How to resolve interpersonal and intrapersonal conflicts: basic strategies, techniques and rules of behavior

Hello all readers! Lyudmila Redkina is with you, and today we will discuss a very interesting topic. When I was in my fifth year, we had the subject “Conflictology,” we looked at various sensitive conflicts, and many were even quickly resolved. And there are so many people among us who have been suffering for years because of unresolved situations. Even more are those who suffer from intrapersonal conflicts. This article will talk about how to resolve conflicts, who or what can help with this, what to do if the conflict is extremely difficult to resolve.

What is conflict and what types are there?

Conflict is a word of Latin origin that means a clash of interests, opinions, tendencies, saturated with strong emotional experiences, most often negative. Psychologists focus on the fact that if such a collision has already occurred, then it only brings destruction and negativity. Therefore, conflicts need to be resolved immediately, the sooner the better.

But there are studies that admit that a clash of interests also leads to positive results, like “truth is born in disputes.” For example, W. Lincoln argues that conflict leads to accelerated self-awareness, the search and unification of like-minded people, helps to set priorities and acquire new working contacts.

Well, I don’t think there’s any need to tell you about the negative impact; everyone has experienced it themselves at least once.

There are many classifications of such collisions; let’s leave all the details to the specialists, and I will describe only the main types:

1. Between groups, within groups, between individuals and within one individual.
2. Horizontal, vertical, mixed - they are defined according to the vertical of power and subordination.
3. Constructive, destructive.
4. Subjective and objective are divided according to the reasons for their occurrence.

I would like to pay attention to another classification - Deutsch, this is closer to human psychological processes:

• genuine - your partner broke your favorite cup - is recognized by everyone, perceived as it is: he repents, you are angry;
• accidental - you were late for a meeting because the bus was canceled - depends on circumstances that easily change, a feeling remains, but is not always realized;
• displaced - a dispute between employees about a scheme - behind it lies another conflict, which is at the basis of this (for example, an employee is pushing the first one);
• incorrectly assigned - the sister does not allow her to wear her shoes - the first does not understand why, the second does not understand why not, arises on the basis of an erroneous understanding of the situation;
• latent - should have been there a long time ago, but does not arise, since the parties are not aware of it - the son does not go to “his bread” at 35 years old, his parents protect him;
• false - one looked wrong, the second answered wrong - exists only because there is no understanding, that there are no objective grounds.

Unfortunately, at work and between children at school, the last 3 types of conflicts often arise. And they become surrounded by such intrigues that it is difficult to resolve them later. By the way, it is also often the case that someone is displaced, because it is difficult to forgive previous mistakes, so negativity comes out, perhaps hatred, at the first opportunity.

Where conflict situations occur

Disputes, disagreements, clashes of interests and opinions are a common phenomenon that happens wherever there are people. Where do you often encounter this kind of behavior?

• At school

Nowadays, children have become more bitter, and every now and then you hear about shootings, bullying and harassment. Attacks on the “dissenter” are repeated more and more often. Conflict situations occur between children at school almost every 5 minutes. There’s nowhere without them: someone realizes themselves, someone proves they’re right, someone wins a place in the sun.

But that's not even the point. The thing is that children are now not taught how to constructively get out of conflict situations. In a class where confrontation occurs, it is important to explain behavior during conflict, how to correctly prove your opinion and perceive the opinions of other people. Sometimes conflicts arise between a student and a teacher, and that’s life.

Although 30 years ago we could not even imagine that a student would test his license in front of an adult teacher. To counter child cruelty and teach conflict resolution at school, there are good books that teach how to teach children to resolve conflicts.

• At work

Often clashes of opinions occur between employees.
Experts have noticed that it is especially difficult to resolve conflict situations in a female team where at least one man works. We women are so designed that we want to please the opposite sex even without any hints. It is quite difficult to resist conflicts in the workplace, because everyone is for himself, everyone strives to show their professionalism and skills, show responsibility, and prove to management that they are right. Learn to work as a team without arguing.

Conflict situation at work

• In family

This, in general, is a separate topic, since any detective will say with confidence that most crimes happen on a domestic basis, that is, in families. Family confrontation, on the one hand, leads to an improvement in relations (if each participant is constructive), on the other hand, it completely destroys all blood ties.

