Resolving Conflicts and Disputes, 9 March 2017

www.thetcmgroup.com © 2016
Managing
Conflict
A practical guide
Owen Bubbers
Managing Director of The TCM Group

• Fire alarm and toilets.
• Timings/breaks.
• Phones
• Twitter
@owenbubbers
@APMMBranch
• Opportunity for questions
and debate throughout.
• Guidelines for the workshop
(ground rules):
Confidentiality, Respect, Open
Mind, Please Participate.

TCM empowers people and organisations to
adopt new approaches to dispute and
complaints resolution; workplace relations;
human resources and leadership development.
We are passionate about protecting
relationships whilst securing lasting and
sustainable outcomes.
We work in partnership with our customers to
develop the core values, systems, processes and
behaviours which encourage co-operative
problem solving, open dialogue and stakeholder
engagement.

• Managing Director of TCM’s London
Office and team of consultants
• Mediator, trainer and conflict
management consultant
• Wide consultancy experience in
finance, higher education and
government sectors
• Winner of the Professional
Mediators’ Association ‘Mediation
Champion’ Award – 2015.
• Member of the Professional
Mediators’ Association, the trade
body for mediators in the UK.
Owen Bubbers
Managing Director, The TCM Group

MANAGING CONFLICT
A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO RESOLUTION IN THE WORKPLACE
By David Liddle

1. What impact does
conflict have?
2. What challenges
do you face?
3. What do you need
from this workshop?

Who do you think you are?

Fight.
Flight.
Freeze.
Fall.
FLOW

The
anatomy
of a
conflict

Neutral Transformational
Dysfunctional Functional
Conflict
+ Potential risk -
-Opportunity+ The four states of conflict.

Please form small groups. One of the group describe (briefly) a
dysfunctional conflict that you have experienced: within a work
or project team.
Group discussion, drawing on this example: what actions
could you take (think proactive and reactive) to transform conflict
from dysfunctional to transformational?
N T
D F
Conflict

• Are reactive.
• Are inherently adversarial.
• They polarise the parties.
• Rarely identify root cause of conflict.
• Individual or business needs are ignored.
• They impede creativity.
• They create a ‘blame, grievance,
entitlement or litigation culture.’
The existing dispute resolution systems:

According to recent ONS data,
The UK has one of the lowest
productivity levels of the G7
nations.
The UK is ranked 9th out of 12
leading industrial nations for
employee engagement.
Unresolved conflict costs the UK
economy a staggering £33bn a
year according to CEDR/CBI.
OPP, The people who publish
Myers Briggs, estimate that 85
percent of employees deal with
conflict on some level.

Questions and
discussion

Opening the door to dialogue
Project managers as
mediators and
Peacemakers.

Project teams benefit when they take a values
based, person centred approach for managing
conflict: empathy, co-operation, collaboration,
compassion and adult to adult dialogue.

My top 5 tips for managing conflict within project teams…
LISTEN ACTIVELY.
Create a safe space. Open questions. Acknowledge, affirm, appreciate.1
BE EMPATHETIC.
What is going on for them right now? Walk in their shoes.
DON’T JUDGE, EVALUATE, ASSUME OR BLAME
Support the person to tell you their story. Suspend judgment.
DEPERSONALISE THE SITUATION
Encourage the speaker to describe their 1) observations, 2) their
feelings and 3) their needs. You do the same. ‘Talking from the I’
FOCUS ON INTERESTS AND NEEDS
Negotiate and make requests of each other which are mutually beneficial.
2
3
4
5

next steps…
1. FREE leadership and dispute resolution
consultation.
2. Accredited mediator training.
3. Confident Conversations training
4. Team facilitation
5. World class mediation services
6. Management and leadership training.
7. Setting up an internal mediation scheme.

What has stood out for you?
What changes will you make?

Final Thoughts…
• Be radical – there has never been a better time to for a
new approach to conflict.
• Apply a holistic (whole systems) approach.
• Be proactive: embed constructive conflict management
into project plans and change plans etc.
• Empathy is key.
• Actively encourage co-operative and collaborative
problem solving.
• Strong feelings are OK. Work with them.
• Adult to adult dialogue = talking and listening.

For more information, please email me
or link with me via social media:
Owen.bubbers@thetcmgroup.com
www.thetcmgroup.com
@owenbubbers

This presentation was delivered
at an APM event
To find out more about
upcoming events please visit our
website www.apm.org.uk/events

Resolving Conflicts and Disputes, 9 March 2017

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