The Beauty of Conflict: Harnessing Your Team's Competitive Advantage

By CrisMarie Campbell and Susan Clarke

No one likes conflict—but that doesn’t mean you have to avoid it. Learn how to turn those “Oh, Sh*t! Moments,” when opinions and personalities clash, into the juice that powers your team to great results or new heights.

Politics. Confusion. Factions. Gossip. Turnover. If you lead a team, you may see conflict as the

• Language: English
• Publisher: Two Hummingbird Press
• Release date: Oct 31, 2017
• ISBN: 9780999450123

Book preview

SECTION ONE

OVERVIEW

When we bring together intelligent, passionate people to share a big vision, our tendency is to think, This will be awesome! We’re going to change the world.

But that doesn’t always happen.

More often, all those smart people have different opinions—and they all think they’re right. Tension builds and people grapple for control and get caught in the power struggle of the right-wrong trap. The result? Even more tension and ambiguity.

This lands us smack dab into an oh, sh*t! moment.

There is good news, though. This oh, sh*t! moment is the source of a team’s potential creative energy.

The bad news is that it’s called an oh, sh*t! moment for a reason: conflict feels uncomfortable. We feel incapable of responding to the situation. This is a critical choice point for leaders and teams. It’s the crossroads between, Do I play it safe and opt out, and do I opt in to create something innovative and transformational?

What if your team doesn’t experience these moments of tension and discomfort? If your group always gets along, it’s time for a wake-up call. You are in the business of making things happen, and that requires some juice.

You want to run into oh, sh*t! moments. You need to run into oh, sh*t! moments!

In this section, we’ll discuss why teams fail and get into the gory details of some of our client’s oh, sh*t! moments. As we’ve said, don’t worry, the identifying details have been changed to keep our client’s situations private.

Our goal is to normalize the oh, sh*t! moment because, for humans working with other humans, it is bound to happen. How you handle those moments will make or break your team’s short- and long-term success. We aim to help you and your team be consistently successful. Read on!

CHAPTER 1

Why Teams Fail—It’s Not What You Think

It’s not lack of talent t hat causes team mediocrity. It’s lack of conflict.

The prevailing perception is that good teams shy away from conflict. Doing so makes them look efficient or kind. The truth is, they are holding back from experiencing precious moments. Yes, precious moments. They’re missing opportunities for collective creativity.

We refer to these tension points as oh, sh*t! moments. Maybe you don’t use such language. But have you ever noticed that even if you don’t say it aloud, inside your head you sometimes hear a booming, Oh, sh*t! How did I get here?

That’s the inner experience of being smack-dab in the middle of tension and ambiguity without any immediate answers or solutions to get past the discomfort.

Imagine you’re the head of a manufacturing company. In a team meeting, your leadership team is discussing the last steps in production for your awesome new change-the-world product. Tom, head of operations, says, We aren’t going to be able to produce the number we targeted. We didn’t get the shipment of wafers for the box.

You say (whether out loud or to yourself), Oh, sh*t! What happens next is a bit of a free-for-all.

Out loud you say, Who’s responsible for this? Why didn’t we know earlier?

The CFO barks out, Look, my team did their part. Get it together, Tom.

Head of sales jumps in, Damn it, my sales team worked their asses off, and now this happens. They’re going to look like fools to the customers!

Too often, the blame and banter points to a scapegoat and delays solving the problem. Another common scenario is that team members stay quiet, scatter, and then work harder on their own areas, which leaves the problem and frustration unaddressed.

WHAT CAUSES OH, SH*T! MOMENTS?

We most commonly experience oh, sh*t! moments through efforts of relating to each other and working well together. We want productivity, connection, and collaboration. The path to that end is littered with overwhelming points caused by the gaps and tension between us.

These moments are natural. Teams typically begin the collaborative process inspired and excited about the possibility of working together and successfully accomplishing a shared vision—a better world, a great gadget, an awesome book! And naturally, the end result, gadget or book will turn out better if the process has more than one perspective or genius creating it. Two, three, four, or more people are almost always better than one, especially if they all agree it’s a great vision!

Each is inspired. Each is unique.

Each person contributes his or her distinct piece to this collective journey. It’s no different on your team, whether you are a leader or a member.

You may like your teammates and even love their brands of genius, but at some point you will clash. You will think Kate is crazy because she wants more detail or color. You will want results faster than William, who believes increased speed causes quality to suffer. You try to talk both of them out of their positions and persuade them to move on. Kate will dig in her heels. William will refuse to listen. In response, you either bully your way through or silently suffer, both of which are increasingly uncomfortable because you actually like your teammates. You like your shared vision. You like how your team plans, but it’s not working!

Avoidance, whether through being a bully or keeping quiet, doesn’t work. That little inner voice just gets louder: Oh, sh*t! Oh, sh*t! OH, SH*T!

Let’s say that instead of using your habitual coping options, you stop. You listen. You say to your teammates, Wait. I’m uncomfortable, nervous, and uncertain. We’re at odds with each other, and I don’t know how to fix it! You might even express your worry that they will abandon the project