UNIVERSITY OF SALFORD BUSINESS SCHOOL MSc PROJECT MANAGEMENT

A good leader does not ignore or avoid conflict but manages it

Critical discussion of the role of project manager and team

RICARDO LUCIANO ANDRE GALLEGUILLOS PIZARRO

PROJECT HRM AND COMMUNICATION KEVIN KANE

Salford, Greater Manchester, United Kingdom March, 2012

CONTENTS
Contents .................................................................................................................. 2 Introduction.............................................................................................................. 3 Facing the Conflicts ................................................................................................. 4 Conflict Management .......................................................................................... 5 Leadership .......................................................................................................... 6 Building the team .............................................................................................. 10 Ethics ................................................................................................................ 11 How disciplines and key factors are integrated? ............................................... 12 Bibliography........................................................................................................... 14

INTRODUCTION
Projects are unique and most of the times are linked with uncertainty and unknown factors. Therefore, plans are just a starting point for later changes, which means that Project Managers have to be prepared for later changes and disagreements, otherwise projects will probably result in a massive failure. The issue is that sometimes Project Managers just does not plan what to do in the case of changes and therefore they face delays, cost overruns, low quality, not achieve stakeholders expectations, so on, so forth. (Pisarski et al, 2011). Moreover, evidence from the American Management Association

(Kohlrieser, 2007) shows that managers spend at least 24% of their time Managing Conict. Based on this fact, we assume that to achieve the project or company objectives is not enough with the Managing and Planning skills because compromise only the 76% of the time of Managers. Therefore, is acceptable to think that much of the project success depend on the people and teams involvement. So it is clear that Project Managers should have a greater concerned in the other 24% of the time in which manager probably are going to deal with Conflict Management, Leadership and supporting the Building Team stages. As we are going to argue, conflicts are inevitable, necessary and play a strong and positive role in the project success. The key issue is to identify how the different aspects mentioned before integrate each other in order to achieve the desirable outcomes for the company, the group and the individual itself.

FACING THE CONFLICTS

According to Thomas (1992), conflict is defined as the frustration perceived by and individual or a group of employees. Then to extend this concept, Brown and Hyer (2010) specified conflict as a state of disharmony between opposites ideas, interest or persons, which play an important role in the success of our project team. Furthermore, there are two types of conflict, the task related conflict which arises from disagreements regarding project task and decisions making, and the interpersonal conflict which is related with different personalities (Brown and Hyer, 2010). Then from the analysis of the literature we identified that there is two sides of the coin. There are authors who say that conflicts have a negative impact on the team performance and team satisfaction. However, nowadays is more accepted by researchers the idea that the conflicts are necessary for the effective development of working groups and is positively related to groups outcomes when is properly manage (Amanuel G., Narda R., and Paul E., 2009).

CONFLICT MANAGEMENT
Conflicts are impossible to avoid and project manager must be ready to face it. Actually if we search about conflict in the BBC website, we found out that conflicts are everywhere and at different levels, conflicts in Syria, conflicts between United Kingdom and Argentina about the Malvinas/Falklands, personality conflicts in the music business, conflicts related with religion, conflict between coachs and football player, etc. Fortunately, the properly manage of conflicts is associated with positive aspects (UNDESA/UNDP and The centre for conflict resolution, 2000) such as: Conflict helps to clarify roles, obligations and tasks Conflict helps to build a group identity. Conflicts enhance the group cohesion and performance. Conflicts arise from disagreements and therefore offer a wider range of views to sort out problems. There are an important number of approaches to deal with team conflict such as (1) compromising or negotiation, (2) smoothing or suppression, (3) forcing or power, (4) withdrawing or denial, and (5) problem solving. Each of these conflict resolution styles is more suitable within certain situational conditions (Brown and Hyer, 2010). For example, evidence from Bradford et al (2004) shows the effects of conflict management in the retail networks. They basically came out with interesting conclusions such as: Interpersonal and task conflict have a negative effect in network outcomes if these conflicts are not properly manage. Collaboration or problem solving approach is effective reducing both types of conflicts. Withdraw approach is effective just reducing interpersonal conflicts. 5

