Sunday, August 3, 2014

CONFLICT RESOLUTION

I don't usually have conflicts. Maybe once a year on my job. I work for NYPD. There are so many bosses..sergeants, lieutenants, captains, commanders etc. Then there are civilians like myself. We work as a team at my job. Everyone knows how to do every aspect of the job...whether it is drug testing, writing review slips, giving instructions to candidates etc. Another civilian had disrespected me by slamming a door after saying a derogatory remark to me. At first I was going to avoid the situation but avoidance is not the way to go. If you avoid someone disrespecting you, it will happen again and again. I confronted this person coming from a place of being disrespected and not liking it. Her voice was raised and so was mine. We were in an enclosed room but I was so mad at myself for letting her take me to that place. I just said what I had to do not so nicely and that was the end of it. I walked away to continue doing my job. Now this person is someone who I am very close to usually but when she is pressed for time working she can sometimes get anxious and nervous. It bothered me all that evening after I had left the workplace. The next day I said "Good Morning" to her and she answered begrudgingly. Later that day I went in her office and touched her shoulder and said "you know I hate when we argue". That was the end of that episode. We continue to work together but in the back of my mind, I know she can loose it at any time so I am alert to any change in behavior. The way that we handled that situation was a lose-lose situation. We both were yelling, not listening to the other and were acting very unprofessional for about 30 seconds. We should have made that a win-win situation by discussing what set her off and dealing with that issue. Instead I chose to ignore her in the beginning which probably is the reason that her temper escalated. By discussing the situation and arriving at a solution that satisfied both of us, we both would have remained calm and professional in the workplace.

2 comments:

  1. Karen I enjoyed reading your post. I like how you acknowledged that there was a conflict and that you resolved it appropriately. I like the fact also that you are aware of the signs that will alert you in any change in her behavior. That way you can have control of the situation if it was to happen again.

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  2. Karen,
    I enjoyed your post. It is so easy to respond in anger to a conflict. I like how you resolved the problem but made a plan for how to respond better next time. All we can do is work on how we respond and improve ourselves. Even though this only fixes half the issue, we can still vastly improve our relationships and communication with others.
    Thanks,
    Danielle

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