craft an agreement for results that can serve as the road-map from where you are to where you want to be. This agreement should contain the following items:

  1. What is the vision of what you want to achieve with as much detail as you can think of. What will things look like 3, 6, 12 months out.
  2. How will you measure success? What are the agreed objective benchmarks you will use to measure if you achieved the vision?
  3. Make detailed promises of what each of you will do and have consequences for breaking promises.
  4. Share fears and concerns about moving forward together. Get on the table what might get in the way of fully trusting and committing to achieving the results you want.
  5. Use the above dialogue for developing relationship and deepening trust. Once relationship is established you can work through anything. The detailed agreement is not nearly as important as the relationship. As long as you can continue to work together you will achieve results beyond expectation.

Resolving Conflict – The Big Picture

Remember all conflict happens at an emotional level. The emotional triggers prevent resolution. If you deal with the emotion of whatever the "fight" was about, the conflict will resolve itself. To resolve conflict effectively remember:

  1. Most conflict is not the result of any kind of negative intention. Because of differences in people, failure to get clear at the beginning and inexact language conflict happens. Don't be so quick to blame.
  2. Conflict shows up as a stress reaction. Before you can engage in meaningful collaborative dialogue you must manage your stress.
  3. Three keys to resolving conflict effectively are
    1. listening and understanding the other's point of view;
    2. forgiveness - letting go of how you are holding them and the situation; and
    3. taking the responsibility for educating and being educated about each other’s perspective.
  4. Conflict lives inside each of us as a story - it's the way we talk to ourselves about the situation. For both catharsis, and to share details everyone get's to tell their story from beginning to end, without interruption.
  5. The goal is to reach a new agreement for the future. To get you engaged in doing that keep in mind that as long as the conflict exists you are paying a price for bringing the conflict into the present moment.

Negotiating Excellence

Remember, the game is not to win, but to reach an agreement everyone can win with.

  1. The most powerful form of negotiating is to find out what they want and figure out how to give it to them; and to let them know what you want and to get them figuring out how to give you what you need.
  2. Always leave something on the table. If the deal is too sharp it will come back to haunt you because everyone will not be able to perform.
  3. Think in terms of a long-term collaboration, not a short term transaction. This will help you to create a relationship which is critical if you want to continue working together.
  4. Get beneath positions to the concerns that are behind them. Find out what they are really concerned about and take care of it.
  5. Games and withholding are ploys that never work. Everything always gets revealed so you might as well let it all out and deal with it.

Getting “Them” to Say “Yes:” Creating Irresistible Offers

  1.  Find out what they want and figure out a way to give it to them 
  2. Abide by the "platinum rule" - do unto others as they would do unto "themselves" - motivate them by what they want, don't assume it's the same as what you want
  3. Make them an "irresistible" offer
  4. Build a vision - and create the road map to it that you can agree on
  5. Anticipate all their objections
  6. Develop rapport by modeling (following) their energy
  7. Demonstrate compassion for their concerns
  8. Care for them as a person, not just the project
  9. Stand in their shoes, assume they are listening to WIIFM (What's In It For Me)
  10. Beg, plead and promise them anything!

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About the Author

Stewart Levine, Esq., is a consultant, trainer, mediator and facilitator. He is the author of the award winning “Getting to Resolution: Turning Conflict Into Collaboration” and the recently released “Book of Agreement” that has been called “more practical than Getting to Yes.” www.ResolutionWorks.org.