The first step in working with parties to resolve their
conflicts is to listen to each party’s side of the story. And even when the problem has been framed
as something quite serious, like a lawsuit or claim of discrimination
or the custody of a child, that problem often has roots in what can sound to
you like minor details. As the parties
vent to these seemingly minor transgressions, it is all too tempting to start
to judge and dismiss the parties’ concerns as trivial. This is a trap that a successful conflict resolver
must learn to avoid.
Whether you are a professional mediator, a manager dealing
with employees or a teacher handling schoolyard conflict, jumping immediately
to this type of judgement can prove to be counterproductive, even disastrous. When
you decide that something is too small to be this big of a deal, or too silly
to merit such emotional responses, you effectively put up a wall between you
and the people you are trying to work with.
This wall prevents you from fully hearing them out, and that keeps you
from helping them formulate a successful resolution to the issues at hand.
By listening without judgment, a few things happen that
help pave the path towards resolution.
First, every party that comes to you feels heard, and this is an
important first step. That feeling of
being heard is a key element to the trust that needs to get built between you
and the parties in order to help resolve their issues. Furthermore, listening without judgment is a
critical element of the active listening necessary to get all the information
needed to best fashion a resolution. If
you have your judgements in the way, you may miss the key thing that leads you
to help break through the impasse and get the parties focused on solutions.
I know all too well how tempting it is as a mediator to
sometimes want to hold up my hands and say, “Are you serious? This is what you’re upset about?” But I always remind myself that is not my role. After all, I haven’t been the one living with
these concerns for days, weeks, months or even years. I lack the information and perspective to
fully judge what’s being told to me, or how serious it really is. That information can only come from the
parties, and only by letting them explain everything they need to, can I then
work with everyone to move things forward and find a resolution. And working with people to find those solutions
is precisely my role.
The next time you find yourself in the middle of parties in
conflict, or perhaps in conflict yourself, try to listen to what is being told
to you without any judgement as to whether you think it’s a big deal or
not. It’s a big deal to the person you
are dealing with, and that means that it needs to be addressed in some way before
you can move forward.
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