CONSULTING CASE STUDY:

RESOLVING CONFLICTS
BETWEEN ADMINISTRATORS AND FACULTY

E. Michael Shays

A mid-western college and K-12 school trying to update its administrative, student life, and academic operations encountered great resistance in many quarters. Rather than try to mandate change through edict, the administration asked me to mediate between the opposing parties. Over a period of 17 monthly visits I successfully facilitated 11 changes in which the disputants developed solutions mutually acceptable to themselves and the administration. Some of the typical issues were conflicts between:

• the K-12 school and the college
• the alumni office and the career development department
• the college administration and the college faculty
• the Dads’ Club and the Moms’ Club (they agreed to merge)
• the computer technology office and the promotion department (over the proliferation of un-monitored web sites)
• the college admissions and publication departments

The process I used was getting the differing parties together to surface what each group wanted to accomplish in their roles and what concerns they had about what the other party wanted to accomplish. I then asked each group what the larger purposes were in wanting to achieve their goals or purpose. Frequently this resulted in the beginning of a dialogue between the parties thinking outside the box that resulted in a creative solution none of us had contemplated before the discussion. Sometimes it was necessary to meet with individuals separately to understand the emotional issues and help them to understand where the other party was coming from.

Usually we had acceptance by the end of my monthly visit. Sometimes it was necessary for me to follow up on my next visit before I met with the next pair of opposing advocates. Since we weren’t getting binding agreements to change, their agreements had to be nurtured to get them to step aside from their current work pressures to implement their agreements.

E. Michael Shays
The Focus Leader
EMS@EMSnetwork.com