Organizational Conflict

In every organization two or more persons interact with each other, when these two or more
persons interact, conflict may occur when those people share their opinions with respect to any
task or decision and when these opinions are contradicting with each other conflict in
organization may arise.  An Organizational Conflict or otherwise known as workplace conflict, is
described as the state of disagreement or misunderstanding, resulting from the actual or
perceived dissent of needs, beliefs, resources and relationship between the members of the
organization.

There are 3 types of conflict in an organization: 

Relationship Conflict
 It is a conflict arising out of interpersonal tension among employees, which is
concerned with the relationship intrinsically not on the project at hand.
relationship conflict, arises from differences in personality, style, matters of taste,
and even conflict styles. In organizations, people who would not ordinarily meet
in real life are often thrown together and must try to get along. The relationship
conflict can be common in organizations.

Task Conflict
 Task conflict occurs when there is a discord, among members regarding the
nature of work to be performed. Task conflict often involves concrete issues
related to employees’ work assignments and can include disputes about how to
divide up resources, differences of opinion on procedures and policies, managing
expectations at work, and judgments and interpretation of facts.

Value Conflict
 Value conflict can arise from fundamental differences in identities and values,
which can include differences in politics, religion, ethics, norms, and other deeply
held beliefs of every employee in an organization.

There are some Causes of Organizational Conflict: 

Managerial Expectations- Every employee is expected to meet the targets imposed by

his/her superior and when these expectations are misunderstood or not fulfilled within the
stipulated time, conflicts arise.
Poor Communication- One of the major causes of conflict at the workplace is poor
communication, if one employee requires certain information from another, who does not
respond properly, conflict sparks in the organization.
Misunderstanding- Misunderstanding of information, can also alleviate dispute in
organization, in the sense that if one person misinterprets some information, it can lead to
a series of conflicts.
Lack of accountability- If in an organization, responsibilities are not clear and some
mistake has arisen, of which no member of the team wants to take responsibility can also
become a cause of conflict in the organization. 

The causes of organizational conflict are to be known, to resolve them as early as possible,
because it hinders the efficiency, effectiveness and productivity of the employees and the
organization as well, which ultimately hampers its success. 
There are ways on how to Manage Conflicts in Organization:
1. Handle the conflict positively.
2. Acknowledge that a difficult situation exists
3. Find solutions to satisfy needs
4. Concentrate on the causes rather than their effect, to assess conflicts.
5. Parties to conflicts should be given an equal voice, irrespective of their position, term or
political influence.
6. Active participation of all the parties to conflict can also help to counter it.

In an organization, conflict is inevitable and so various means are to be discovered to resolve

them or use them in a way that can help the organization to increase its productivity. This is
why it is so important to understand what causes conflict in business and to have a conflict
resolution plan in place to address it when it happens.