Mar 22, 20223 min read

Conflict Management: What's Your Conflict Animal?

What do you think of when you hear the word “conflict”?

What do you associate with that word?

Most people say things like “argument” or “fighting,” followed by “uncomfortable” “awkward” and “bad.”

The deal is….

No one really LIKES conflict.

Some people may not mind it as much as others, but most people associate “conflict” with negative emotions and experiences. And that makes most of us want to mitigate it, or avoid it all together!

But here’s the next deal…

We can’t avoid conflict. It’s going to happen.

Just like each of us has our own innate strengths, talents, and personality traits, we each have an innate style of approaching conflict.

There are 5 styles of conflict management - Accommodating, Compromising, Collaborating, Avoiding, and Competing.

In my workshop, we use an assessment to rank our types. And the best part is - the types are associated with animals.

This means when I present this workshop, everyone gets their very own little stuffed animal to keep to remind them of their innate conflict management style and how they can use that to better interact with people around them!

Everyone gets to find out if they are an Accommodating Teddy Bear, a Compromising Fox, a Collaborating Owl, an Avoiding Turtle, or a Competing Shark.

What is the benefit of learning my conflict management style?

1. This workshop reframes the concept of conflict in order to understand the 5 conflict management styles.

We explore definitions of the word “conflict” to understand that, at its core, conflict is simply when two or more things are different.

And considering no two humans are exactly alike, every single one of us lives in a perpetual state of conflict with all other humans.

So we should probably understand how we each handle that so we can function together!

2. This workshop explores how teams can work together and communicate more efficiently through all types of conflict.

100% of employees are people. 100% of customers are people. 100% of investors are people. If you don't understand people, you don't understand business. - Simon Sinek

It doesn’t matter if your group is an office staff, a student organization, a civic group, a sports team, a church volunteer group, or a family unit - it’s made up of people.

People who need to communicate and work together.

People who have distinctly different ways of communicating and working together.

And, remember, different = state of conflict.

So it can only benefit us, individually and as a team, if we understand the different styles of conflict management.

This is as much about learning other people’s innate styles as it is learning our own.

Embracing diversity to create unity.

It’s pretty cool stuff.

3. It’s actually fun!

Because this workshop isn’t directed at a person involved in conflict or a situation causing conflict, we can discuss the topic with less emotion and distress than usually accompanies conversations surrounding this subject.

This means we can explore and even celebrate the unique qualities of our own personalities that make us who we are free from the emotional labor of trying to solve a conflictual problem.

Makes sense?

And because we are really exploring and celebrating personal temperament - which is generally viewed as a positive, informative, and enjoyable process - we can have fun with it!

Bottom line - it’s a really cool and fun way to learn more about yourself and your team WITHOUT the cheesy icebreaker games AND WITHOUT the dull academic presentations.

Who knew talking about conflict could be so fun?!