King and Kitchener and Conflict

When I read Audrey's most recent post on our King and Kitchener reading, I thought about HASC's leadership development courses that we offer to supervisors and crew leaders. 

We see a lot of learners every day, and usually, we only see them for a few moments. Most of them take learning courses in our computer lab, so our ability to interact in more meaningful or personal ways is limited. This is not true in our leadership development courses. 

In our leadership courses, we get to connect with the learners over at least one day and in some cases two full days (that's a very long time for our organization where training time is measured in minutes and hours rather than in weeks or semesters). During that time we get to discuss their career stages and career growth. We rarely discuss these aspects of their work in terms of adult development but we could. Instead, we discuss it in terms of their leadership development. 

One area where we focus a lot of our time is in conflict management. In the past (and still to this day) it seems as though most supervisors and crew leaders make that transition to leadership not because they have leadership tools, fundamental leadership understanding, or leadership techniques, but in many cases, it seems to me they are promoted because they show up the most consistent and most often, they are friends with the boss, or they are good at completing projects. Their ability to manage conflict within their teams is not a focus point until they come to our training. We not only give them training and techniques to manage conflict on their teams but within our work, there is a lot of rivalry between groups and organizations. Fights are common. Blaming other organizations is also very ordinary. Due to the shortened time horizons for completing work and the daily grind, temper can and do flare-up. 

Most of the learners who come to our leadership courses are older and are ready for that next step in their development. Having a more nuanced understanding that conflict can be seen in multiple perspectives, or that understanding all sides is necessary is a part of that development and what we train them on. It's a tough sell in just a two-day or one-day course, but again, we are limited in our time with them. It has always been my goal to get KPIs that we can measure to determine if our work in conflict management might in some way be influencing the worksite in a positive way. It would be hard to gather and determine a direct relationship. 

References:

King, P. M., & Kitchener, K. S. (2004). Reflective judgment: Theory and research on the development of epistemic assumptions through adulthood. Educational psychologist, 39(1), 5-18.