Conflict – The Dual Concerns Model
The text introduces the “Dual Concerns Model”. This model is presented because it explains how people handle conflict.
Source: Essentials of Negotiation (4th ed.)by Roy J. Lewicki, Bruce Barry, and David m. Saunders, p. 21
It helps to give examples of each of these to further your understanding. As each is presented think of a recent conflict situation in which you were involved. Which of the ways to deal with conflict did you employ?
Contending: Pedro and Jose work together in the same department. Pedro wants to take Saturday off to attend a family event. Jose wants to take Saturday off to go to a sporting event. Both people can’t have the day off. In each situation, the men only care about their outcome (taking Saturday off). They don’t care about the other’s concerns. Each will try to convince their boss to give him the day off. This is a situation characterized by the expression, “I win and you lose”.
Yielding: There are many times, especially in long-term relationships, when a person intentionally loses. This is called yielding. Instead of, “I win, you lose”, the phrase for yielding is, “I lose, you win.” It seems counterintuitive to allow someone to win in a negotiation so let’s look at a quick situation: Denise’s husband wants to go see an action-packed movie. Denise doesn’t really care about the type of movie they see and would prefer to have her husband happy so she allows her husband to “win” the negotiation. We often allow people to win in a negotiation because we know that in the future something will come up that we really care about and if we let the other person win in this negotiation even, the next time it will be your “turn” to win.
Problem solving: The words, “win-win” capture what occurs when people employ the problem solving approach to conflict management. For example, Zeluis and Hilga are trying to develop a proposal for a client that both share. Instead of being competitive, both want to act in the best interests of their client. Both care about each other’s outcomes, but also care about their own outcomes. They will work together to resolve conflicts.
Inaction: There are times when you should walk away from conflict. Inaction describes the situation where your outcomes and the other person’s outcomes are of no importance. When the other person is acting unethically, for example, you should walk away.
Compromising: If you have a moderate concern for your outcomes as well as the other’s, it is called compromising. For example, if Jim wants to eat at a Mexican restaurant and Dave at a Chinese restaurant, they may find a compromise because both are only moderately concerned about where they eat.
At the beginning of this segment, I asked you to think of a conflict situation in which you were involved. Which method of conflict resolution did you employ? Keep in mind that there is no one best way to approach conflict. Much depends on the characteristics of the situation.