Building culture for co-production - Chapter 7. Working with conflict

Conflict, like collaboration, arises naturally in any system. Conflict wants to become learning. Conflict is full of potential learning.

When we are in conflict, we often feel lots of difficult emotions such as guilt, embarrassment or shame. Our minds also tell us stories to explain what is happening. To allow conflict to transform into learning, we need to give these thoughts and feelings space to be and to change.

Minor conflicts, referred to as micro-conflicts, are more readily resolved before additional emotional and cognitive layers accumulate or challenging interactions become habitual. By fostering supportive and courageous environments, we can prevent micro-conflicts from escalating and, in some cases, facilitate their transformation into valuable learning opportunities.

If a micro-conflict remains unattended, it may naturally dissipate or it may ‘flare up’ into something bigger. This is when we need help from others to mediate, witness and support the transformation of our conflict. This takes time and patience and often involves the transformation of a wider group of people.

The aim in all of the suggestions below is to find ways to deepen and strengthen our relationships, to add more tools to our compassionate practices tool kit and to notice and take on board any changes that are needed to wider systems, using the social model.

Just to clarify; we are not trying to prevent conflict from occurring. Instead, we are trying to enable conflict to transform into some form of learning. We don’t know what form this learning will take, but we are learning how to help it emerge.

Prevention involves addressing group and individual needs, even conflicting ones, as early and compassionately as possible.

This often means changing how we meet and speak with each other. Here are some of the ideas that we have tried. Many of these ideas arose from conflict transformation processes that are described in the next section.

Ideas for ways in which to prevent conflict arising:

• embed compassion practices into your meeting procedures; develop a rhythm and form habits that work for your whole team. Flex these when you feel ready to try something new.
• agree guidelines for how you expect the team to engage and interact with each other in team meetings. Keep this guide at hand, so that you can use it to inform decisions in respect of this topic. Reflect on it at intervals to check that it is working for everyone.
• introduce timers into your meeting or sharing circles and have a compassionate way of indicating when the time is up.
• appoint a ‘vibe-watcher’; a person whose role is to check for when the temperature of the meeting rises or the conversation becomes heated. They can then call for a minute of silence to reset and/or invite all participants to ‘call time’ if they need a break at any point during a meeting or sharing circle.
• when the group checks in at the start of meetings, allow members to request more time for sharing, especially if they feel the need for additional consideration, e.g. if they feel like they have a personal challenge that would benefit from a longer time to speak, be heard and/or get feedback. Part of the meeting should then be allocated to the task of listening to anyone who feels they need to be heard and, if requested by the individual with the challenge, for feedback. This may include requesting time in a breakout room with someone specific, or not, in order to have the necessary attention in a timely manner.
• hold occasional ‘spotlight’ meetings when one particular person is given the opportunity and space to feel heard and where they can talk about what is important to them and why they have attended the meeting.
• you may wish to agree certain visual clues that can be used instead of breaking into the flow of someone’s words, such as:
  • a self-hug to indicate sympathy and understanding
  • a finger over the lips to ask for silence
  • heart-shaped hands or a thumbs up
  • drawing a big circle in the air (signalling "Wrap it up!") when a person's time is up

Conflict is an inevitable part of life, and we will all experience it.

Provided we are not in danger, conflict is not always a sign that something is wrong. It is however, always an opportunity to learn and grow.

Listening isn’t agreeing.

How can we agree to disagree and/or agree to talk more deeply?

What are we trying to do?

When we are trying to respond compassionately to conflict, we are experimenting with practical actions that might:

• maintain curiosity and increase understanding
• help us with co-regulation of our physical and emotional states
• help us work out how to agree to disagree and still work together productively
• help us explore how our different realities inter-relate

Self-protection and safety

There is no learning without risk. Just learning something is unlikely to feel entirely comfortable until we have got a real appetite for putting this learning into practice.

Not all days are as good as each other. It is important to assess the situation, to choose when we are ready to engage in attempting a deeper compassionate response and when we need to gently retreat to a recovery space.

We spot conflict with someone else by noticing conflict inside us. Possibly the most important thing we have noticed is that when there is a conflict with someone else, we are only able to spot this by noticing a conflict feeling inside us. That internal conflict is something we can work on either at the time or later, either with others or (to some extent) alone.

What can I do for myself?

Here are some of the things we are trying, to help us remain in the moment, as calmly as we can, when we have just realised that we’ve noticed a conflict:

• feel our feet on the floor or our body on the chair
• safety Position, i.e. hand on heart, hand on belly
• butterfly Hug, i.e. crossed arms, tapping fingers on our clavicle
• calm the amygdala by slowly looking around the room, soaking everything in
• counting to ten before responding
• asking for time out or a moment to breathe

Using these methods or otherwise, we can attempt to notice where in the body we are feeling conflict. Then we can politely excuse ourselves or we can re-engage in listening or conversing.

How does this internal conflict feel?

What is it trying to contribute to the conversation?

How can I invite the other person to join me?

Preparing

We have carried out successful mediations many times. Mediation is an emergent process. Every conflict is unique, and it is important to trust the process, to trust yourself to respond in the moment and to trust in not knowing what will happen.

Stay present to what is happening and allow things to unfold. The centre of the disagreement may clarify and dissipate at any time during this process.

Offer a named mediator and support mediator to the two participants. Are they happy to work with these mediators? If not, offer alternative mediators.

Invite all 4 participants to bring a witness with them, not to take part in the conversation but to watch and listen, to be extra ears for the participants or for the wider learning system.

