Conflict Management & Negotiation Assignment 1

Conflict Management & Negotiation Assignment 1
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Conflict Management & Negotiation Assignment 1
Description of Conflict and its Causes
Conflicts in the workplace are not rare occurrences; they happen from time to time. It is important to manage conflicts well to avoid adverse effects in workplace settings. I have experienced a workplace conflict before in a marketing firm that that I was working for. I was working as a marketing representative in a group of five staff members. We were all tasked with the duty of marketing the products of the company. The group was doing very well but it reached a point when the leader of the group started conflicting with the marketing manager. There were several reasons that caused the leadership conflict in the workplace. Firstly, the leader of our group complained that the marketing manager had become very authoritative and this affected the performance of the team. For example, he constantly gave harsh commands to the team leader in the presence of the team members. Secondly, the marketing manager was excessively micro managing the team, making it difficult to operate effectively. For instance, he insisted on knowing where we were sourcing customers from and how we were engaging them. Additionally, the team leader did not like the way the marketing manager was finding fault in everything that the team was doing. For example, when, in some occasions, the team failed to convince customers to use the company’s products, the sales manager always complained about it. These issues brought about a leadership conflict that affected the workplace environment.
Stages in the Development of the Conflict
The development of the conflict above can be divided into five stages including: latent stage, perceived stage, felt stage, manifest stage, and aftermath stage. In the latent stage, the marketing team was not aware that there was a leadership conflict trying to emerge. Everything seemed very okay. In the perceived stage, the group started being conscious of the fact that there was conflict between the marketing manager and the leader of the marketing team. Signs of discontent were seen during meetings. In the felt stage, anxiety and extreme discontent were experienced in the whole group. There was a cold rebellion from the marketing team because of the manager’s actions. The manifest stage exhibited an open conflict when the marketing manager started shouting at the marketing team leader without regard for workplac...