When there’s conflict in your organization

Erwin is a manager of a business processing company. One afternoon, a subordinate went to him to report about a shouting match amongst his subordinates. Erwin nonchalantly dismissed the report as irrelevant and not worth of his time. After a week, Erwin was a witness to a brutal fight involving the subordinates that had a previous shouting match. 

How should you react when there is a report of conflict in your organization? Should you simply dismiss it as a quarrel amongst children or you immediately act to resolve it? The wise course of action to do is to immediately resolve it. Because when you simply dismiss it, it will grow and have a natural life that could result to something tragic.

However, many of us perhaps put it aside or we outright dismiss it because we are too busy with work. But the crux of the matter is conflicts are disturbance of smooth organizational life. It creates dysfunction not only in the organization but also in the respective lives of those who are involved. So, when there’s a report of conflict don’t dilly dally immediately act to resolve it. For it will save you and the organization from unwanted trouble.

How are you going to resolve it? Don’t take sides, be objective and be impartial. Be as calm as possible and don’t overemphasize your authority. Let them speak and attentively listen to the parties involved and act more as a friend than a judge. Why? Because in doing so you’ll be able to gain their trust and confidence. Thus, you’ll be able to ferret out the truth immediately.

After hearing both sides, mediate and let those who are involved be reconciled. And after that give them time to speak if they want to speak then urged them to shake hands. Then  close the meeting with a prayer.

Whether we like it or not the ugly head of conflict will come out every now and then. Nonetheless, a good, calm and effective manager/leader can easily navigate the organization towards its immediate resolution. – Marino J. Dasmarinas   

On sustaining the gains of an off-site team building

A few months ago I assisted in the conduct of a two days team building session. Seeing the organization break the barriers of communication and alienation was very fulfilling to say the least. Before we ended the top executives of the organization imparted their views on how they appreciate the improved functional and cross-functional relationships among them.

They said that, the invisible walls which formerly isolated individuals and departments were broken. And they now have a one team one vision mentality.  However, as I was listening to them, I asked myself this question: “Would they be able to sustain the gains of the team building session and who will lead it?”

Who will lead the program and how will she/he keep the fire of the team spirit burning? The driver of course is the CEO/Manager. He should see to it that the gains of the team building session is sustained to the hilt. Until the next off-site team building session comes along.

To be able to sustain the team spirit gained in the off-site team building session managers/leaders may want take a look at these two guidelines:

       1. Encourage communication and openness in the organization – What makes an off-site team building exercise/game successful? It’s communication the team that communicates effectively is the team that wins the activity/game. The team that does not effectively communicates doesn’t win. Therefore, managers should see to it that this culture of effective communication is brought and harnessed inside the organization. Communication is like an oil being poured into a rusted bicycle chain. It eliminates rust which creates cranking sound, it strengthens the chain and it exposes the weak links in the chain so that can be replaced or repaired. This is also what communications does to an organization.    

         2. Make the hierarchical organizational structure invisible as the need arises – One of the effects of organizational hierarchy is it creates unintended division. Notice during lunch breaks, who normally are present on a table for lunch? It’s the employees who are in the level of the same organizational hierarchy. For example, lower level managers cluster themselves on a table during lunch time. Same case with the middle level, top level managers and the ordinary employees. They create their own clusters which is divisive and sometimes elitist.

It’s very rare to see lunch tables with cluster of employees from different hierarchies. But truth be told, its during this instance that the organizational hierarchy should be made invisible. Why?  To continue to promote cross-functional team spirit and openness inside the organization.

What do you think? – Marino J. Dasmarinas 

The silo mindset in your organization and how to cure it

During the cold war era (1947-1991) between the United States of America (USA) and Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). The united states built many missiles armed with nuclear warheads. They individually hid these missiles inside underground silos to conceal it from detection by the USSR. These missile silos were independent from each other and it can launch a nuclear armed missile by itself.

Many organizations today have a literal silo existence among its departments. For example, the four functional areas of an organization: human resource, accounting, marketing and manufacturing departments. These four functional areas/departments function independently from each other. Inside these four major organizational departments are layers of many more  departments with the same behavior.

These departments if not carefully watched could imbibe a silo mindset. This means that there is a possibility that they could function independently from each other. Which obviously is counter productive in the life of an organization.

So, how do we cure this silo mindset? And how can we transform this independent departments to become interdependent departments? How can we break the attitude of competition and selfishness among these departments?

The person that will lead the curing of the silo mentality is the top gun of the organization. It’s the CEO or company president for big corporations and the managers for small organizations. What they have to do is to organize a permanent grouping of employees who will represent the different departments.

Their extra task is to see to it that the department where they belong is still in harmony with the overall objective of the organization. The moment these members observe that their department is slowly veering away from the objective of the organization. It is their responsibility to re-align again the department which they represent to the overall organizational objective. 

