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Prevention of conflict for leaders

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Page in progress: As a manager, you are responsible for safeguarding the employer's responsibility for a good, safe, and fully sound psychosocial and organizational work environment. On this page, you will find information on how to prevent and handle personnel and work environment issues.

Main page Prevention of conflicts | Prevention of conficts for employees

Norsk: Konfliktforebygging for ledere 

Organizational and psychosocial work environment concerns the social and interpersonal aspects of the workplace. How you organize, plan, and carry out work is of great importance. You must exercise supportive, fair, and clear leadership, and ensure a balance between job demands and the employee's ability to control their own work situation.

Professional disagreements and discussions are part of everyday life in a vibrant university environment. When a disagreement is no longer about the issue at hand but becomes personal, it can be burdensome for the individual and the work environment. As a leader, you must address the challenge in such situations.

Step 1: Prevent

To prevent, you must assess the work environment. Here are some tools that can help you:

Discuss the work environment in section meetings, department meetings, staff meetings, etc. How do you want difficult topics to be addressed, what expectations do employees have of you as a leader, and what expectations do you have of your employees?

Have regular dialogue with each employee. This can occur through daily informal interactions. Investigate whether the employee has manageable workload and deadlines, meets the requirements of the work, and if any changes need to be made.

Employee interviews can also provide information about the individual employee's work situation and how they perceive the work environment. You can inquire whether the employee experiences a lot of stress, has collaboration challenges, struggles with tasks, or needs adjustments.

The Work Environment Survey (ARK) can provide an overview of the state of the work environment and whether there are factors that need further attention or maintenance.

Regular meetings with the safety representative can provide important information about the work environment and how employees are doing at work. See Guidelines for adaptation and cooperation between line manager and safety representative - NTNU.

Conduct a risk assessment of the work environment together with your employees and the safety representative. The risk assessment should be repeated annually. Additionally, you may consider conducting regular temperature measurements, for example, quarterly.

Characteristics of a robust work environment:

  • Expectation clarifications are systematized.
  • Clear guidelines are established.
  • Targeted preventive and risk-reducing work is conducted.
  • Management intervenes at the first signs of conflicts or contradictions.
  • Time is allocated to work on the work environment.

Step 2: Take action

If an employee or the safety representative reports an issue to you as a leader, you must always follow up. You should also inform the employee about how you will handle the matter.
 
How you follow up depends on what you are informed about, but it always occurs in three steps:
a) Clarify and document what has happened.
b) Assess how the issue affects the work environment, if at all.
c) Evaluate further action. Issues between employees: Investigate the matter through individual discussions with the individuals involved. You can seek assistance from the Occupational Health Service and the HSE (Health, Safety, and Environment) section at NTNU to facilitate such discussions. The Occupational Health Service can also conduct the discussions.
 
It is important that issues between individuals remain confidential and are not treated as work environment issues.
 
Issues involving you as a leader and employee/employees: In this case, the matter must be escalated one level up in the organization to ensure impartial handling.
 
Issues concerning the work environment: Implement measures affecting the entire environment, not individual cases. Even if only one employee reports an issue or needs assistance, it may affect several employees. For example, an employee may report high workload due to inadequate work organization, poor leadership, lack of participation, or feeling excluded from a group of employees. The threshold for taking action in the work environment should be low.
 
The extent of follow-up depends on the reported issue and its severity. Even if an issue is defined as a work environment issue, further follow-up should be adapted based on whether it concerns the entire work environment or a group within it. Collaborate with the safety representative before and after implementing measures.
 
Address the challenges as topics in section meetings, department meetings, etc., and invite employees to suggest solutions. It is not always easy to determine if a personnel matter also concerns the work environment. In such cases, it may be wise to ask the safety representative for their impression of the work environment. The safety representative can be a valuable collaborator. However, keep in mind that the safety representative is neutral and should not act as a support person for you or the employee in a conflict situation.

Step 3: Managing conflict or work environment issues

Not all issues can be prevented, and conflicts may arise in a work environment. If your handling does not result in change or improvement, and the situation is perceived to be deadlocked, you must address the matter following NTNU's guidelines for conflict resolution and work environment issues.

How to prevent and handle personnel and work environment issues

As a leader, you must monitor the work environment and work preventatively to ensure that work environment issues or conflicts do not arise or escalate.

Practical advice for receiving cases:

  • See and acknowledge each individual and their experience.
  • Be mindful of language and communication.
  • Be aware of your own role.
  • Try to identify ownership of the issue.
  • Distinguish between personal complaints and whistleblowing about misconduct.
  • Seek advice or assistance early on.
  • Do not postpone or refrain from taking action.

Communication during disagreements:

  • Avoid email. Have the conversation in person.
  • Talk to the person involved, not about them.
  • Try to understand the other person's perspective before speaking to them (needs, expectations).
  • Sort out facts and avoid assumptions and interpretations.
  • Clarify expectations, both yours and others'.
  • Consider the choices you have and the consequences of your actions.
  • Take a moment to calm down.
  • Avoid using "always" and "never."
  • Use "I" statements instead of "you" statements.
  • Speak for yourself. Avoid phrases like "everyone thinks that..." or "we are several who..."

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