Informative Essay: Conflict Management

In this informative essay, we will discuss conflict management (CM). CM reduces negative outcomes that distract from the Mission. There are five different types of management styles. Those styles include accommodating, avoiding, compromising, competing, and collaboration. Leaders need to be able to manage conflict when they occur and their ability to manage them is critical to the mission and Soldiers for them to succeed. A good way for leaders to figure out their type of style would be through the Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument. This assessment takes less than 15 minutes and provides effective feedback to those wanting to use the five different conflict-handling styles.

The Army should not use the accommodating style. Accommodating is when a party gives in to what the other party wants without even voicing their opinion. Once Soldiers give up their opinions the Army loses a chance for more positive resolutions. We can eliminate the avoiding style for military use as well. Avoiding involves evading decision-making or never giving an opinion. Soldiers have to learn decision-making skills to progress to teach the next generation and complete missions.   The last style that can negatively impact Soldiers is competing. Competing involves not listening to the other party's opinion and always concluding your solution is the best. A competitive style can negatively impact Soldiers on the Mission and a rift in leadership. Both collaboration and compromising can lead to positive outcomes for all involved in Mission. To meet Army standards they are consistently used.

Collaboration is not only cooperative but all involved are happy with the solution agreed upon. Since it is time-consuming, collaboration occurs before every mission and can even be started months or years in advance. Compromising can occur while on a mission or even before stepping off. Annual training could have included the gas chamber, but instead, the command decided we should teach a class on our Joint Service Lightweight Integrated Suit Technology (JSLIST). In doing so there would be more time for Soldiers to qualify on the range. The compromising style involves individuals agreeing on a solution and issues can be resolved quickly. Not only does it allow everyone to be heard, but those involved learn about each other's different perspectives. However, compromising can come with backlash. Some Soldiers will walk away feeling unhappy and as though they sacrificed too much. In the Army what Soldiers do on a day-to-day basis is sacrifice. This style should be our bread and butter since Soldiers always place the Mission first. Soldiers will undoubtedly have to compromise on a variety of their missions. Say Staff Sergeant Kotlarski and Staff Sergeant McCook both need off on the 31st, at their AGR positions, so both agreed to take half the day. They both came to a compromise and agreed with their solution and thus creating a positive outcome.

A solution made from collaboration can create a lasting resolution to a conflict if the two parties cannot work together. It can be time-consuming to collaborate. If Soldiers are on a mission collaborating could cause mission completion to be delayed. This style has seven steps to go through to be successful. Collaborative steps include identifying conflict, identifying the root cause of conflict, gaining acceptance, framing conflict more positively, generating ideas, appraising possible solutions, and working toward a solution. Soldiers would leave happy with their needs and wants being considered when a win-win solution is found. Sergeant Segura is at Battalion and has seven down trace units that are their own companies. As a collaborative scenario, she gets put on orders to re-image computers for full-time staff who get their computers which are a win-win for herself and Battalion.

In conclusion, CM is the process of increasing positive outcomes and reducing the negative ones. Leaders have to learn to manage conflict as they occur and their ability to manage conflict is important to the mission and Soldiers for them to succeed. The five CM styles are implemented by individuals daily. Those styles include accommodating, avoiding, compromising, competing, and collaboration. Styles that would have a more negative impact rather than positive would be accommodating, avoiding, and compromising. The Army uses the collaborative style when planning missions. Soldiers and officers use the compromise style mainly during missions or last-minute touch-ups. Using CM is imperative to complete the Mission. Officers and Soldiers may face setbacks from disagreeing, but can always use these styles to combat negative outcomes in the line of duty.