Any senior Level Managers with ideas about workplace conflict? (employee, credit, profit)

[Long Time Unemployed]

Back when I was working in management I was always pushing people to change their approach or the company to update their policies and procedures. Change comes hard to corporate America but unless someone was not afraid to break some china and get some people angry at them, we would still be doing things the same way as the 1980s.

Anyone who is proud of how effective they were at getting people or organizations to change, pissed off lots of people but were a hero in the end because the change made things more profitable or efficent?

Tell us your stories!

[kevinm]

I worked most of my career as an IT constultant. I did not care about unworkable policies or projects. My motto as a consultant was "If you can't be part of the solution then make lots of money prolonging the problem!".

[druinder]

Sometimes changes are needed in order to take it to a new level. I personally can see that being the case in a lot of companies however, some high ranking people within a company will take it the wrong way and see it as a threat to their jobs and will go to great lengths to keep their jobs when in reality the employee just wants the chance because he's a real "go-getter" and knows he can make the company more money but wants to be compensated handsomely for it.

Anyways, to answer your question. Yes, I have done this several of times and yes all the above. I remember back in 01-02 when I first did this. At first it made a lot of people extremely upset with me however, over the course of about a year and a half the profit margins went up roughly 23% and everyone was pleased and even gave me the just deserved credit for a having the balls to take a plunge.

[Thursday007]

I had two departments which were dependant on each other for the operation to function properly and profitably. Each chronically complained about the other doing something or not doing something and I realized it wasn't lack of care, but education. So, to correct the problem I let them figure out what to do after I made each one of them take a day and work the other person's job in the other department. They were all surprised at what kind of impact their decisions had on the other department and no one had to bust balls or lay down the hammer - they came up with solutions together and the departments were more profitable by months end from just this activity and because they came up with the solutions instead of them being dictated to them they were taken seriously and were more effective.

[Long Time Unemployed]

In my experience as you move up in the corporation, more and more of the success in your jobs will be based on how you communicate with your coworkers and fellow managers. The potential for serious conflict and office politics goes up especially when you are at the Director Level. The same games they play on Capital Hill between the Democrats and Republicans are played in the executive board room but in many cases it is even nastier.

I hope some more people have stories about extreme conflict on the job and serious office politics.

[Oliviaer]

When people work together in groups, there are bound to be occasions when individuals disagree and conflicts arise in the workplace. Whether these disagreements become full-blown feuds or instead fuel creative problem solving is, in large part, up to the person in charge.You can do a lot to ensure that your employees deal with disagreements in proactive, productive ways by knowing when and how to intervene — and when to let things be.