Background: Conflict management skill is an essential skill for an effective nurse leader.As inappropriate use of conflict resolution skills leads to degeneration of communication and poor working relationships particularly between nurse leader and their staff nurses.Aim: the current study aimed to determine the relationship between conflict management strategies used by head nurses, and the quality of vertical dyad linkage at Port Said hospitals. Subjects and Methods: A descriptive correlational design was applied in this study on 31 head nurses and 203 staff nurses working in Port Said General Hospital and Port Said Health Insurance Hospitals, using two tools; the first was Thomas-Kilmann conflict mode instrument to assess head nurses' preferred conflict resolution strategies, and the second was vertical dyad linkage scale from staff nurses point of view. Results:The results of the present study showed more than two-thirds of head nurses (67.7%) used accommodating strategy as a primary method to resolve conflict, followed by compromising strategy used by 51.6% by them to resolve conflict and less than two third (64%) of staff nurses had a neutral relation with their head nurses. Conclusion: Based on the results of the present study, it can be concluded that, there was no statistically significance relation between conflict management strategies used by head nurses, and the quality of vertical dyad linkage in Port-Said hospitals. It was recommended that head nurses should use conflict management styles depending on the situation. In addition to, develop an in-group relationship with as many staff nurses as possible.

Background: Conflict management is an essential skill for an effective nurse leader. As the inappropriate use of conflict resolution skills leads to degeneration of communication and poor working relationships particularly between nurse leader and their staff nurses. Aim: The present study aimed to determine the effect of conflict-management enhancing strategy for head nurses on the quality of vertical dyad linkage with nurses. Material and methods: Pre-experimental research design (one-group pretest-posttest) was used on 31 head nurses and 203 staff nurses working in Port Said Hospitals. Tools of data collection: Three tools were used; A Self-Administered Conflict Knowledge Questionnaire, Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument and Vertical Dyad Linkage Scale. Results: Revealed a statistically significant improvement in head nurses' knowledge regarding conflict and its management strategies after strategy implementation. Conclusion: There was a statistical improvement related to the quality of vertical dyad linkage among head nurses and their staff after implementation. So, the findings pointed to enhance head nurses' abilities related to conflict management through educational programs. Also, further researches are suggested in this area.