Conflict Strategies for Nice People

Do you value friendly relations with your colleagues? Are you proud of being a nice person who would never pick a fight?  Unfortunately, you might be just as responsible for group dysfunction as your more combative team members. That’s because it’s a problem when you shy away from open, healthy conflict about the issues. If you think you’re “taking one for the team” by not rocking the boat, you’re deluding yourself.

Teams need conflict to function effectively.  Conflict allows the team to come to terms with difficult situations, to synthesize diverse perspectives, and to make sure solutions are well thought-out.  Conflict is uncomfortable, but it is the source of true innovation and also a critical process in identifying and mitigating risks.

Still, I meet people every day who admit that they aren’t comfortable with conflict.  They worry that disagreeing might hurt someone’s feelings or disrupt harmonious team dynamics. They fret that their perspective isn’t as valid as someone else’s, so they hold back.

Sure, pulling your punches might help you maintain your self-image as a nice person, but you do so at the cost of getting your alternative perspective on the table; at the cost of challenging faulty assumptions; and at the cost of highlighting hidden risks.  That’s a high cost to pay for nice.

To overcome these problems, we need a new definition of nice. In this version of nice, you surface your differences of opinion, you discuss the uncomfortable issues, and you put things on the table where they can help your team move forward.

The secret of having healthy conflict and maintaining your self-image as a nice person is all in the mindset and the delivery.

To start shifting your mindset, think about your value to the team not in how often you agree, but in how often you add unique value.  If all you’re doing is agreeing with your teammates, you’re redundant.  So start by telling yourself “it’s my obligation to bring a different perspective than what others are bringing.” Grade yourself on how much value you bring on a topic.

Here are a few tips on improving your delivery:

1. Use “and,” not “but.” When you need to disagree with someone, express your contrary opinion as an “and.” It’s not necessary for someone else to be wrong for you to be right.  When you are surprised to hear something a teammate has said, don’t try to trump it, just add your reality. “You think we need to leave room in the budget for a customer event and I’m concerned that we need that money for employee training. What are our options?”   This will engage your teammates in problem solving, which is inherently collaborative instead of combative.

2. Use hypotheticals. When someone disagrees with you, don’t take them head on—being contradicted doesn’t feel very good.  Instead, a useful tactic is to ask about hypothetical situations and to get them imagining. (Imagining is the opposite of defending, so it gets the brain out of a rut.) If you are meeting resistance to your ideas, try asking your teammates to imagine a different scenario. “I hear your concern about getting the right sales people to pull off this campaign. If we could get the right people…what could the campaign look like?

3. Ask about the impact. Directing open-ended questions at your teammate is also useful.  If you are concerned about a proposed course of action, ask your teammates to think through the impact of implementing their plan. “Ok, we’re contemplating launching this product to only our U.S. customers. How is that going to land with our two big customers in Latin America?”  This approach feels much less aggressive than saying “Our Latin American customers will be angry.”  Anytime you can demonstrate that you’re open to ideas and curious about the right approach, it will open up the discussion (and you’ll preserve your reputation as a nice person).

4. Discuss the underlying issue. Many conflicts on a team spiral out of control because the parties involved aren’t on the same page.  If you disagree with a proposed course of action, instead of complaining about the solution, start by trying to understand what’s behind the suggestion. If you understand the reasoning, you might be able to find another way to accomplish the same goal. “I’m surprised you suggested we release the sales figures to the whole team. What is your goal in doing that?” Often conflict arises when one person tries to solve a problem without giving sufficient thought to the options or the impact of those actions.  If you agree that the problem they are trying to solve is important, you will have common ground from which to start sleuthing toward answers.

5. Ask for help. Another tactic for “nice conflict” is to be mildly self-deprecating and to own the misunderstanding.  If something is really surprising to you (e.g., you can’t believe anyone would propose anything so crazy), say so.  “I’m missing something here. Tell me how this will address our sales gap for Q1.” If the person’s idea really doesn’t hold water, a series of genuine, open questions that come from a position of helping you understand will likely provide other teammates with the chance to help steer the plan in a different direction.

Conflict — presenting a different point of view even when it is uncomfortable — is critical to team effectiveness. Diversity of thinking on a team is the source of innovation and growth. It is also the path to identifying and mitigating risks. If you find yourself shying away from conflict, use one of these techniques to make it a little easier.

The alternative is withholding your concerns, taking them up outside of the team, and slowly eroding trust and credibility.  That’s not nice at all.

Materials Management Day

HAPPY MATERIALS MANAGEMENT DAY to all.

Rules of Email Etiquette

Rules of Email Etiquette

Without sounding like Miss Manners, here are my rules of email etiquette.

1) KEEP EMAILS SHORT – Don’t write a novel. Keep the email to one or two pages of text. Any longer, consider using an attachment.

2) REPLY QUICKLY – Respond within 24 hours. Send a quick email if it will take you longer to reply.

