Strategies for Dealing With Conflict
As we look at joint ventures and ways to mitigate conflict, transparency, trust, and truthfulness among alliance partners are central factors (Das & Teng, 1998). The opportunity and mechanisms for learning about and from each other are also critical aspects of conflict management.
When a firm increases its operational connection and embeddedness with its partners, suppliers, and distributors abroad, conflict can be minimized through openness and access to information about each other’s resources (Hyder & Ghauri, 2000). Enhanced knowledge about each firm’s competencies and desires brings opportunities to develop new understandings (Tsang, 1998).Guttman’s (2007) strategies for addressing conflict focus on three core areas of the partnership that require common agreement and macroalignment. These are (1) aligning strategic and operational goals, (2) aligning roles and responsibilities, and (3) aligning around decision-making protocols. Without question, disagreement around corporate strategy (i.e., an organization’s definition of its future) is at the heart of a multitude of cross-border organizational conflict. Differences in views about timelines, product lines, territory, and growth targets, to name a few, can undercut even the most culturally sensitive teams and organizations.
To alleviate these concerns, Guttman (2007; who interviewed groups from numerous Fortune 100 companies) suggests that new ventures first and foremost ensure that their global group is fully aligned with the company strategy and are clear about what implications that strategy will have on operations. Second, Guttman argues that the proper alignment of roles and responsibilities is a key factor in avoiding conflict. Representatives from a global parent and regional partner often conflict when decision-making roles overlap in areas such as decisions regarding time investment and product development.
Finally, Guttman views decision-making type (i.e., decisions made unilaterally, consultatively, or by consensus) as a core issue that organizations must resolve to mitigate conflict. Unilateral decisions are made by one person with no input from others, consultative decisions are made by one person after getting input from the fewest number of players to add value, and in consensus-style decisions, everyone has input and everyone must agree to live with the decision. In weighing choices of decision-making styles for global ventures, one goal is to ensure shared clarity over which mode applies to a specific decision. Without this shared clarity, confusion and possibly destructive conflict may occur. Broadly speaking, the alignment features that Guttman discusses are grounded in the overarching strategies and mission of the larger organizational venture. Moreover, both microlevel and macrolevel conflict management strategies must work in tandem if the global joint venture is to be successful.Conclusion
Meeting the demands of globalization requires cooperation and new forms of partnerships from organizations and teams of employees across several sectors of society and different cultural groups. But as our review has indicated, meeting these challenges is very difficult. Most organizations and teams are not able to choose only collaborators whose relations and cultures are closely aligned. Participants in the global workplace operate in environments comprising others unlike themselves. But it is not simply enough to be aware of cultural differences in isolation of the larger context. A major conclusion of this review is that it is impossible to address conflict in the global workplace without taking into account the dynamic interplay between internal, structural, and the socio/political/economic external environments.
The responsibility for managing conflict lies with every member of the organization. Whether someone is in a senior management position, a new employee, or an experienced supervisor, organizational communication at both the microlevel of teams and the macrolevel of organizational strategy constitutes the organizing structures that are the building blocks of global organizations.
It is important that partners develop a set of shared principles and work platforms that transcend cultural differences. Globalizing an organization while localizing the experience, fostering a common universal culture but also respecting individual differences, and seeking inclusion and diversity while finding points of similarity are the challenges of the global workplace. The processes of globalization are too complex, too intertwined, and too wide-ranging to manage the inevitable conflicts via isolated, independent acts. Both researchers and practitioners, alike, need to continue to develop rich theoretical formulations, new research tools, and larger knowledge bases in order to understand better the global processes in which communication plays such a pivotal role (Monge, 1998). Overall, globalization creates a work context in which social identities, normative expectations, and societal institutions must continually be negotiated as they can no longer remain spatially or communicatively distinct.