In the process of clarifying the relationship, a wife can tell her husband and vice versa a lot of unnecessary things, “cover” each other with obscenities, and offend. But this will only aggravate the situation. Learn not to get personal, but to figure out the problem in the situation.

Disputes between teenagers and parents often arise. The reason for this situation is banal, described by Turgenev in his work “Fathers and Sons” - the conflict of generations. Quarrels with parents arise even in old age, when the “children” are over 60 and the parents are already under 90.

These are the main areas where clashes of interests and opinions occur. So what to do when your opponent is indestructible, but you don’t want to subordinate your opinion to anyone?

Lifehacks of a leader

I repeat: not only an employee, but also a boss at any level is, first of all, a person. He tends to make mistakes and doubt his actions. But for business it is important that there are not too many errors and conflicts.

Experience shows that in a difficult situation, the main life hack for a manager is not to desperately try to find someone to blame in order to resolve the problem as quickly as possible. Moreover, there is no need to focus all the blame on yourself: they say that you judged incorrectly, intervened at the wrong time, and so on. Strictly speaking, what matters is not who is to blame, but what to do. We need to analyze what happened, learn lessons for the future, and remember that there are simply no universal solutions for every case.

And one more piece of advice: the function of a leader in any team conflict is to reduce the degree of irritation by making the situation as transparent as possible: this means discussion, assessment and unbiased analysis. That is why there should be no sharp judgments and movements on the part of the boss: not only are people already on edge, but they will also lose faith in a reasonable and adequate leader. In order for the quantity and quality of conflicts to tend to zero, the leader must maintain Olympic calm and be balanced. Then a natural attenuation of the acute conflict occurs, and the team gets used to the fact that any problem can be solved calmly and without shouting. This is similar to what psychology says about the relationship between parents and children - when parents are calm and reasonable, children become so too. And the boss is a status and, in a sense, emotional “parent” for his team. His behavior affects the behavior of all employees.

Managing Interpersonal Conflicts

It is not always possible to resist aggression and resolve conflict peacefully. It depends on some factors or reasons why it occurred.

Factors

The same Lincoln identified five factors that are at the origins of the confrontation:

1. Informational. A quarrel arises based on rumors, suspicions, that is, a lack of information. The person comes up with something, gets offended by it, and even resorts to open confrontation.
2. Behavioral. Unacceptable behavior of one of the participants in the collision. Here I mean unreasonable rudeness and aggression in relationships. Manifests itself through broken promises, self-centeredness, and apparent superiority.
3. Relationship. Something is preventing you from building good relationships. This may be incompatibility of social level, education, values, etc.
4. Value-based. Inconsistency of principles. For example, one partner “cheated” the other out of money, while the other, even in a nightmare, could not think of such a deception.
5. Structural. Circumstances that hardly change: norms of behavior, legal norms, hierarchy, power.

A conflict specialist in an organization, knowing these factors, can prevent and constructively resolve a conflict.

Strategies

Conflict management workshops describe two main strategies:

1. Partnership strategy. It is based on the tag “any conflict can be resolved through compromise,” and therefore takes into account the interests, opinions and needs of the opponent. At the same time, a search for common ground and opinions is being conducted.
2. Pressure strategy. In interpersonal disputes, a person focuses only on himself, his opinion, goals, imposing them.

Strategy of pressure in conflict

Techniques

To resolve social conflict, you need to use some techniques:

1. Take control of your emotions. If you turn on self-control in time, you can peacefully resolve all troubles and disputes.
2. Try to understand your interlocutor. For some situations, it is important to have a high level of emotional intelligence. Selfishness is not the best way to resolve disagreements. He will help, but in the end you will be alone. Better try to hear your opponent, even if you do not support him at all.
3. Ask questions before the starting point. Try to ask questions “why”, “why”, “what for”, getting to the core of the problem.
4. If you object, offer an alternative. This shows that your interlocutor's opinion is important to you.
5. Don't stop halfway. If you have already started to conflict, make it a rule not to remain without a solution to the controversial situation.

Methods

In psychology, there are 5 ways to resolve conflict situations:

1. Rivalry is the imposition of one’s vision, opinion, and interests. Constructive only with limited time when making decisions.
2. Compromise - mutual concessions. It's like a marriage contract that one owes the other and vice versa.
3. Adaptation - concession, surrender of positions, the opponent wins.
4. Cooperation - in other words, commonwealth - rivals begin to cooperate in an amicable way. Conflict experts believe that this is the best way to “amicably” resolve the problem.
5. Care – avoiding a conflict situation with minimal losses. But with this method, deep-seated problems are not solved, they only accumulate.

