Conflict Competence Features
Finally, the criteria of communication appropriateness, effectiveness, productivity, and satisfaction can serve as evaluative yardsticks of whether an intercultural communicator has been perceived as behaving competently or incompetently (Canary & Lakey, 2013; Cupach, Canary, & Spitzberg, 2010; Spitzberg & Changnon, 2009).
“Appropriateness” refers to the degree to which the exchanged behaviors are regarded as proper and match the expectations generated by the insiders of the culture. “Effectiveness” refers to the degree to which communicators achieve mutually shared meaning and integrative goal- related outcomes in the interaction situation. Effective encoding and decoding processes lead to mutually shared meanings. Mutually shared meanings lead to perceived intercul- tural conflict understanding. Communication interaction effectiveness has been achieved when multiple meanings are attended to with accuracy and mutually desired interaction goals have been conjointly reached.“Productivity” refers to the generation of new ideas, new plans, new momentum, and new directions in resolving the conflict problem. Finally, “communication satisfaction” can refer to the overall satisfaction or emotional fulfillment reported by both parties about the interactive negotiation process and the outcome. Dynamic conflict communicators can use culture-sensitive, adaptive communication skills to manage the process appropriately and integrate divergent interaction goals effectively to foster interdependent productivity and team satisfaction within the embedded macro- and microconflict system. The intricate relationship among these various conflict process and outcome criteria—appropriate- ness, effectiveness, productivity, and satisfaction await to be further explored and flushed out from a multilevel analysis. In two recent update versions on the theme of intercultural conflict competence, Ting-Toomey (2009) defines intercultural conflict competence as the mindful capacity in managing emotional frustrations with the process-outcome goal of transforming ingrained conflict habits and trying to see things from the other cultural premise. Furthermore, mindful conflict competence also emphasizes the importance of intentional transformational changes in the mind-set and the heart-set of the communicators in understanding the conflict case from both an ethnorelative standpoint and a univer- salistic-humanistic angle (Bennett & Bennett, 2004; Fisher-Yoshida, 2005; Mezirow, 2000; Ting-Toomey, 2012; Worthington, 2005).