Do conflict management styles affect group decision making? Evidence from a longitudinal field study

Abstract

This study examined the relationship between group conflict management styles and effectiveness of group decision making in 11 ongoing, naturally occurring workgroups from 2 large U.S. organizations. The major postulate of the study was that groups develop norms regarding how they will manage conflicts that carry over to affect other activities, such as decision making, even when these activities do not involve open conflict. To determine the impact of conflict management style on decision effectiveness, a longitudinal design was used that identified conflict management styles in the initial portion of each team's series of meetings and then analyzed a group decision taken in a meeting near the end of that series. Group conflict management styles were determined using observational methods, and decision effectiveness was measured using multiple indices that tapped member, facilitator, and external observer viewpoints. Task complexity also was considered as a possible moderating variable. The findings suggest that groups that developed integrative conflict management styles made more effective decisions than groups that utilized confrontation and avoidance styles. Groups that never developed a stable style were also less effective than groups with integrative styles.

Team conflict management and team effectiveness: the effects of task interdependence and team identification

“…Future longitudinal research in more controlled settings (but ideally with real, interacting teams) should be conducted before causal inferences regarding the relationships observed in the present study can be made with more certainty (Moye & Langfred, 2004). Moreover, considering conflict management at the team level raises some questions regarding the process of adopting and maintaining a particular stylistic choice, which might be more than a simple formulaic combination of individual styles (Kuhn & Poole, 2000). We suggest that further research address these questions and examine their implications for team performance.…”

“…It is also known as a competing, controlling, contending, win-lose, or zero-sum style (Rahim, 2001;Rahim et al, 2000). Studies that have extended the cooperativecompetitive conflict management typology to organizational settings (e.g., Kuhn & Poole, 2000;Tjosvold, 1999;Tjosvold et al, 2005;Tjosvold, Morishoma, & Belsheim, 1999) have demonstrated that conflict dynamics and team outcomes are greatly affected by whether team members emphasize a cooperative or a competitive conflict-management approach. According to Deutsch's (1973Deutsch's ( , 1980 theory of cooperation and competition, team members may choose to emphasize their common goals.…”

Decision development in facilitated modelling workshops

“…It also avoids the potential biases associated with averaging interaction data across groups to reach conclusions about the decision development processes of any one group. For example, Kuhn and Poole (2000) used a longitudinal case study approach to identify different conflict management patterns in 11 ongoing, naturally occurring workgroups from two large organisations, and relate them to decision effectiveness using multiple indices that tapped group member, facilitator and external observer viewpoints.…”

Identifying causes of disputes in creative industries: Lithuanian architecture segment case study

“…Properly managed conflict can improve group outcomes (Rahim, Bonoma 1979;Alper et al 2000;Kuhn, Poole 2000;DeChurch, Marks 2001;Lakis 2008). But more statistically realistic outcome of conflict is that it can create a destructive effect -reduces the effectiveness of the production (creative), the implementation of the project requires additional (unforeseen) resources, deteriorating labor environment, increased staff turnover or the loss of partners and customers and, in some cases, even litigation.…”