3) CHOOSE A MEANINGFUL SUBJECT LINE: Be clear, not cleaver or cute. Don’t be vague (i.e. “Hi there”) Use something relevant to clarify the email’s content. This also allows them to locate your email in the future.

4) VERIFY YOUR EMAIL ADDRESSES – This is still a common mistake: sending an email to the wrong person, or overlooking an email address in a list of people. This can be embarrassing and disastrous, so double-check!

5) USE BCC: TO HIDE RECIPIENTS NAMES – Not only is a long list of recipients unsightly, but most people do not feel comfortable with their email address displayed to strangers. Use BCC: to hide people’s email address when sending to a group of people.

6) USE DISTRIBUTION GROUPS – If you frequently send to the same group of people create a distribution list containing all of their email addresses.

The distribution list is now in your Contacts list, and can be used when sending an email to that group.

7) CHECK SPELLING, GRAMMAR & PUNCTUATION – Your writing reflects you and your company. Reread your documents before sending. If you’re not a strong writer, read your email aloud before clicking send.

Use WORD to Create/Edit Your Emails & Turn-On Auto Spell Correct:

8) DON'T MISUSE REPLY ALL – Be careful when replying to an entire mailing list. It’s rare that the entire mailing list needs to see your reply.

9) DON'T TYPE IN ALL CAPS – Why this still needs to be a rule is beyond me. Mankind invented lowercase letters because they’re easier to read. STOP SHOUTING!

10) ANSWER ALL QUESTIONS BY QUOTING (AND REEDITING) THE ORIGINAL EMAIL MESSAGE – When answering questions from an email, quote the original email along with your reply. Email responses of “Sure, sounds great. . .” are not useful. Many topics will require reediting the original text to answer all questions separately.

11) AVOID JOKES, HUMOR & SARCASM – Use your own humor and sarcasm sparingly; your wit will probably be misunderstood in print anyway.

Don’t forward jokes. But if you do: run spell-check, remove all of the “>>” forward marks, use BCC: when sending to many people, and be aware that your friends may viewing your joke at work . . . so warn them if it is not G-Rated!

If you forward MANY jokes, people may no longer respond to your emails quickly or ignore them completely.

12) DON’T ARGUE OR SEND EMAILS WHEN ANGRY – Since you’ve learned that your humor and sarcasm will be misunderstood, so shall your anger. Attempting to argue in an email is futile. It’s best to wait before writing your email, or even better give them a phone call.

13) AVOID TEXT FORMATTING – If your email is more complicated than a few paragraphs of text (i.e. tables, graphs, graphics) it will probably be reformatted (incorrectly) when read by the recipient. Reading colored stationary and special & colored fonts don’t look correct on non Outlook programs, and look even worse on a mobile device. If you need to preserve the special formatting of your document; send it as a Word or PDF attachment.

14) AVOID ATTACHMENT MISTAKES – The most common mistakes when attaching files are:

Forgetting to actually attach the file

Sending too large of an attachment (under 2MB for some systems, 1MB for others)

Not telling the recipient to expect an attachment

Not telling the recipient what type of file is attached

Sending to a company that removes all attachments due to potential viruses

15) CREATE A SIGNATURE – Include a brief signature (i.e. name, address, phone number, email address, company name, disclaimer, website) on your email messages. Avoid scanned images.

NOTE: Do not use vCards – while sounding like a nice method for signatures; they appear as an attached file and are not recognized by all email programs, as well as ignored by most people.

16) WHEN TO FORWARD EMAILS – You “should” tell the original author that you’re forwarding their email. Since this is rarely done, remember that your own emails may too be forwarded without your knowledge! (See #22)

17) COMPANY EMAIL RULE – If you send an email from your company, it came from your company. Don’t use your company’s email for anything personal – period.

18) REMEMBER EMAILS ARE READ AT SOMEONE’S WORKPLACE – Don't send anything inappropriate for public viewing; if you do, give the recipient a warning!

19) DON’T FLAG EMAIL AS URGENT – Unless required by your company; don’t use this feature because it doesn’t work with all email programs, and they’re typically ignored by most people.

20) DON’T USE REQUEST A DELIVERY RECEIPT – Unless required by your company; don’t use this feature because it can only be enforced within your company. It doesn’t work with all email programs, and people feel they’re untrustworthy.

21) EMAIL IS INDEED ETCHED IN STONE – Your email is not anonymous. And while you may have intended for only “one person” to read your email, it can (and may) be read by others.

22) SETUP MULTIPLE EMAIL ACCOUNTS – Keep your work life separate from your personal life. Create email accounts for: work, personal, online gaming & shopping.

23) INSTANT MESSAGING – should be used for quick “conversations” and is beginning to overtake email for this exact purpose. Email should be used to document a conversation.

24) DON’T ALWAYS USE EMAILS – Just because email is easier, pick up the phone or meet in person. Don’t hide behind your computer monitor!

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