Together with the organization’s top gun, these members will serve as the catalyst in curing this dangerous silo mindset. How would they do it? 

The following are my humble suggestions: 1. Emphasize the need to align with the overall organizational Vision/Mission 2. Use face to face communication once in a while rather than always using electronic communication 3. Encourage unity instead of diversity 4. Break existing behavioral arrogance, closemindedness and egotism then replace it with humility, openness and the willingness to listen. – Marino J. Dasmarinas   

The folly of shock and awe mentality

Jonathan, a newly retired general was invited by his friend to become the Chief Executive Officer of his business conglomerate. John accepted the offer with the thought in mind that he will use the shock and awe strategy in running the organization. So that he could immediately dominate his subordinates and impose his will upon them.

He therefore immediately buckled down to work. His first act was to call for a meeting among the managers of the business conglomerate. During the meeting John immediately emphasized his authority by dominating the meeting. And not allowing the anyone to question his pronouncements. The meeting ended with the managers feeling threatened and paralyzed by their new Chief Executive Officer.     

Shock and awe strategy is useful as a military tactic when you want to immediately conquer and decimate your enemy. This require rapid and swift dominance by the attacking force to immediately destroy the will to fight and morale of the enemy.

However, in a civilian/private organizational setting this shock and awe mindset will never work. Why?  Because in a private organizational setting there’s no human enemy to conquer. What is to be conquered is the flawed behaviors of the human resource. The flawed system and processes of the organization. And no C.E.O can conquer a flawed behavior, system and processes by using this shock and awe strategy.  

A leader/manager who would use this shock and awe strategy is an egocentric and autocratic leader/manager. And this kind of manager/leader has no place in our modern and technologically driven organizations today.

Organizations today thrive in dialogue, communication and democracy. The same with our leaders and managers today. They also are successful when they are open to dialogue, communication and democracy. – Marino J. Dasmarinas  

Social media and your millennial employees

Darla is a nineteen years old effective supervisor in a call company. She complained to her manager about their organization’s denial of social media access whenever they are already inside their organization’s premises. Her manager told her to simply focus on her work and not complain about access on social media. After a month, citing their organziation’s restrictive social media access darla resigned.

How are you managing a millennial employee such as darla? A millennial or generation Y employee is someone who was born between 1980-2000. They have a strong desire for work life balance which means that it’s not all work when an employee is already within the organization’s premises. While official work time is not yet starting employees such as darla should be given some leeway on matters of access to social media.

 Organizations today can effectively motivate and manage their millennial employees if they would allow them social media access.  Given the modernity of our time right now it’s very wise for employers to allow social media access for its employees. Why? For the simple reason that social media access is already part and parcel of employees need for work-life balance. Therefore, it would be more prudent for organizations to give their millennial employees free access to social media subject to limitations of course.

Majority if not all millennial employees are extroverted by social media. They wish to be connected with as many people as possible because this is already part of the millennial work life culture right now.

In fact, the desire to be connected and to have social media access is not only limited to the millennials. Social media access is also very much desired by generation X employees or the baby boomers they are those who were born in the early 1960s up to the late 1970s.

The poet John Donne said: “No man is an island.” This means that nobody is self-sufficient, we need each other to survive and thrive in this world. This quote from John Donne still rings true today in the social media driven organizational life of an employee.

In order for millennial employees to have work life balance. And for them to be more motivated in their work they certainly need fast and accessible social media access.  This access is of course subject to the discipline of the organization. – Marino J. Dasmarinas  

Do not limit your motivational instrument with reward and punishment

Do you still use the traditional method of motivation called reward and punishment? Reward and punishment or the carrot and stick method of motivation goes this way: Rewards are given to an employee to sustain a positive behavior. For example: promotion, monetary incentive, recognition and the like.  The punishment is administered to force an employee to correct an errant behavior or to push an employee to correct an errant behavior. This has been the traditional motivation approach.

Is this kind of motivation technique still effective in this modern time and with millennial human resource around? Not anymore, the human resource one hundred to fifty years ago is very much different from the human resource today. The human resource then, did not have the luxury of technological modernity. So different from the present-day human resource where they can navigate the world anytime using their smart phones.

Therefore, there should be additional upgrades when motivating the millennial human resource today. The number one upgrade is to insert social relevance to the work that they are doing. For example, a call center agent should not only be told to sell products or solicit clients.

They must be informed of the relevance of what they are doing in relation to his family and his personal wellbeing. If the organization could inject this idea in the mindset of its human resource. It would serve as a point of motivation for them not only to work hard but to put more value into their assigned work.

