Case studies

How assumptions based on past history can lead to miscommunication.

 John was Susan's boss. 6 months ago Susan lodged a grievance against John for bullying after he had frightened her by the intensity of his anger when he lost his temper.  He attended a Bullying Awareness Course as a result.  Now Susan was once again raising a grievance but this time John was incensed because he felt he had followed the advice from this Course and that her remarks back to him were equally inappropriate.   From a mediation session the following emerged.

Susan had burst in on John when he was engrossed in something else and he had reacted with temper.  Recognising his vulnerability and inappropriate response he followed the advice of his Bullying Course literally.  He walked behind his desk and said "I am coming to stand here behind the desk so that you don't feel that I am going to hit you"

Unfortunately in her heightened emotional state she only heard "I'm going to hit you"  
She responded "I can't believe you said that to me.  It's made me feel sick"
Focusing on his own need to calm down he heard "you make me sick!"

Understanding how they had misinterpreted each other helped to mend the rift.

Role Ambiguity can lead to covert conflict that eventually explodes.

Dee had a large portfolio in her job.  Believing her to be overloaded her boss appointed Jane to take over some of her responsibilities although he had never consulted her about this or involved her in which areas of her work she would lose.  6 months after Jane was appointed the two women had a huge shouting match in public in front of their staff.  Jane was accusing Dee of tampering with her mail making her miss a crucial deadline, whilst Dee accused Jane of making her look foolish in front of their staff.   Dee was coached to help her accept the change in her role. This resulted in her aplogising to Jane.  The two women then worked together with a mediator to understand how each of them had felt and how they could establish some common rules in working together.

A case of bullying a colleague can be a symptom of a bigger problem.

Ben had been brought into the company to affect major changes as one of the senior management team.  He came to realise that he was bullying Tom one of his colleagues who he believed was obstructing the changes.  He would score points off him in management meetings.  Initiate banter about him around the office and undermined his authority by going to his staff for action behind his back.  Ben responded rapidly to some coaching and stopped the behaviours, upon which his relationship with Tom changed dramatically and the two men developed a respect for each other. 

At this point his other colleagues then turned on him and accused him of "letting Tom off the hook".  They too had problems with Tom obstructing their work and had enjoyed and actively encouraged Ben to "punish" him in meetings on their behalf.  The intervention then moved to team development.

Different visions.

Joan and Mark were equal partners in a small company where each required the other to provide specialist expertise.  The problem was that Mark wanted to invest and expand rapidly whilst Joan wished to keep the company small so that she could manage it without too big an impact on her family.  This she achieved by stalling any plans for expansion.  Through coaching Joan came to realise that she was confusing success with long working hours a belief that stemmed from her very successful but frequently absent father. Once she recognised this behaviour she was able to rationalise that she was actually working very long hours keeping the company small and that expansion would free up some of her time as they would be able to afford administrative staff.  They then put into place joint plans to expand the business.

Mismatch of incentives against personal motivation.

Keith ran a sales company that was part of a large global group.  His sales team were well rewarded with commission on their sales and they had won the top sales team award for the whole international group for two years running  He had one saleswoman, Jill, who was earning considerably more than the rest of the team.  When conflict arose Kieth believed this was due to jealousy on the part of Jills colleagues.  On investigation the conflict was actually caused by her.  She was not motivated by her remuneration but by the annual team award (which was a trophy not remuneration). She found the pressure of performing at such a high level to retain this award had become intolerable as she believed she was carrying the whole team and this was affecting the way she interacted with them.  The solution was to give her a sales training role.