 Confrontation is effective only reducing task conflicts in networks in which interpersonal conflict was low. So as we can see depending on the situation and the kind conflicts that we are facing some conflict management approach are more effective than others. Other well known example is the Wembley stadium failure, in which disagreements and conflict management approaches (denial, negotiation and forcing) were part of the faults. For instances disagreements whether include the Olympics games or not (fail of negotiation because took too long to agree), different point of view between the Australian company Multiplex and the Football Association (F.A) possible additional funding needed (fail of the F.A trying to manage this conflict forcing their point of view), disagreements between Multiplex and their contractors and supplier which ended up delaying the project (total denial approach), etc. (BBC Sport, 2006) What is important to note, as the authors agree, is that Project Manager must keep in mind that the wrong use of conflict management approach will lead to negative effects in the conflicts (for instance, when we used the confrontational approach to address high interpersonal conflict).

LEADERSHIP
According to Anantatmula (2010) when changes are significant, the leadership assumes an important role: Convincing people that changes are good and necessary. Aligning employees to the new directions. Motivating them to work together.

So is all about encourage employees performances and lead them to achieve positive outcomes (Pisarski et al, 2011). Therefore, Project Leaders should show positives behaviours such as: Appropriate and effective communication performances. Supportive behaviour. Demonstrated opportunity recognitions. Managers who aspire to become leaders need to understand burning issues for instance that good leaders have good character, there is not best way to lead and that leaders must collaborate (Allio, 2009). Then the question is; which is the appropriate Leaderships approach to use? To answer this we based on the type of conflict, the Situational Leadership Model (Figure 1) and the McGregor leadership theory. To begin with, evidence from McGregor (Bolden, Gosling, Marturano, and Dennison, 2003) indicates that there are two different leadership styles. For one thing, in the case of Theory Y leaders will be more likely to take actions to enable team members to have greater participation and opinion in each of the problems to be solved. For another, a leader who applies Theory X approach will take actions to formalize rules and task. Although, it have been suggested that Project Leaders using Theory Y approach are more likely to be success and will tend to achieve a greater performance. Theory X can be as important as theory Y, because there are some organizations such as Ford, where employers just need a worker doing his or her job or task, without involvement, communication or any commitment with the company (Thomas and Bendoly, 2009). Therefore, in companies in where employees need to do just their function, Theory X seems to be the better Leadership approach.

Figure 1: Situational Leadership Model. Source: Google images.

On the other hand, in the Situational Leadership Model (Figure 1) we identify four different ways in which Project Managers can lead, such as delegating, supporting or participate, coaching or consult and directing or tell (Ayoko, Konrad, and Boyle, 2012). For instance, in the article of Sims, Faraj, and Yun (2009), they analyse the situational leadership within a trauma centre, and they found out that leaders are going to develop their own personal theory of leadership on the base of unique circumstance (Figure 2) such as: 1. Objectives. Ensure a successful resuscitation. Offer learning opportunities for each team members. 2. Situational conditions. Severity of the patient injury. Degree of experience and expertise of team members.

Figure 2: How an attending surgeon selects a leadership style. Source: Sims et al, 2009.

As we can guess, at some point every team member (attending surgeon, an anaesthesiologist, nurses, technicians, medical students, etc) will want to undertake a procedure, therefore the conflicting goals present a challenge to this leader who must decide who is going to take charge for a patient. The result of this study was quite straightforward. For one thing, they did not find evidence about the use of coaching, and supporting leaderships (which can be expected). For another, as we can see in the figure 2, they found that the common approaches used by the attending surgeon were directive and delegating leadership, depending on the situational conditions mentioned before. The first case the attending surgeon personally does everything, from carry out the diagnosis to makes treatment decisions; he just assumed the central role of decision maker and task given. In the second leadership the responsibility of a particular patient was simply delegated to other team member with enough experience to carry out the procedures (Sims et al, 2009).

BUILDING THE TEAM

Evidence from Tuckman (Ayoko, Konrad, and Boyle, 2012), shows that group pass through four stage. As we can see in the figure 3, the forming, storming, norming, performing and in some cases for instance in companies with matrix organizational structures, team members go through a final stage of reforming in which employees return to their work routines.

Figure

3:

Team

Building

Process.

Source: Google images.

