Blog 5 - Conflict

Conflict Blog 5

Define in your own words what conflict is.

Conflict within an organisation is a situation of friction or opposition between two or more employees resulting from actual or perceived differences or incompatibilities. Conflicts such as this are generally reoccurring between the same people as a means to hinder fellow employee’s progress. (Mullins, 2012)

Identify any group you have been a part of (work, social, voluntary, educational etc) that has not been able to achieve its purpose. What were the conflicts within the group and what strategies were used to deal with the conflict.

The leisure centre I work for was desperate for more staff over the summer to keep the building open. To solve their staffing issues my work hired agency staff to come in a cover shift that could not get covered by original leisure centre employees. The resulting staff that were employed caused all manner of conflicts in the short space of time working at the centre. One agency staff member in particular causes the moth aggravation. I myself was involved in a conflict situation with him ware by he was persistently rude to the other members of staff and the regular members of the public who use the swimming pool. This caused a conflict between us as I have a very good relationship with some of the more senior users of the pool as I have known them for over four year, and do not like to see them being mistreated. I took it upon myself to confront him about his mannerisms, as a senior member of staff I explained to him the consequences of his actions and that unless he changed his ways he would get sacked. My line manager also spoke with him and unfortunately he failed to change the way he behaved at work with resulted with him being sacked. This is a clear example of how Brook’s would define conflict. Brooks stated that “Conflict is apparent when at least one party perceives that it exists and where an interest or concern of that party is about to be or has been compromised or frustrated. (Brooks, 2006)

Describe French and Raven’s different ‘sources of power’ and illustrate each one with an example

French and Raven’s different sources of power surprisingly consists of five main types of power. These are:

1.    Coercive Power

2.    Reward Power

3.    Expert Power

4.     Legitimate Power

5.    Referent Power

(Raven, 1959)

Some people consider Morgan’s other sources of power in 1996. Morgan suggests that there were 6 more sources of power and these are

1.    Control of budgets

2.    Control of rewards

3.    Persuasion

4.    Rules of procedures

5.    Physical presence or threat

6.    Charisma

(Morgan, 1996)

Coercive Power “is the power to punish or recommend punishment” managers have coercive power when they criticise their staff. For example a manager has coercive power when a cleaner forgets to dust down at the end of their shift and the manager criticizes their work ethic. “Coercive power is the negative side of legitimate and reward power.” (Richard L. Daft, 2008)

Reward Power “comes from the authority to give rewards to other people”. An example of reward power would be when a supervisor gives a lower ranked member of staff a pay rise due to good performance within the workplace. (Richard L. Daft, 2008)

Expert Power is “power resulting from a leader’s special knowledge or skills regarding tasks performed by its followers.” An example of this is when a lecture passes on their knowledge of a particular subject to a student, the student then uses this knowledge to enact a previously unsolvable to them task. (Richard L. Daft, 2008)

Legitimate Power is “the authority granted from a position in a organisation.” An example of this would be when a base staff member is selected t become a higher rank such as a team leader. The other base staff members now all realise that they must adhere to the team leaders authority as they are of a higher rank within the corporate structure, giving them legitimate power. (Richard L. Daft, 2008)

Referent Power “comes from a individuals personality and characteristics. These characteristics are respect and admiration which followers follow as they try to emulate and eventually become the leader within the organisation.” (Richard L. Daft, 2008)

Conclusion

In conclusion controlling conflict is very important part of running a successful business with a happy work force. Company’s can use human resource services as a way of ensuring that employees have the chance to air grievances and have a grievance policy and procedures. As Mullins said conflict is friction between two or more member of an organisation resulting from actual or perceived differences or incompatibilities. Unless these conflicts are resolved the likely hood of work being done and targets being meet are greatly lessened. French and Raven have also written theory's on conflict determining the six different types of power within the workplace. All these types of power are legitimate and affect staff moral and motivation.

Bibliography

Brooks (2006).

Morgan (1996) New Sources of Power.

Mullins (2012) Conflict in the workplace.

Raven, F.a. (1959) Sources of power.

Richard L. Daft, P.G.L. (2008) The Leadership Experience. In: The Leadership Experience. 4th ed., pp.363 -365.