Before meeting, the lead mediator can provide questions or documents based on the details of the mediation task, separately to each participant. These enable participants to reflect, think, and perhaps write, about themselves, their feelings, style and motivation, before the session.

Make it clear at this stage that more than one session might be necessary to provide the support needed and could be part of a longer process.

Coming together

The process of exploring and supporting change together can be held in a virtual or actual room. Quiet music as you enter the room can be helpful to enable a calm start, with minimal conversation.

The mediator welcomes everyone to the space. In a virtual meeting, they may spotlight the four participants to focus our attention. In a physical room, witnesses may be asked to move their chairs two paces back.

The mediator explains the process we will be using, including the four steps that participants have already seen on the preparation document.

• Motivation - The Story of Us
• Fears and Hopes
• Interaction Styles & Warning Signs
• Appreciation

These are based on evidence from appreciative enquiry. This starts with determining what is working well, and what our aspirations are (rather than what is broken or not working). This can help us to move forward more effectively. We might come back to these more difficult things later in the process.The mediator will explain the following:

the difference between rules-based and principle-based systems.

the challenges of adrenaline in our bodies when we are in a challenging session such as this and how this reduces our ability to hear.

• the role of the witnesses to help overcome this challenge by listening. They are asked to be impartial, fair, observational and kind.

that mediators will be taking notes to share with participants.

the time that is being allowed for this first session, including any renegotiation that is necessary at this stage, e.g. if someone has another meeting immediately after this, then this session should close earlier to allow for transition.

• accepting not knowing quite what is going to happen and trusting learning to emerge.

The mediator checks whether everyone feels good and safe enough to give today’s session a try. If not, we will resume on another day, place or time.

The lead mediator introduces the support mediator who will be helping with time keeping and vibe watching. They will ask people to stop speaking once they have had their allotted time. They may suggest that everyone takes a moment to pause if emotions are running high. The support mediator explains that others can also call for a pause whenever they need to.

(You can share out the tasks in different ways, as suits the mediation team.)

If appropriate, the support mediator provides a grounding exercise suitable to the group.

The lead mediator explains how much you are hoping to cover today, that the pace of the meeting will be slowed to allow more time, if it is feeling too rushed.

Motivation - The Story of Us

This section is about our desire, or just the need, to be together in the same space. What are the reasons you choose to collaborate? Why do you, <<name>>, need to collaborate with <<name>>? And <<name>>, why do you need to collaborate with <<name>>? 

Who would like to go first?

[this person remains first for this and all of the following questions.]

The question is repeated for the other person. Each answer is timed (e.g. 3 minutes).

Silences are welcomed and held. At the end of the time, the support mediator signals, and if necessary, states, that time is up.

The mediator may gently ask whether there is more to say and if/when there is completion, offer a final pause before moving on to the next section.

Fears and hopes

Fears - Explain the importance of fears and the power that fear can have over us if it is not expressed/observed. This is about the fears you have around this relationship. Do you have any fears and what are they?

[again, each participant is given their own time to answer]

Hopes - Naming your hopes will help you to know that you’re on the right track together and to celebrate together when someone’s hopes have been reached.

What are your hopes?

[again, each participant is given their own time to answer]

Interaction styles and warning signs

It is a human foible to see ourselves as the centre of the universe; when someone says something unkind, we think immediately that this is about us but there may be many other reasons that are actually not related to us at all.

Interaction styles - This question has 2 parts, the first part of this question is about how and when you are at your best. Acknowledging that life is hard, and we may seldom be at our best.

On your very best day, what is your natural style when you are in a good place?

The second part is an acknowledgement of your personal style. How do you like to work and be?

[again, each participant is given their own time to answer]

Warning signs - Now for the opposite, again in two parts. Firstly, when things are stressful or difficult, what might other people notice about you, what are the warning signs they might see? What do you need when you are in this state? And secondly (perhaps the hardest part to do) what would help you to feel less stressed?

This is to help with self-realisation, but also to help you to support each other.

When things start to be stressful, I look like this….

When things start to get stressful, I need this…

[again, each participant is given their own time to answer]

Possibly a good point to take a short break, if you haven’t done that yet.

Whenever you are restarting, restart with an acknowledgement of gratitude from the mediator.

This next step is to work on expectations. Is there anything we need to go over before we start that? You may not remember everything, of course, that is fine. We will share notes with you so that you can see each other’s contribution after the session. Is there anything else that needs to be said or heard before we move on?

Appreciation

Coming in reverse order this time (and leaving the agenda for a moment), I’d like to invite each of you to share something that you appreciate or admire in the other person.

[again, each participant is given their own time to answer]

Expectations

The mediator may be able to draw out an example that has already emerged, if so, what else can you do to support and help each other in the future?

[again, each participant is given their own time to answer]

Closing

Thank everyone, note the progress, however small the steps, explain where further support is available and agree the next meeting if required.

Remove the spotlight or move the chairs forward again.

Invite a check out comment from any or everyone in the group.

Notes

Remember that you may not get through all these stages in one session. That is fine. It is ok to meet as many times as required.

We are creating a positive learning space that is just one space on a much longer journey of learning in all our meetings and interactions together.

Learning in the virtual space is preparation for learning beyond the availability of these spaces.

Generative conflict takes practice, be gentle and keep practicing.

Other things that may be useful

Broccoli Seed Agreement – Gesturing Towards Decolonial Futures

The Transformative Power of Restorative Justice with Charlotte Calkin