Take for example what happen with successful football teams for instance Barcelona. First of the coach Guardiola formed they group buying the players under certain conditions (situational variables) such as the team formation in the pitch, characteristics of players, availability of players, policy of the club, etc. Then, the team went through the storming stage in which players try to get the coach idea and start to know each other in the way they play and the role that each player have in the team. This stage is well known for interpersonal conflicts regarding to egos in the popular players and lack of motivation from players who already won everything. Therefore, here is when the Leadership of the coach have a significant importance in the future success of the team, and as far as we know Guardiola definitely managed the conflicts at this stage with a high level of leadership, that 10

is why this team is one of the most successful team of the last years. After this stage, tasks and responsibilities became clearer in the pitch, as we can see in Barcelona, rules, norms (ethics) and the motto more than a club are reflected in every game that they play. Finally in the performing stage they show all the potential of the team, being the most successful team in the last 5 years. However, there are people who doubts in the continuity of Guardiola in charge of Barcelona because the team already reached the peak of performance and because situational factors, such as important monetary offers from other clubs, personal objectives, etc. (BBC Sports, 2011)

ETHICS
In general terms Ethics are a way of life. Then there is a long academic discussion about ethical theories but as Project Managers the important issue is to distinguish between which actions are right and wrong and which values are defined by the company (Vanem, 2011). In basic terms ethics are a set of rules of conduct or a moral code. In other words is framework that we have to understand: What is good? What is fair? What is one's duty? Project Manager must bear in mind that these answers are different for each company or project (Craig Keller, 2005). Going further, evidence from Marta et al (2011), introduce the concept of institutionalization of ethics, which is basically the degree to which companies explicitly and implicitly incorporates ethics into its decision-making processes. Implicitly means that is not directly expressed such as Ethical Leadership and open communication, whereas, explicitly means that ethical behaviour is formally expressed, for example codes of ethics and ethics training. Furthermore, these authors concluded that the effect of ethic depend on where we are. For instance, ethic institutionalization has a strongest effect in the quality of work life at Thai than in USA because the Thai culture is collectivistic, whereas the USA culture is individualistic. 11

HOW DISCIPLINES AND KEY FACTORS ARE INTEGRATED?

Even though, Project Managers usually focus on classical functions such as planning and controlling, allocating and organizing resources, conflict

management, leadership and team building are important responsibilities that will help employees motivating and guiding them to achieve the organizational and projects goals (Anantatmula, 2010).

Figure 4: How disciplines and key factors are integrated? Source: Own creation.

When should a leader be directive? When should a leader be delegating? When should a leader be coaching? It is depending on what we call the input (Figure 4), which is basically identifying the key issues related with the unique circumstances in each conflict, such as: 1. What is the kind of conflict? Task or Relationship conflict. 2. What is the source of conflict? 3. Which are the situational conditions? 4. Which are the objectives of your team? 5. The nature of the job: Organizational resource, structure, priorities of the company, etc.

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Then based on this information, we choose the appropriate conflict management style. However, before implementing this approach, employees have to recognize that changes are good and necessary, and therefore, here is when Leadership become important. Moreover, Leadership is still important through the application of the conflict management aligning employees to the new directions and motivating them to work together based on the sort of leadership suitable for each team work member (theory X and Y). Even more, leadership is a fundamental skill in the building of the team especially in the storming stage in which employees are trying to be involved, know the rules of the company, create trust among them and clarify roles and responsibilities On the other hand, Project Managers or Leaders must be aware about the ethics because provide a moral code in which about what is acceptable to do, what is good, what is fair and what is wrong. In fact as we discuss before, implicit forms of ethics institutionalization include ethical leadership. So it is crystal clear that these set of rules are like the limits or framework for Conflict Management and the role of Leaders. Furthermore, we must understand the set of rules of conducts in the company and the fact that when we start to work with people we are going to go through the team building cycle in which leadership role become a key factor to face a conflict and encourage employees to build the trust among each other. Finally, in an overall view of the figure 4, Project Managers, who want to successfully achieve the project deliverables need to be able to analyze the inputs, identify the conflict management approach, take into account the stage of the team development and the ethical framework, and practice high level of leadership to achieve different sort of outputs such as effective team building, cohesion of the team work, achievements of objective within a project, and resolution of task and relationship conflict. 13

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