CENTRAL LUZON DOCTORS’ HOSPITAL -

EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION
Romulo Highway, San Pablo, Tarlac City
Department of Graduate Studies
MASTERS OF SCIENCE IN NURSING
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COURSE TITLE: HUMAN BEHAVIOR IN ORGANIZATION
TOPIC: CHAPTER V - Conflicts and Stress
1. Conflict in an Organization
2. Stress
3. Stress Management
REPORTER: JESSY CAMILLE S. MOLINA, R.N.
SECTION: MSN 1E

OBJECTIVES:

● Give an overview about conflict & organizational conflict

● Discuss the types of conflict, sources of conflict, and styles to handle conflict

● Give an overview about stress and stress management

● Discuss the causes of stress and the innovative responses to stress management

CONFLICTS AND STRESS

Conflict

- Is a state of mind. It has to be perceived by the parties involved.

- A serious disagreement or argument between an individual or group

Organizational Conflict

- Is the discord that arises when goals, interests or values of different individuals or groups

are incompatible and those people block or thwart each other’s efforts to achieve their

objectives (George and Jones, 1996)

TYPES OF CONFLICTS
Two basic types of conflict that occur in teams are task conflict and relationship conflict.

Task conflict refers to disagreements among people about the goals to be achieved or the
content of the tasks to be performed.

Relationship conflict refers to interpersonal incompatibility that creates tension and personal
animosity among people.

BALANCING CONFLICT AND COOPERATION

There is evidence that mild conflict can be beneficial to teams. A healthy level of conflict helps
to prevent groupthink, in which people are so committed to a cohesive team that they are
reluctant to express contrary opinions.

However, conflict that is too strong, that is focused on personal rather than work issues, or that is
not managed appropriately can be damaging to the team’s morale and productivity.

Team leaders have to find the right balance between conflict and cooperation.

SOURCES OF CONFLICT

Vecchio (2003) pointed out the communication, structural, and personal behavior factors as

sources of conflict in the organizations.

1. Communication Factors. Communication rarely creates a mental image to the receiver as

exactly the same detail as intended by the sender. In this sense, conflict evolves from such
 unsuccessful communication. Incorrect, distorted, and ambiguous information would

develop conflict.

2. Structural factors. Size, staff heterogeneity, participation, line-staff distinctions, reward

systems, resource interdependence, and power are factors that explain the sources of conflict.

● SIZE: conflict occurs likely in the larger organizations

● STAFF HETEROGENEITY: conflict shows the variations among employees as regards

authority, longevity, orientations, and values that can bring strong impact on performance

● PARTICIPATION: conflict tends to be higher in participation with a greater number of

members

● LINE-STAFF DISTINCTIONS: conflict appears between line and staff units in an

organization. Line units perform tasks that are directly related to core functions of the

organization. Staff units work tasks that support the line function.

● REWARD SYSTEMS: conflict exists when one party benefits from rewards at the

expense of the other party

● RESOURCE INDEPENDENCE: conflict results to be the lack of coordination and

cooperation between groups or parties

● POWER: conflict occurs due to asymmetry of power distribution in the intergroup.

3. Personal behavior. The uniqueness and commonness among individuals explain the source of

conflict. Their different styles of values, orientations, or perceptions and unique dispositions in

the given situations would induce conflict within organization

STYLES TO HANDLE CONFLICT

Teams as well as individuals develop specific styles for dealing with conflict based on the desire

to satisfy their own concern versus the other party’s concern.

 ● The dominating style (my way) reflects assertiveness to get one’s own way and should

be used when quick, decisive action is vital on important issues or unpopular actions,

such as during emergencies or urgent cost cutting.

● The avoiding style (no way) reflects neither assertiveness nor cooperativeness. It is

appropriate when an issue is trivial, when there is no chance of winning, when a delay to

gather more information is needed, or when a disruption would be costly.

● The compromising style (halfway) reflects a moderate amount of both assertiveness and

cooperativeness. It is appropriate when the goals on both sides are equally important,

when opponents have equal power and both sides want to split the difference, or when

people need to arrive at temporary or expedient solution under time pressure.

● The accommodating style (your way) reflects a high degree of cooperativeness, which

works best when people realize that they are wrong, when an issue is more important to

others than to oneself, when building social credits for use in later discussions, and when

maintaining harmony is especially important.

● The collaborating style (our way) reflects a high degree of both assertiveness and

cooperativeness. The collaborating style enables both parties to win, although it may

require substantial bargaining and negotiation. The collaborating style is important when

both sets of concerns are too important to be compromised, when insights from different

people need to be merged into an overall solution, and when the commitment of both

sides is needed for a consensus

STRESS AND STRESS MANAGEMENT

Stress is an individual’s physiological and emotional response to external stimuli that place
physical or psychological demands on the individual and create uncertainty and lack of personal

control when important outcomes are at stake.

These stimuli called stressors, produce some combination of frustration and anxiety.

CHALLENGE STRESS AND THREAT STRESS

Psychologists have long noted this “dual face of stress”, and make a distinction between

challenge stress and threat stress.

Challenge stress fires you up, whereas threat stress burns you out.

CAUSES OF WORK STRESS

● Task demands are stressors arising from the tasks required of a person holding a

particular job

● Interpersonal demands are stressors associated with relationships in the organization

WORKING FOR A BAD BOSS IS A MAJOR CAUSE OF WORKPLACE STRESS.

Here are some things that bad bosses do to create stress for their subordinates:

1. Impose unreasonable demands and overwhelming workloads

2. Don’t let people have a say in how they do their work
3. Create perpetual doubt about how well employees are performing
4. Refuse to get involved in conflict between employees; let them work it out
5. Fail to give people credit for their contributions and achievements
6. Keep people guessing about what is expected of them
7. Bully and harass people to keep them on their toes
8. Don’t allow people to form a community; tell them work isn’t a social club.

INNOVATIVE RESPONSES TO STRESS MANAGEMENT

● Seek and destroy key resources of stress. A recent study found that the most beneficial

stress management competency is prevention. None of us can eliminate all the potential

sources of stress from our lives but we can avoid some of them and manage others.

● Find meaning and support. You are much more likely to experience ill effects of stress
 if you’re working in a job that has no meaning for you and if you feel alone in life

without social support.

● Mediate and manage your energy. Mediation is a way to both prevent and alleviate

harmful stress responses

● Find work-life balance. The final technique for managing stress is to balance work with

other interests and activities.

WHAT MANAGERS AND ORGANIZATIONS CAN DO

Here are some proactive approaches managers can take to combat the growing stress level in

today’s workplace:

● Create a psychologically healthy workplace. The number one way to lessen employee

stress is to create a healthy corporate culture that makes people feel valued.

● Provide wellness program and training. Wellness program that access to nutrition

counselling and exercise facilities can be highly beneficial in helping people cope with

stressful jobs.

● Train managers in stress intervention. Training managers to recognize warning signs

of stress overload is critical

● Make sure people get to have some fun at work. Particularly for jobs that have a high

degree of task-related stress, allowing people to blow off steam by having fun can make

all the difference in the stress level

Managers should always remember that employees are human resources with human needs. By

acknowledging the personal aspects of employees’ lives, these various initiatives communicate

that managers and the organization care about employees.

In addition, managers’ attitude make a tremendous difference in whether employees are stressed
out and unhappy or relaxed, energetic, and productive.

REFERENCES:
Apruebo, Dr. Roxel (2006) Essentials of Organizational Behavior - First Edition
Daft, Richard L (2014) New Era of Management - Eleventh Edition, Philippine Edition