About four weeks ago, when I was working in an early head start center we had a discussion about hand washing. We have a bathroom in the hall way and the director came from the bathroom in the hallway directly into the center. To get into the center you must open the door with your keys and enter the center. I was told on day one when you enter the center you are directly in the classroom and you must wash your hands again before you touch anything. This is what most of us did, and I actually thought everyone involved also did, but this was not the case. We are all trying to catch the director doing something out of protocol because it is fun when the tables have turned.
This opened up a big discussion over “Do we wash our hands again, after we just did so in the bathroom. We all had our input and at times the discussion did get very serious because we all wanted to express our opinions.
This discussion turned into a power struggle and what needed to be done is change the agenda to make it a win/win situation for everyone involved. The strategies of a win/win approach is to go back to the underlying needs, recognize the individual needs of the persons involved, remain open to adapt to the different positions, share information and attitudes, and attack the problem not the people involved (www.crnhq.org). We all wanted to be heard. The approach we should have taken was to come to a resolution by using the Third Side approach because it is a systematic approach to handling a conflict (www.thirdside.org). We should have listened all sides of the conflict, encourage the process of cooperative negotiation, and support a solution to fairly meet the needs of all sides involved. By taking the Third Side this will gives the opportunity to transform the conflict from being destructive into constructive change. When there is a situation such as this one, there is no need to take sides nor do you have to be neutral, what you want to do is seek to understand all sides and come to an amicable agreement that meets the needs of all sides involved. The goal in communication is transform a challenge or destructive conversation into a constructive or negotiable way to settle things peacefully.
We all agreed, when in doubt, wash your hands. The director was going to look it up in the operations manual and get back to us in the next monthly meeting.
References
Conflict Resolution Network. (n.d.). CR kit. Retrieved from http://www.crnhq.org/pages.php?pID=12#skill_3
The Third Side. (n.d.). The third side. Retrieved from http://www.thirdside.org/
Hi Tammy, thanks for the detailed example you gave. It is interesting how conflicts can arise over so many different things. It is also interesting that you said you thought everyone was doing what you had been instructed to do. I think this is the case many times, we have people who follow the rules and others who don't. This can be a big source of conflict. Also people interpret rules differently and this can also lead to conflict. You gave good examples of how to resolve the conflict and sometimes it is necessary to revisit rules and regulations to make sure they remain relevant and doable. Thanks for your post. Delores
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