Encouraging Differences Whilst Managing Conflicts

The key to managing conflicts is by having a culture that encourages differences. However, Leaders should stay alert and agile if they notice that the differences are now moving further down and can soon emerge as a full-blown crisis.

- Ajit K. Kamath

Differences are the spark to a blast of a conflict. Differences are also the waves that surf into creativity and innovation. Most innovations would not have seen the light of the day if it were not for someone challenging the status quo, challenging what was acceptable, challenging the norms. The tool used by humans to challenge thus, is the tool of "voicing their differences". Recent Supreme Court judgements show that if it were not for the differences that made petitioners' knock the doors of years of traditions, practices, and beliefs, we would not have seen the paradigm changes in laws that we are seeing.

In organisations, ideas thrive when there are differences, disruptions happen when innovative leaders challenge the status quo. The whole start-up universe has been in its own quest of discovering the next idea by openly encouraging differences in the existing ways of doing things. In India, we have seen our local start-ups such as Flipkart challenging the idea of readers going to buy books in stores, Ola challenging the concept of having self-owned, chauffer driven cars, Big Basket challenging the belief that an Indian will always want to touch and feel vegetables before they buy them.

And, I am sure in the founder-led garages, differences are what made these thoughts thrive and saw unicorns in the making. On the other hand, we have observed founders of established start-up as well as established companies facing an exodus (self initiated or board influenced) when the same differing voices could not be managed, leading to poisoning of the environment, thus leading to distrust and loss of reputation.

So, let us understand how the encouraged differences can move on to become unmanaged conflicts.

What is Conflict? It can be described as a disagreement among individuals or groups characterized by bitterness and hostility.