Workplace Mediation

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Unit 1
AO1 Describe the causes and effects of workplace conflicts

Conflict is an inevitable and is part of business life, where there are people there will always be conflict, not all conflict is negative. Some workplace conflict s healthy and if viewed positively, however where unhealthy conflict is present it has a potential risk to cause the company serious problems Workplace conflict can be in many forms from serious flare-ups to less obvious, but less destructive forms of negativity. Workplace conflict can be caused by personality clashes or style differences and personal. Workplace factors such as poor leadership, poor management, unfair treatment, poor communication, budgets, discrimination, Unrealistic work expectations Mushroom effect – no one knows what’s happening around here, bullying and harassment , overwork, favouritism, Stress and exclusion . These issues can affect not only work life, but personal life as well. Individuals experiencing workplace conflict may feel stressed, anxious, angry, and even depression. When employees are not getting along, the consequences can be costly. Productivity and efficiency tend to decrease as people focus on their distress rather than their work.

Poor management, or inconsistent management procedures is one of the major cause in workplace conflict an example of this is where two employees are doing the same job and being paid a different rate. The employee on the lower rate may feel that they are being discriminated against or the manager favours the other employee more than them and is being treated unfairly. Unfair treatment can lead to feelings of anger, jealousy, frustration, lack of respect, envy and it makes it very hard for a person to be rational. An example of this is the manager has a particular favourite member of staff and is always praising them or giving them the good jobs. Unclear job role or where responsibilities conflict can be confusing, frustrating and stressful and may lead to conflict between employees, in my company there are very few job descriptions so there are disputes over where one job finishes and the other one starts, boundaries are unclear and this causes major problems with employees not knowing what there responsibilities are. Inadequate training is another source of conflict and can lead to frustration in not being able to carry out the job correctly, low job satisfaction, lack of motivation. Employees may feel that they do not have the skills to carry out a task and this can leave them frustrated because they want to do the job but cant. I had an employee who was promoted to bike assembler; he was given one day of training and then left to get on with the job. Every bike he built was rejected for one thing or another. The more bikes he got back the more frustrated he became and in the end he broke down and cried and went sick due to stress. This was all due to little or no training. He has now had extensive, reviewed with good and bad feedback. The result of this is he is now happy and valued member of the time and builds bikes to a good standard. Poor communication in the workplace can cause tension, result in lowered morale, hurt feelings Confusion and lack of trust, fear and dissatisfaction. For example in my company there is currently a plan to re-layout the factory but the management have not told any of the shop floor staff. Rumours are flying around and the staff are speculating and guessing what the changes are going to be and what they mean. There is a level of uncertainty amongst the staff because they do not know how they will be affected by the change. Staffs dealing with conflict in the workplace are more like to have high absenteeism due to stress, heart problems, back problems, mental health issue and workplace injury. An example of this is at my last company the managing director was a bully and he was often very rude to his secretary he would shout and curse at her blaming her for documents that were...
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