CONFLICT MANAGEMENT IN HEALTHCARE Tekeste Abate West Coast University LDR 432 Principles of Leadership for Healthcare Organizations Professor Coleen Poitinger February 12, 2017 CONFLICT MANAGEMENT IN HEALTHCARE The aim of conflict management is to enhance learning and group outcomes, including effectiveness or performance in organizational settings. Properly managed conflict can improve group outcomes. (Rahim, 2002). The opportunities inherent in a conflict management system can be categorized recognition of conflict as indicator to allow early identification of problems, promotion of a proactive response to problems and conflict, encouragement of a culture of mutual respect, open communication, and problem solving during inquiry or intervention relating to conflict, and a means of working towards potential resolution. Unaddressed interpersonal conflict can interfere with the personal well-being of the individual, result in negative co-worker relationships, undermine safe patient care/outcomes; and be disruptive to the organization. High relationship conflict appears to cause dysfunction in team work, diminished commitment to team decisions and decrease organizational commitment (Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario, 2012). Conflict occurs at many levels within an organization, among and between many healthcare providers and can be about many things. The management and resolution of conflict is critical to the effective functioning of the organization. The nature of the health-care delivery system creates tension as professional care-givers seek to meet the needs of patients and their families as well as the sometimes competing demands of the system itself. Differences in perspectives based on the educational socialization to their professions, position, authority and power often lead to conflicts in the health care arena (Mills, 2002). The increasing prevalence and subsequent impact of interpersonal conflict in health- care settings necessitates for requirement for organizations to have a process to manage conflict that may occur. Interpersonal conflictive interactions among members of the Health- care team create subtle unpleasant experiences that result in negative attitudes and behaviors. In turn, this can create a stressful work environment with negative consequences such as job dissatisfaction, weak organizational commitment, and a lack of trust and sense of support in the workplace. Conflict, resentment and interpersonal disputes occur when someone believes their values, needs or identity have been undermined or challenged. The most strongly negative feelings associated with interpersonal conflict are anger, fear and contempt, which lead people to disengage, or to engage destructively (“Developing Conflict, Resilient”). Without a current conflict management system in place, it is difficult to know how various dis.

1. CONFLICT MANAGEMENT IN HEALTHCARE
Tekeste Abate
West Coast University
LDR 432 Principles of Leadership for Healthcare Organizations
Professor Coleen Poitinger
February 12, 2017
CONFLICT MANAGEMENT IN HEALTHCARE
The aim of conflict management is to enhance learning
and group outcomes,
including effectiveness or performance in organizational
settings. Properly managed conflict
can improve group outcomes. (Rahim, 2002).
The opportunities inherent in a conflict management
system can be categorized
recognition of conflict as indicator to allow early identification

2. of problems, promotion of a
proactive response to problems and conflict, encouragement of a
culture of mutual respect,
open communication, and problem solving during inquiry or
intervention relating to conflict,
and a means of working towards potential resolution.
Unaddressed interpersonal conflict can interfere with the
personal well-being of the
individual, result in negative co-worker relationships,
undermine safe patient care/outcomes;
and be disruptive to the organization. High relationship conflict
appears to cause dysfunction
in team work, diminished commitment to team decisions and
decrease organizational
commitment (Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario, 2012).
Conflict occurs at many
levels within an organization, among and between many
healthcare providers and can be
about many things.
The management and resolution of conflict is critical to
the effective functioning of the
organization. The nature of the health-care delivery system
creates tension as professional
care-givers seek to meet the needs of patients and their families
as well as the sometimes
competing demands of the system itself. Differences in
perspectives based on the educational
socialization to their professions, position, authority and power
often lead to conflicts in the
health care arena (Mills, 2002).
The increasing prevalence and subsequent impact of
interpersonal conflict in health-
care settings necessitates for requirement for organizations to
have a process to manage
conflict that may occur. Interpersonal conflictive interactions
among members of the Health-

