FREE online courses on Conflict Management - Basics of Conflict Management - Ways People Deal With Conflict

 

There is no one best way to deal with conflict. It depends on the current situation. Here are the major ways that people use to deal with conflict.

1. Avoid it. Pretend it is not there or ignore it.
1. Use it when it simply is not worth the effort to argue. Usually this approach tends to worsen the conflict over time.
2. Accommodate it. Give in to others, sometimes to the extent that you compromise yourself.
1. Use this approach very sparingly and infrequently, for example, in situations

when you know that you will have another more useful approach in the very near future. Usually this approach tends to worsen the conflict over time, and causes conflicts within yourself.

3. Competing. Work to get your way, rather than clarifying and addressing the issue. Competitors love accommodators.
1. Use when you have a very strong conviction about your position.
4. Compromising. Mutual give-and-take.
1. Use when the goal is to get past the issue and move on.
5. Collaborating. Focus on working together.
1. Use when the goal is to meet as many current needs as possible by using mutual resources. This approach sometimes raises new mutual needs.
2. Use when the goal is to cultivate ownership and commitment.