Navigating Complexity with Conflict Agility
A complaint has come to you about someone you oversee. In the previous newsletter we explored the various responses of the accused to an accountability process using Henry Cloud’s framing of The Wise, The Fool, and The Evil. Based on how the Accused responds, a Leader is now tasked with continuing the process and managing their own response. Utilizing Conflict Agility can help a Leader remain agile to a situation that will threaten to keep them stuck.
Pause
Take a moment to breathe. Don’t fall into the tyranny of the urgent. A discerned process is more effective than a hasty response.
Go In
As a Leader responding to the complaint, it’s important to be aware of your own internal processing. You can’t remove your biases (to both the Accused and the Complainant) but you can be more aware of them and how they might influence your decision-making. You’ll want to note what threats you might be discerning, how these charges brought forward impact you in your role, and how you are feeling in light of the situation. You might discount your feelings, or even feel ashamed of them—I don’t have time for this, why can’t they just sort this out, this all seems petty to me—but awareness and acknowledging these emotions for yourself is key in not letting them take over.
Go Up
From this place of greater self-awareness, a Leader can gain perspective by Going Up. A helpful tool to gain this perspective is to utilize Blokmapping. Blokmapping—a technique developed by my colleague John Radford—is a process that helps individuals make sense of the complexity by identifying all the relevant factors in a situation. It’s a way of externalizing what’s happening internally, and making explicit what is implicit. (See below for training opportunities to equip you in this method).
Likely, the denial of the Accused is leaving you spinning. It’s like you’ve hit a wall when the person denies responsibility. To grasp the components of the situation it can help to quite simply name them. Each issue, concern, dynamic, pattern, or element can be captured on its own sticky note, and then each component is arranged in a way that reflects how you are experiencing the reality. Mapping the pain points and relevant factors are not just to capture the complexity, but also to identify possibilities to move forward. These are your leverage points—small shifts that can be acted on in a system that can produce significant results.
What’s key for a Leader is to stay above the noise and distractions and to keep the tension with the Accused. One tactic to be aware of is if they try to victimize themselves. In this way, the Accused may try to reverse the charges, and rather than taking responsibility for the impacts of their behaviour, they make a charge against the Complainant. Often it will be the very process of accountability they claim is negatively impacting them, saying they feel attacked. This is a standard pattern with people who feel cornered, people who fear their power is being stripped from them, or abusers wanting to avoid accountability (a handy acronym captures the pattern—DARVO: Deny, attack, reverse-victim-offender). It’s an effective way to shine the spotlight on someone else to distract the Leader from the original charges.
Being able to identify when this is taking place is key in not getting caught up in this tactic. If the Accused has valid concerns against the Complainant as well, then those can be responded to appropriately. But the concerns shouldn’t detract or discredit the concerns the Complainant has brought against the Accused.
Another trap Leaders can fall into is conflating the issues with the individuals themselves. The concerns get turned into an interpersonal conflict where the two people just need to work out their relational strife. This can feel like a quick fix a Leader tries to employ, just wanting people to get past their differences and get along. If this happens, the Leader has most likely lost sight of the issues and concerns. Leaders can forget that a reconciliation process starts with truth and addressing the concerns.
The best thing a Leader can do is remain clear on the concerns, and hold the tension here.
Go Out
With explicit awareness of what is taking place within you and the greater context, leverage points are likely to emerge. Acting on the leverage points you’ve discerned is essentially where this process will lead you. But instead of reacting in the moment, you’ve taken in the relevant factors, and discerned with greater awareness of the system and the individuals in it.
What’s a Leader to do: Decision-making doesn’t get easier from here, so it will be important as a Leader to maintain clarity and to keep the tension and necessary pressure with the Accused. Rather than predetermining the outcome, Leaders can lean into a discovery process.
As a Leader you might consider:
What exactly is the pattern or behaviour that has been brought forward? What are the power dynamics influencing the situation?
How did the Accused respond when the feedback was first raised? What about after time to process?
Are they open, reflective, and willing to take ownership—or are they minimizing, deflecting, or DARVO-ing?
What is a proportionate response that acknowledges the harm but also creates possibility for change?
What are the consequences (if any) for their actions at this point? Does there need to be restructuring temporarily? How will we measure growth or change? Will there be any accountability?
If others on the team were watching, what would they learn about what is tolerated—and what isn’t?
How will the Complainant be supported and cared for in this process?
And all along, continue to Go In and keep tabs on your own felt response through the process:
Am I trying to fix this too quickly to avoid discomfort?
Where do I feel pulled (toward rescuing, placating, dismissing)?
What assumptions am I making about each person, and what data supports or challenges those?