3. care team create subtle unpleasant experiences that result in
negative attitudes and behaviors.
In turn, this can create a stressful work environment with
negative consequences such as job
dissatisfaction, weak organizational commitment, and a lack of
trust and sense of support in
the workplace.
Conflict, resentment and interpersonal disputes occur
when someone believes their
values, needs or identity have been undermined or challenged.
The most strongly negative
feelings associated with interpersonal conflict are anger, fear
and contempt, which lead
people to disengage, or to engage destructively (“Developing
Conflict, Resilient”). Without
a current conflict management system in place, it is difficult to
know how various disputes
are being handled before reaching a formal phase of the process,
which may lead to
litigation.
Healthcare organizations are going to need critical
management skills and a mean for
integrating collaborative process into their day-to-day
operations. The goal in hospital and
healthcare facilities is to develop and implement a conflict-
management process so that
conflict does not adversely affect patient safety or quality care.
Conflict can, however, also create negative interpersonal
relationships that reduce the
quality of communication and hinder the ability to obtain
meaningful outcomes.
Dysfunctional or destructive conflict leads to organizational and
personal stress, distortion of
unit goals, and game-playing (Mills, 2002).
Misunderstandings, poor choices of language, ineffective
management styles, unclear

4. roles and responsibilities, miscommunication, and poor
leadership. By listening to others,
learning to problem solve, talking and exploring options, and
most conflict can easily be
corrected (Cloke & Goldsmith, 2011).
The goal in hospital and healthcare facilities is to develop
and implement a conflict-
management process so that conflict does not adversely affect
patient safety or quality of
care.
Conflict has a negative effect on productivity. Clearly,
when people are butting heads
rather than working toward a common goal, they are less
efficient. But conflict has other
hidden costs as well. The costs of unresolved conflict are many,
ranging from individual
distress, to broken relationships and strained organizational
resources (“Developing
Conflict Resilient”).
I. Mental and physical wellbeing, absenteeism, counter-
culture activities and
ongoing dissatisfaction.
II. Lost productivity, lost opportunities, declining trust and
morale and increased
disputation.
III. Time spent on case management, difficulties with
recruitment and retention.
Workplace stress associated with unresolved conflict can result
in significant costs.
IV. In a report commissioned by International Labor
Organization (ILD), Geneva, it
was estimated that workplace stress accounts for between 1-
3.5% of a nation’s Gross
Domestic Product (GDP), through measures such as loss of
productivity, compensation
payments, early retirements and welfare-related costs.

5. (“Development Conflict
Resilient”).
Conflict does not always appear in the same form or from
the same people.
Unaddressed, conflict can undermine a hospital’s efforts to
ensure safe, high-
quality patient care. If conflict is not controlled, it can have
damaging effects
in the workplace, stifling the growth of departments and
deflating employee
morale. Hospitals are not only committed to meeting the
standards of the Joint
Commission, but also to changing the culture of the hospital and
supporting
improved outcomes. A culture of collaboration can be a key
asset in addressing the
future environment of care (“Joint commission resources,”
2011). By creating a
more conflict-enlightened work environment, the quality of care
provided to
patients may increase, and the cost of doing so may in fact
decrease.
The extent to which conflicts can be avoided or disputes
expediently
resolved for each party’s mutual satisfaction, the more positive

6. the health care
environment will be for patients and providers and the greater
opportunity to
develop high performance multidisciplinary teams (Mills,
2002).
How conflict is managed and ultimately resolved is
critical to the effective
functioning of the organization and its ability to creatively
move forward.
According to the journal by Mills, (2002), accommodation,
compromise and
collaboration are some of the methods of dealing with conflicts.
In addition, the
journal indicated that communication is the key to this process
and requires active
objective listening, mutual problem solving and creation of
options and action
plans.
Murphy, (1996) identified leaders with high “Leadership
IQ” or
“workleaders”, that have mastered 8 critical roles: selecting the
right people,
connecting them to the right cause, solving problems that arise,
evaluating progress

7. toward objectives, negotiating resolutions to conflicts, healing
the wounds inflected
by change, protecting their cultures from perils of crisis, and
synergizing all
stakeholders in a way that enables them to achieve together. In
Murphy’s view,
leaders are a form of intelligence.
Evans, G. Edward, Patricia Layzell Ward and Dendle
Rugaas, (2002)
describe the “acknowledge-create-empower” paradigm that lets
leaders coach their
staff to empower them and foster creativity. In addition, the
authors describe an
organizational structure for employee-centered leadership that
is flexible and open
to change, and they discuss methods of giving orders and
interacting with staff that
foster a climate of cooperation.
Conflict can be constructive if enacted in a positive way
to stimulate the
accomplishment of goals and to synthesize differing viewpoints
and promote
critical thinking. As result, the management and resolution of

