Organizational conflicts often occur due to the lack of cooperation between the respective institution members or the faulty communication channel from the bottom-most employees to the highly ranked individuals. There are different types of organizational conflicts depending on the type of disagreement in the situation leading to a conflict. Major organizational conflicts are divided into three categories: task conflict, relationship conflict, and value conflict. In the non-profit organization's given scenario, there is a conflict resulting from Teds, a member of the organizations' leadership team, actions as he is closed to feedback.
Ted being closed to feedback means that he is only concerned with personal opinions and does not accept other team members' opinions. This type of conflict is a relationship conflict because it has resulted from relationship-related issues in the non-profit organization ( Chenhall et al., 2016 ). The consultant's efforts bore fruits as the problem was easily identified through consultations with the team involved in its operations, including the CEO and other employees. Ted was the problem because he admits that he was closed to feedback from fellow employees, and always held his opinions. Not only being closed to feedback, but it is also evident that Ted played some games with young women employees in the organization, which led to him being closed to feedback. According to the consultants’ interview conducted on the rest of the employees, Ted is the conflict source since every employee argued that he was closed to feedback and only withheld his opinions.
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Several reasons might have caused the occurrence of the conflict in the non-profit organization. First, Ted was closed to feedback from fellow employees is the chief cause of the organizational conflict in this scenario. This is because every employee in an organization expects to feel valued and part of the institution by making contributions concerning any issue and ensuring that his contributions in the form of opinions are considered for change. In this scenario, Ted focused only on his personal opinions and ignored all other employees’ opinions, thus prompting the emergence of the organizational conflict. Secondly, another source of the organizational conflict is that Ted was considerate with young women in the organization and ignorant of other employees. Favoritism triggers the emergence of conflicts in every given situation ( Wang & Wu, 2020 ). As a result, employees in the organization felt ignored by their team leader, Ted, which led to the start of the conflict. It is not an easy task for employees to keep a good relationship with a team leader, bearing characters like those showed by Ted; consequently, the latter prompted the organizational conflict.
A third party's use to resolve the organizational conflict was not necessary since the conflict was not hugely escalated. Since the CEO is tasked with the oversight responsibility, it was his duty to solve the conflict amicably without being biased to any side of the conflict. The employees should have reported the matter to the CEO, who would then take necessary measures to bring the organizational conflict to an end peacefully without involving an outside party's intervention. In this scenario, the consultants’ services were not needed since the organizational conflict was not yet escalated. Before approaching the CEO with the issue, the employees should have done their best to see whether Ted can change his behavior and attitude towards young women in the organization.
Secondly, the employees could have advised him on the overarching impacts that result from being closed to feedback. For example, miscommunication and broken communication channels are matters that should be identified to Ted by fellow employees before reporting the matter to the CEO. On the other hand, the CEO should not be swift to act by bringing an external consultant but should first take the CEO's responsibility and try to restore things in order. This could be done by sitting Ted down and engaging him in productive talk to ascertain his reasons for being closed to feedback and deter him from playing with the organization’s young women employees. From there, the CEO should observe Ted's actions afterward to identify whether he changed or not. If he does not change, it is now time to hire an external consultant to assist in resolving the organizational conflict.
Internal conflict within a nonprofit organization has significant impacts on the community served by the organization. Some of these impacts include delays to failure of delivering services. For example, in the scenario involving Ted and his fellow employees, the nonprofit organization's community will be significantly impacted since employees are working under poor working conditions and have an unresponsive team leader. As a result, employees lack the motivation to continue working under dire conditions hence might be tempted to offer less input which translates to inefficiency in services delivered. Additionally, another effect of internal conflict within a nonprofit organization includes the increase in employee turnover rates ( Tabassi et al., 2017 ). Employee turnover results from the increasing frustration with the organization's level of conflict, which prompts them to terminate their membership. Lastly, conflicts in an organization, when unresolved promptly, can escalate and transform into violence. However unfortunate it is, nonprofit organizational conflicts can escalate and cause violence amongst members involved. This, in return, results in legal issues in a company, thus destroying the company’s reputation.
In conclusion, organizational conflicts are common occurrences and should be addressed immediately they are noticed. Conflicts derail organization progress and are devastating to the persons involved. Thus, it is essential to monitor organizational conflicts and address them before they escalate into legal issues that affect the company’s reputation and affect its progress negatively.
References
Chenhall, R. H., Hall, M., & Smith, D. (2016). Managing Identity Conflicts in Organizations: A Case Study of One Welfare Nonprofit Organization. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly , 45 (4), 669–687. https://doi.org/10.1177/0899764015597785
Tabassi, A. A., Bryde, D. J., Abdullah, A., & Argyropoulou, M. (2017). Conflict Management Style of Team Leaders in Multi-Cultural Work Environment in the Construction Industry. Procedia Computer Science, 121, 41–46. doi:10.1016/j.procs.2017.11.007
Wang, N., & Wu, G. (2020). A Systematic Approach to Effective Conflict Management for Program. SAGE Open . https://doi.org/10.1177/2158244019899055
