Conflict Management

“Never look who is right and wrong. Always look what is right and wrong.” – Prof.M.S.Rao

When you look at individuals there will be involvement of egos and emotions. On the contrary, when you look at the issues there will be no individual preferences and prejudices. Better judgment prevails.

Susan was working in a multinational company in India as an Human Resource (HR) Manager. Her role was to recruit the candidates for the company and to ensure smooth functioning of office administration. She was a smart worker and built a reputation for herself from superiors by working for six years. The top management also respected and consulted her on several occasions. She did not talk to anyone unnecessarily at the work place and she meant business. She was 33 years old. She was bold and beautiful. She was polite and well mannered. She was a woman with strong character. But she was stubborn by nature. She disliked office politics.

Ron joined in the same company who was hard working and was yet to prove his abilities and establish his credentials. Prior to joining this organization, he had 18 years of industry experience in several companies and he was 39 years old. As per the rules of the company, Ron had to work with Susan initially. He was a hard worker and rose from ranks. He learnt bitter lessons in his life and knew the value of life. But he was adamant by nature. Both Ron and Susan respected each other and had been working together.

Susan was introvert, by nature, and hardly mingled with other employees. At the same time, she never kept ill will against anybody. She was a principled woman having exposure to outside world. She was combination of education, intellect and beauty with grace which was a rare combination. She was good at heart and helpful. Seeing the close and cordial relations betwee
Susan and Ron, a few people working in the office felt jealousy. Since Susan never socialized with others and her cordial relations with Ron upset a few of their colleagues.

Ron also never socialized with anyone as he believed in his office work although he was an extrovert by nature. Ron initially moved closely with a colleague by name John. But John started speaking ill of Susan to Ron which Ron did not like. Gradually Ron distanced himself away from John who tried to settle his scores with Susan as they worked together in the past. Ron was basically an independent thinker and never listened to others and he followed his heart rather than looking things from the mind of others. Ron did not appreciate negative things being talked by John against Susan whom he respected at the core.

Ron’s gelling with Susan in a friendly manner upset a few and especially two female colleagues. They tried to create rift between them by talking ill of Susan with Ron. Ron never liked to entertain negative people and was totally against office politics. Since the plan failed to work, they attempted to poison the mind of Susan who initially resisted the same. But over a period of time, Susan stopped talking to Ron and the latter did not know the reasons but Ron sensed some problem. However he began interacting with Susan with the same spirit to keep the things going on smoothly. Since Susan began neglecting Ron, he also began concentrating on work and avoided Susan totally except whenever there was need for official interaction and communication.

In fact, Susan touched the subconscious mind of Ron. As a result, Ron began thinking about Susan frequenlty and deeply. Ron was not able to concentrate on his work properly. For Ron, Susan was the second woman to enter in his life and the first woman was his wife.

At heart, Ron was thankful to Susan as she helped him to groove within the system. He developed admiration towards her but never revealed to others at the workplace even to Susan. In fact, Susan touched the heart of Ron.

One day, Susan told Ron to collect resumes from the candidates who came in for walk-in interview. Ron got up from his cubicle and asked her whether to give the same to Senior Manager. She said, “Yes”. Ron was energetic by nature; he rushed immediately to get the resumes and collected from the candidates. Subsequently, Ron rushed to the Senior Manager and handed over the resumes and chatted with him for some time.

Susan who was waiting outside the Senior Manager’s cabin took Ron to nearby room with anger and shouted at him. Both had heated conversation for some time.

Susan questioned Ron, “Who told you to hand over the resumes to Senior Manager?”

Ron replied, “When I asked you, you told to hand over to Senior Manager. Therefore, I handed over to him.”

Susan shouted, “You rushed inside the room. But I told you to hand over to Jim.”

Ron said, “You told me to hand over to Senior Manager. Therefore, I handed over the same.” And he added, “Why do you make it a big issue?”

Susan shouted, “You did not listen properly and your behavior is not good”.

Ron did not want to hurt her and asked, “Ok! Tell me in which way my behavior is bad? And I will change my behavior.” And he added further, “You keep something else in your heart and talk something else outside. I don’t like this. I am straightforward. I respect you a lot from the core of my heart. But every time, you listen to negative people and rush to wrong conclusions about me.”

Susan said, “Stop talking all that! Next time don’t repeat like this.”

Ron pacified, “Ok! I will not do like this. But it all happened due to your miscommunication and let us close the issue here itself.”

Susan cooled down her temper and said, “Now you go outside the room.”

Ron left the room puzzled, shocked and it was first time in his life a woman took him to task for none of his mistakes. But since he respected Susan at the core of his heart he didn’t like to hurt her in any way.

Outside the room, a few office friends asked Ron to find out what had happened. He did not reveal what really happened inside the room as he was basically a confidential person by nature.

After some time, Ron called Susan telephonically and explained his stand that things went wrong due to improper communication. And he apologized her for the incident. Susan said that she was in a position to take action against him but said that she would not initiate any action against him. Ron asserted that he was not bothered for any kind of action but more worried if Susan was hurt.

The issue depressed Ron for many days as he failed to analyze where he went wrong. He was not worried about the incident but more worried as he liked Susan very much. Ron kept internalizing her and thinking of Susan all the time. It disturbed his peace and sleep. He tried to communicate the same with Susan number of times but the latter never gave such an opportunity.

After reading this, please post your valuable comments directly on the blog itself:

Was it a conflict?
If it was a conflict, what led to this conflict?
Was it due to miscommunication?
Was it due to improper communication of Susan?
Was it due to lack of understanding of Ron?
Was it due to clash of egos?
Who was responsible for this conflict - Susan or Ron?
Was there anything hidden between these two personalities?
Did the real issues come up or anything still hidden between them?
Was there any role of third person for this rift?
Was the conflict worth calling for attention?
Who was wrong?
What were the other hidden reasons?

The author invites your own comments.