8. conflict is critical to
the effective functioning of the organization (Mills, 2002).
Gordon, (1977), gives practical advice and examples
concerning skills and
methods that people must learn to be effective leaders. Based on
the author’s
model, these skills include helping followers solve their
problems, improving one’s
listening skills, communicating to followers to get things done
and evaluate them
without hurting them, making teams effective by selecting the
right people, running
different kinds of meetings to make them more productive and
enjoyable, dealing
with conflict and turning conflict in to cooperation, and making
one/s influence
known with superiors.
Transformational Leadership: A leadership approach in
which individuals and
their leaders engage in an exchange process that broadens and
motivates both
parties to achieve greater level of where the leader takes a
visionary position and

9. inspires people to follow (Northouse, 2016). Leaders that use a
more active style of
conflict management to address interpersonal conflict will result
in productive
outcomes which indirectly influence patient/client care. Leaders
act as a role
models and have clear expectations can also be effective at
preventing, mitigating,
and managing conflictual situations. Ultimately, mastering the
skills of self-
awareness, social awareness, self-management and relationship
management can
strengthen a person’s ability to perceive process and mange
conflict (Northouse, 2015).
References
Developing conflict resilient workplaces, (n.d). Retrieved from
Department of human website:
http://dpcd.vic.gov.au/communitysector
Evans, G.E., Layzell-Ward, P., & Rugaas, B. (2000).
Leadership. In Management basics for information
professionals. New York: Neal-Schumann.
Gordon, T. (1977). Leader effectiveness training: The no-lose
way to release the productive potential of people. New York,
NY: Wyden.

10. Joint Commission Resources: (2011). Hospital accreditation
standards. Oakbrook Terrace, lll.: Joint Commission on
Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations.
Mary E. M. (2002): Conflict in health care organizations.
Journal of Health Hare Law andPolicy volume 5, issue 2, article
8.
Murphy E.C. (1996). Leadership IQ: A personal development
process based on a scientific study of a new generation of
leaders. New York, NY: Murphy Emmett C.
Northouse, P. G. (2015). Leadership: Theory and
practice (7th ed.).Thousand Oaks, CA.
Registered Nurses’s Association of Ontario (2012). Managing
and mitigating conflict inhealth-care teams. Toronto, Canada:
Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario.
Rahim, M.A.; Bonoma, T.V. (1979). Managing organizational
conflict: A model for diagnosis and intervention. Psychological
Report. 44:1323-1344. Doi: 10.2466/pro.1979.44.3c 1323.
two 400 Geography/.DS_Store
__MACOSX/ two 400 Geography/._.DS_Store
two 400 Geography/Assignment 3 (1) (1).docx
Assignment #3
One-child policy versus two-child policy in China: One-child
policy was introduced into China between 1978 and 1980 to
control its rapid population growth. It was phased out in 2015
and replaced by the two-child policy to allow couples to have
more children. Do research on these two policies and use
concepts and theories in population geography to answer the
following questions: What are the pros and cons of China’s one-
child policy? Will the two-child policy eliminate population
aging in China? Do other overpopulated countries need to
implement similar population control polices?
Requirement: 400 words, double spaced, 12 point font.

11. __MACOSX/ two 400 Geography/._Assignment 3 (1) (1).docx
two 400 Geography/Assignment 4 (1).docx
Assignment #4
Your task is to briefly summarize the key observations and
conclusions of World Urbanization Prospects: The 2014. You
can view and download this report from
https://esa.un.org/unpd/wup/Publications/Files/WUP2014-
Highlights.pdf. This will require a careful reading of the report
and the equally careful preparation of research notes that you
will then boil down into what you determine to be the most
crucial points. You will construct a summary paper using the
guidelines from How to Summarize a Journal Article
(http://www.wikihow.com/Summarize-a-Journal-Article).
Requirement: 400 words, double spaced, 12 point font.
__MACOSX/ two 400 Geography/._Assignment 4 (1).docx