Researchers have used various concepts to understand the conditions and dynamics by which conflict can be managed constructively. This review proposes that the variety of terms obscures consistent findings that open-minded discussions in which protagonists freely express their own views, listen and understand opposing ones, and then integrate them promote constructive conflict. Studies from several traditions also suggest that mutual benefit relationships are critical antecedents for open-minded discussion. This integration of research findings identifies the skills and relationships that can help managers and employees deal with their increasingly complex conflicts. Research is needed to deepen our understanding of the dynamics of open-minded discussion and the conditions that promote it as well as when open-mindedness is inappropriate. Training studies can test and show how the model of open-minded discussion supported by mutual benefit relationships can be applied in cross-cultural and other challenging settings.

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This study examines antecedents of turnover intention and job performance in China. The total sample consisted of 153 employees in a toy manufacturing factory in South China. Data from matched supervisor and subordinate responses supported the hypotheses that the workplace experience of perceived organizational support related to turnover intention which in‐turn related to individual job performance. Findings also indicated that the employees with traditional values and positive affectivity related significantly to perceived organizational support.

Opportunism in organizational partnerships may be understood in terms of how partners conclude that their self-interests are related to each other. When partners believe that their goals are competitively but not cooperatively related, they are tempted to pursue their self-interests opportunistically. Cognitive understandings and values of a shared vision may help partners believe their goals are cooperatively related. Results from 103 pairs of customer and supplier organizations support the argument that partnerships are not inevitably threatened by opportunism. Using structural equation analysis, the authors suggested that shared vision can help partners develop cooperative goals that lead to low levels of opportunism. These results suggest that a shared vision and cooperative goals are important foundations for effective organizational partnerships.

Competitors are increasingly forming partnerships to improve their capabilities to respond to customers and solve problems. This study uses research on guanxi and conflict management to identify critical conditions that facilitate effective collaboration between competitors. It theorizes that a high level of guanxi promotes cooperative and reduces competitive approaches to conflict that in turn facilitate partnership effectiveness. Data were collected from 100 paired competitors, operating in many industries in Shanghai, China. Results from the structural equation analysis indicated that a high level of guanxi reduces a competitive approach to conflict that in turn results in partnership effectiveness. These findings were interpreted as providing support that a high level of guanxi and a reduced level of the competitive approach to conflict are foundations for effective collaboration between competitors in China and perhaps in other countries as well.