Human
beings, Homo sapiens, are the only species known to science
that is able to think and reason. That being said, not all individuals from the
human population think or reason in the same way. This leads to personal
differences such as differences in personality, beliefs and ethics. Sometimes, these
differences can be ignored but in other cases, such differences get in the way
of relationships. This is known as interpersonal conflict. In this blog post,
my personal experience will be mentioned and critically analyzed to gain a
better understanding on resolving interpersonal conflict.
Being an executive
committee member in my club a year ago, I was part of a group that had to make
decisions for the entire team. Such decisions were made after careful considerations
and were made for the benefit of the “greater good” of the team in mind. There
was a senior member of the team who disagreed with many of the choices made.
This led to many internal disputes within the team and things started to get
out of hand, with the senior member personally attacking committee members
countless of times. The issue was finally resolved after calling for an entire
club meeting where members could voice their opinions openly, in the presence
of mediators.
This experience showed
that differences in opinions and beliefs could lead to detrimental results on
the wellbeing of a larger group of people due to a snowballing or cascading
effect. It teaches the importance of exercising emotional intelligence in
decision-making. In the case above, further damage was prevented via the club
meeting as a “damage control”. Another way that damage could have been
minimized was if personal attacks were avoided. In conclusion, Emotional
Intelligence is key in resolving interpersonal conflict.
Oh dear that must have been really ugly! Having to call in mediators to resolve internal issues (within a team) spells a total collapse of the system. Perhaps the communication channels were not established at the outset. What I mean by that is the whole process of decision -making should be systematised and a consensus reached as to how this will happen. This is help the committee avoid needless stalling of decision-making simply because one individual (regardless of how senior the member is) is unhappy.
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