Kenneth Cloke - Resolving Conflicts at Work: Ten Strategies for Everyone on the Job

Also by Kenneth Cloke

Conflict Revolution: Mediating Evil, War, Injustice and Terrorism

The Crossroads of Conflict: A Journey into the Heart of Dispute Resolution

Mediating Dangerously: The Frontiers of Conflict Resolution

Mediation: Revenge and the Magic of Forgiveness

Also by Joan Goldsmith (with Warren Bennis)

Learning to Lead: A Workbook on Becoming a Leader

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Resolving Personal and Organizational Conflicts: Stories of Transformation and Forgiveness

Resolving Conflicts at Work: A Complete Guide for Everyone on the Job

Thank God It's Monday: 14 Values We Need to Humanize the Way We Work

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Cloke, Kenneth, date.

Resolving conflicts at work : ten strategies for everyone on the job / Kenneth

Cloke, Joan Goldsmith ; foreword by Warren Bennis. Third edition.

p. cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-470-92224-8 (pbk.); ISBN 978-1-118-01062-4 (ebk.); ISBN 978-1-118-01081-5 (ebk.); ISBN 978-1-118-01082-2 (ebk.)

1. Conflict management. 2. Interpersonal relations. 3. Personnel managementPsychological aspects. 4. Psychology, Industrial. I. Goldsmith, Joan, date. II. Title.

HD42.C56 2011

650.13dc22

2010048701

Third Edition

Excerpt from Heart of the Enlightened by Anthony de Mello. Copyright 1989 by The Center for Spiritual Exchange. Used by permission of Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc.

The table in Strategy Four is reprinted by permission of Harvard Business School. From What Makes a Leader by Daniel Goleman, NovemberDecember/1998. Copyright 1998 by the Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation, all rights reserved.

Excerpt from Memoirs of Hadrian by Marguerite Yourcenar. Copyright 1954, renewed 1982 by Marguerite Yourcenar. Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC.

Excerpts from The Human Side of Enterprise by Douglas McGregor. Copyright 2006 by McGraw-Hill. Reprinted with permission of The McGraw-Hill Companies.

Excerpts from Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco, translated by William Weaver. Copyright 1988 by Gruppo Editorale Bompiani, Sonzogno Etas S.p.A., Milano. English translation copyright 1998 by Harcourt, Inc. Reprinted by permission of Harcourt, Inc.

Excerpt by Brenda Ueland copyright 1987 by the Estate of Brenda Ueland. Reprinted from If You Want to Write with permission of Graywolf Press, Saint Paul, Minnesota.

Excerpt from Strengthening Your Grip by Charles Swindoll. Copyright 1982 by Word, Inc., Nashville, Tennessee. Used by permission of Insight for Living, Anaheim, California.

Excerpt from Beyond the Chains of Illusion: My Encounter with Marx and Freud. Copyright 2006 by Erich Fromm. Reprinted with permission from the Continuum International Publishing Company.

Excerpt from The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Briggs by Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by Michael Hulse. Translation and editorial matter copyright 2009 by Michael Hulse. Reproduced by permission of Penguin Books, Ltd.

The poem For the ones I work for is from Who Whispered New Me by Killarney Clary. Copyright 1989 by Killarney Clary. Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, LLC.

Foreword

Conflict: An Opportunity for Leadership

In the midst of the recent financial crisis, it is clear that leadership has never mattered more. We are in dire need of leaders who can courageously confront and resolve the many conflicts that plague our organizations and threaten our well-being, who can address and resolve the conflicts that damage the very fabric of society, and who can openly and skillfully resolve conflicts that have an adverse impact on our daily lives.

We need organizational leaders who can release us from unrelenting conflicts and do not merely paper over disagreements and disputes. We have to resist the temptation to follow leaders with perverse agendas that undermine or distort the authentic resolution of recurring conflicts. Instead, we need to develop organizational leaders who are skilled in resolving conflicts, who seek solutions that address underlying causes, and who serve the interests of all involved.

If we look to one of the leaders of our early Republic, Abigail Adams, we see that she had it right when she counseled her son John Quincy that hard times are the crucible in which character and leadership are forged. It is not in the still calm of life or the repose of a pacific station that great characters are formed, she wrote to him in 1780. The habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulty. Great necessities call out great virtues. The spirit of this wife and mother of two founding presidents inspires us to consider our own era as a time when leaders can imaginatively create environments in which conflict resolution strategies generate a viable, collaborative new future. This future will be created by leaders who can cope with rapid, uncertain change and address social strains, psychological tensions, and chronic conflicts in cultures that foster collaboration, open and honest communication, and conflict resolution.