Dear Reader,

First things first: Respecting your partner as an individual, a whole living system with their own patterns and processes, means there will be conflict. Expect it. Expect misalignments. Then prepare for them.

Not every conflict has to be an all-out fight.

Sometimes when expectations clash, or two people have opposing interests and goals, the task is to move out of defensiveness, and into curiosity.

Use these tools and questions to help you identify conflicting values or motives upfront, and to find your way back to center.

Definition of a Conflict Behavior

The Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument (TKI) is designed to assess an individual’s behavior in conflict situations.

It defines “conflict situations as situations in which the concerns of two people appear to be incompatible." In such situations, people tend to behave along two basic lines:

1. Assertive - the extent to which the individual attempts to satisfy his/her own concern.

2. Cooperative - the extent to which the individual attempts to satisfy the other’s concerns.

Plotted on a graph, the TKI describes five methods of dealing with conflicts:

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Someone who prefers Competing is assertive and uncooperative in a conflict situation – they pursue their own concerns at the other person’s expense. This is a power mode, where you use whatever power you might have; your ability to argue, your rank, or withholding money or affection.

Competing could mean ‘standing up for your rights’, defending a position that you believe is correct, or simply trying to win. On the dark side, it can be controlling.

Competing is useful in an emergency, when you’re the top dog calling all the shots, or to protect yourself against people who want to take advantage of you.

On the other hand is Accommodating and that’s unassertive and co-operative in conflict situations. When accommodating, you neglect your own concerns to satisfy the concerns of another person; there is an element of self-sacrifice in this mode.

Accommodating might take the form of selfless generosity or charity, obeying an order even when you’d prefer not to, or yielding to another’s point of view. On the dark side, it can turn into emotional blackmail.

Accommodating is useful when you know you’re actually in the wrong, or when the issue isn’t that important to you but very important to the other person. It preserves harmony and might even buy you brownie points for next time.

Avoiding is both unassertive and uncooperative – you’re simply not addressing the conflict. Avoiding might take the form of diplomatically side-stepping an issue, or postponing an issue until a better time. On the dark side, it can look like a sarcastic or passive-aggressive conversation around the actual issue.

This approach is useful when the issue isn’t important at all, when you know it’s a lose-lose situation, when the potential damage of confronting it outweighs the benefits, when you don’t have enough information about the situation, or when everyone needs to take time to cool down to reduce tensions. So really, lots of applications.

Collaborating is both assertive and co-operative – the opposite of avoiding. Collaborating involves an active attempt to work with the other person to find some solution, which fully satisfies the concerns of both persons. It means digging into an issue to find alternative win-win solutions.

Collaborating between two persons might take the form of exploring a disagreement to learn from each other’s insights, fix the environment or context so competition is no longer necessary, or confronting and trying to find a creative solution to an interpersonal problem. On the dark side, this can turn into a never-ending “and what about this little thing”.

Collaborating sounds great, and is most useful when both sides have concerns that simply have to be addressed, when the issues is big enough to warrant the time it takes to figure it out, and when you actually want to learn from and with the other person.

Compromising is intermediate in both assertiveness and co-cooperativeness. The objective is to find a quick, mutually acceptable solution, which partially satisfies both parties. So it addresses an issue more directly than avoiding, but doesn’t explore it in as much depth as collaborating.

Compromising might mean splitting the difference, exchanging concessions, or seeking a quick middle-ground position. On the dark side, it can turn into a race to the bottom of who can leave more on the table.

Compromising is useful when the goals are equally important and both parties are equally committed. A compromise can come in handy as a temporary solution for a complex issue to be revisited later, or as a back-up in case collaboration or competition doesn’t work out.

Did you find your preferred conflict style? As with Type preferences, there are no wrong answers. All five modes are useful in some situations, and their effectiveness depends on the conflict situation.

Mapping Conflict Modes to Type

All of us are capable of using all five conflict-handling modes: none of us can be characterized as having a single, rigid style of dealing with conflict.

However, any given individual uses some modes better than others and therefore, tends to rely upon those more heavily than others.

If you have an ST in their Type code, you're probably focused on the short term, detailed, technical aspects of a problem, so you're probably comfortable with competing.

If you have an NT in your Type code, you’re probably focused on the long term, global, technical aspects, and comfortable with collaborating or avoiding, to gather more information.

If you have an SF in your Type code, you’re probably focused on short term, unique, personal aspects of the problem, and comfortable with compromising or accommodating.

If you have an NF in your Type code, you’re probably focused on long term, general, human aspects, and comfortable with accommodating or collaborating.

Again, these are not hard and fast categories, but a way to start thinking about how you deal with confrontations.

Last but not least, don't beat yourself up if you forget all your good intentions in the heat of the moment. Take some time, and then have a fight-debrief. What did you learn? How do you want to be better next time? Apologize to each other, and move on.

Questions, comments, concerns - you know I'd love to hear them. Just reply to this email.

Cheers,

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