Speak only for yourself

When you rely on your own experience, your words are almost impossible to dispute. But when you start speaking for other people, anyone can object or doubt your arguments. And you are very likely to exaggerate, simplify information, or slip into stereotypes. And definitely weaken your position in the dispute.

Therefore, base your speech on your own experience. If someone else's experience is really important to your argument, find a way to get the person to talk about it personally.

Recommendations for resolving intrapersonal conflicts

Intrapersonal conflicts cause a lot of problems for a person. They can destroy personality, but also lead to self-development. If you are overcome by negative experiences due to the contradiction of the structures of the inner world, then this is the place for you. In simple words, internal conflict in a person causes serious feelings, lack of self-acceptance, and negative changes in behavior.

Often such problems happen to a teenager, a lonely or creative person. But other people are also susceptible to such psychological problems at different stages of their lives. So, what you need to do for self-help, recommendations:

• try to understand what exactly doesn’t suit you; if you can’t figure it out on your own, it’s better to consult a psychologist;
• analyze how you got into this situation, what led you to it;
• formulate the “hearth” of the problem, discarding everything unnecessary;
• when you find out what haunts you, honestly admit to yourself what this state gives you, perhaps you will make some important decision;
• transform negative emotions into positive ones, creativity, relaxation;
• if you are not satisfied with your activity, try to change it or make changes to it;
• correlate desires, needs and opportunities, answer yourself what you are currently capable of;
• develop the ability to forgive and not be offended by people, it will be useful to you, especially in relation to yourself;
• learn to say “no” to what stresses you out;
• in the end, cry, it will help reset all the accumulated negativity.

conclusions

There have always been and will always be conflicts among people. But so that they do not disrupt work processes and spoil the atmosphere in the team, the manager must maintain restraint and calm. In difficult situations, it is imperative to involve third parties in the company in resolving problems - first of all, HR specialists, and, possibly, senior management. Because an objective assessment of what is happening is required. And because dialogue is necessary. Even if the boss thinks that the conflict arose because of a toxic employee, all parties must be given the opportunity to speak out and discuss the situation.

Communication is the basis of everything: the entire team or department has the right to participate in the discussion of the current situation. In addition to the fact that useful details can be revealed in a transparent and open discussion, it can also become an element of team building. Each employee will be able to understand that in a difficult situation both his superiors and his colleagues will support him. And if necessary, they will criticize - for good reason.

And in the situation with the toxicity of employees, it is necessary to understand it not in order to send a person to the hospital. And in order to, if there is a chance to correct the situation, take advantage of it. Especially if the employee is valuable to the company. Eventually, a person can become toxic because they work without vacation, moving from one difficult project to another. Maybe a vacation or remote work will change his mood and approach to work for the better?

Finally, criticism is an integral part of communication. It is very important as part of feedback and an element of improving the quality of tasks performed. But criticizing balancedly and correctly is an art that a leader needs to learn. Really necessary! So as not to turn, due to her absence, into a “shirtless guy who doesn’t scold his subordinates.” Or so as not to turn into a “dictator boss” who will never say a kind word, but is always ready to criticize.

What should not be allowed during a conflict

In any situation you need to remain human, even in the biggest conflict. What should not be allowed in the event of a conflict of interests:

• speak criticism towards the individual, and not about the situation;
• assert that you are confident in the mercantile interests and motives of your opponent;
• characterizing a person’s condition is very annoying;
• show that you are superior to him, instruct;
• blame only one side for everything;
• exert physical influence;
• touch a person's nerves;
• remember old grievances.

How to be prepared for conflicts

We are met with disagreements at every step: your apartment can be flooded, you can be accused of something you didn’t do, you can be “loaded” at work for no reason, and more, more, more. If you take all situations to heart, this can lead to neurosis and other problems. Therefore, you need to be mentally prepared for all sorts of troubles.

The online intensive “Effective Communication” will help with this. It will allow you to learn how emotions manifest in other people in order to understand yourself and those around you. You will learn to manage your emotional reactions, manage conflicts and communicate harmoniously. The course leader is Oleg Kalinichev, known for his rich experience in the psychology of emotions.