When two leaders are constantly in conflict, the easiest conclusion is that one of them is the problem.
Maybe one person is difficult to work with. Maybe communication has broken down. Maybe management simply needs to decide who is right and who is wrong.
But workplace conflict is rarely that simple.
One of the lessons I have taken from studying organizational development is that conflict between people can sometimes be a symptom of a much larger organizational problem. If management focuses only on the personalities involved, the immediate disagreement may improve while the conditions that created it remain.
Look Beyond the Two People
When conflict becomes serious, leaders should first understand the environment around it.
Are responsibilities clearly defined? Are employees receiving the information they need? Are teams competing for limited resources? Are processes creating unnecessary pressure? Are departments working toward different priorities?
Problems with staffing, unclear responsibilities, poor processes, limited resources, and weak communication can create an environment where interpersonal conflict becomes much more likely.
This does not mean individual behavior should be ignored. People are still responsible for how they communicate and treat others. It means management should avoid assuming that changing or removing one person will automatically solve the larger problem.
Diagnosis Should Come Before the Solution
A useful organizational development principle is to diagnose the problem before selecting an intervention.
If I were dealing with a serious conflict between two leaders, I would not begin by deciding which person was responsible. I would speak with both individuals separately and gather information from other people who regularly work with them.
The goal would be to identify patterns rather than collect opinions for one side or the other.
I would also look at measurable operational information. Depending on the organization, that could include employee turnover, project delays, customer complaints, missed deadlines, support escalations, rework, or other indicators of performance.
Combining employee perspectives with operational data creates a much better picture of what is actually happening.
Move From Blame to Shared Responsibility
When a conflict has reached the point where two people cannot resolve it themselves, a neutral third party can help.
The purpose should not simply be to get both people into a room and tell them to communicate better. The conversation needs structure.
One useful approach is asking each person to consider three things:
- What does the other person do well?
- What behaviors from the other person create problems?
- What do I do that may contribute to the conflict?
The third question may be the most important.
It is easy to explain what someone else needs to change. Sustainable improvement becomes more likely when each person also recognizes their own contribution to the situation.
The conversation can then move from “What are you going to change?” to “What are we each going to do differently?”
Fix the Relationship and the System
Improving the relationship between two employees does not necessarily fix the organization around them.
If employees are still overloaded, information is difficult to obtain, responsibilities remain unclear, or processes continue creating unnecessary frustration, conflict can return or appear somewhere else.
This is where I find the sociotechnical systems approach especially useful. Work has both a social side and a technical side.
The social system includes people, communication, relationships, leadership, and teamwork. The technical system includes tools, technology, processes, information, and the way work is organized.
Improving only one side can leave the other side creating the same problems.
I see this frequently in technology projects. A company can implement an excellent new system, but if employees are not involved, processes are poorly designed, responsibilities are unclear, or training is inadequate, the technology alone will not solve the problem.
Measure Whether the Change Actually Worked
A productive meeting is not the same thing as successful organizational change.
After an intervention, leaders should determine whether behavior and organizational performance actually improve.
That means establishing follow-up actions, assigning responsibility, setting reasonable timelines, and measuring results. The measurements will depend on the problem, but they could include turnover, delays, quality issues, employee complaints, customer satisfaction, or other operational indicators.
Follow-up also helps determine whether people are maintaining their commitments after the initial pressure of the intervention disappears.
The Leadership Lesson
One of the biggest mistakes leaders can make during workplace conflict is searching too quickly for the person to blame.
Sometimes an individual really is the primary problem, and management needs to address that directly. But sometimes the conflict is exposing weaknesses that already exist in the organization.
Good leadership requires separating those two situations.
Before reorganizing a department, replacing a manager, or introducing another process, leaders should understand what is actually driving the problem.
Diagnose first. Address the behavior that needs to change. Fix the organizational conditions contributing to the problem. Then measure whether the change produced better results.
That approach takes more effort than simply deciding who is right or wrong, but it has a much better chance of creating lasting improvement.