Fair Work Commission

What is conflict?

Conflict occurs when 2 or more parties disagree about a particular issue or course of action, and is an inevitable feature of any workplace.

Conflict can arise over matters such as:

• work health and safety
• rights and entitlements
• allocation of work
• performance management
• or simply different values or ideas.

Conflict can be between individuals or groups, and can escalate into a dispute when it’s not resolved early or carefully.

The Commission’s New Approaches: Cooperative and productive workplaces jurisdiction provides parties with tools to approach dispute resolution from a problem-solving perspective that focuses on each party's interests and seeks to resolve conflict through agreement.

A problem-solving approach to dispute resolution

Problem-solving is a consensus-seeking approach that can be used in almost any situation. It is a way of working things out that has practical implications for how decisions are made and how disputes may be prevented or resolved.

The joint problem-solving approach steps through the following processes:

• identifying the issues in dispute
• identifying stakeholders in the dispute, as well as their interests
• collecting information
• generating options
• developing criteria for assessing options
• selecting and trialling options
• implementing a solution and monitoring progress.

By applying the principles of joint problem-solving, employers, employees and their representatives can:

• uncover solutions that may not otherwise have been considered
• prevent future disputes from arising
• increase the acceptance of changes at work
• minimise the cost, inefficiency and damage often incurred through conventional dispute resolution processes
• reduce stress and frustration felt by those involved in a dispute
• deal with issues themselves more quickly and with a greater degree of control
• provide an opportunity for active engagement and for voices to be heard.

A joint problem-solving process enables management, employees, unions and other stakeholders to generate solutions together. As a tool, it can be applied to a particular problem, or it can become an integral characteristic of the organisation's culture.