The organization could also make the work environment homey and environmental friendly.  This could be done by creating a relaxed and plant friendly atmosphere. If the organization would innovate this way, this would certainly serve as a new motivational tool for its human resource. Who would not be motivated to work in this kind of atmosphere?   

The organization should also encourage participation of its human resource in decision making most especially in their work area. Gone are the days wherein management would always force its ideas on their workers. And the workers would have no other choice but to simply accept the decisions of management whether they like it or not.  

As technology evolves and upgrades motivational approaches of organizations toward its modern-day human resource must also evolve and upgrade. Otherwise they would be left behind and be extinct eventually. – Marino J. Dasmarinas

About predictable behaviors

There is a story of a manager who was always late going to work hence his subordinates would also be late always. He was also at all times very lenient to a fault to his subordinates. These predictable behaviors resulted in his demotion. Why? For the simple reason that it bred complacency and lack of discipline among his subordinates.

There is another story of a manager who was always early at work, he would always be there twenty minutes before the official office time. He is also strict when at work but friendly and just wants to be treated as of the boys when not at work. His subordinates took notice of his behavior. Thus, they saw to it that they would always be early when reporting for work. They also observe discipline when at work.

Predictable behavior can always work for a manager/leader when that predictable behavior is positive. On the other side a predictable behavior can also work against a manager/leader if the predictable behavior is negative, as exemplified in our first story.  

A good manager/leader should always sustain a positive predictable behavior. Because a positive predictable behavior is obviously good for a person’s image. It will also help him move upward in the organizational hierarchy.   Positive predictable behavior always works as an invisible advance party for the person who has it. It makes his organizational life easier it also breeds respect among peers and subordinates.

What if a manager/leader has a negative predictable behavior? Of course, it’s no brainer that this kind of /manager/leader should reform and earnestly ditch his negative predictable behavior. Otherwise, he will be up for reprimand, demotion even separation. – Marino J. Dasmarinas 

How to handle enemies in your workplace

Do you have enemies in your workplace? Some of us may have enemies, not that we create enemies for ourselves. But there really are people who behave like they are the boss even if they are not the boss. Many of them have boorish behavior that they bring into the workplace.

So, how would we handle them? The first that we have to do is to simply ignore them. When we ignore them, we let them drown in their own arrogance and foolishness. This kind of behavior when ignored normally dies a natural death.  

However, there are those who are so arrogant that they would persist to annoy us even if we’ve been ignoring them. They would try to bait us to stoop to their level. What then should we do? Should we as well stoop to their sewer level behavior? Of course not! We have to take the higher plane by not stooping to their level.

Would this mean that we will simply let them annoy us and we do nothing to extinguish their errant behavior? Absolutely not! Everything has its own limit or tipping point. Sooner or later there would come a time that we have to face them so that their errant behavior could be addressed permanently.

And when we do so we have to be firm, we should not back down and we have to stand our ground no matter the odds against us. There are trouble makers in the workplace for the simple reason that we allow them to create trouble. – Marino J. Dasmarinas

Effective Planning: The vehicle for the achievement of your Goal/s

Effective Planning is a very important component in the achievement of organizational goals. We cannot speak of successful goals without carefully assessing the plans on how to best achieve it.

A goal is a time bound future target that we all wish to accomplish. However, how come that there are goals that are not achieved? The answer lies with ineffective planning. We would not be able to speak of successfully achieved goals without planning effectively to achieve it.

Effective planning is the vehicle that would bring us to the realization of our goals since without it there would be no realization of goals. Planning is a management function that involves setting goals and effectively using every means available on how best to achieve them.

 For example, a sales manager whose goal is to increase his sales output by ten percent (10%) for the next quarter. She/he must see to it that there is a carefully laid out plan that would effectively support the realization of her/his goal. Perhaps, she/he can educate his sales staff on how to discover untapped markets. She/he can also use motivational methods on his sales staff or close monitoring of their outputs and so forth.

An effective Manager/Leader is someone who always see to it that whenever there are Organizational Goals to be achieved. There are also complementary Plans that would effectively support the achievement of said organizations Goal/s. - Marino J. Dasmarinas 

Does your organization have a viable Vision?

What is organizational vision? Organizational vision gives an organization a reason for its existence. It keeps an organization going and moving and it’s the lifeblood and future of an organization.

We cannot understate the importance of Vision in an organization. In fact an organization without a viable Vision is like a headless chicken that runs around without any direction whatsoever. 

After spinning for a few seconds or minutes the headless chicken dies. This is the same with an organization without a viable Vision. It would exist for a period of time, it may even earn profit but at a definite point in its life it will cease to exist simply because it has no viable Vision.

In the Bible it says: “Without prophecy the people become demoralized (Proverbs 29:18).” Relating this with an organizational setup. This simply says that a person who works for an organization that has no viable vision would eventually loss its trust on the organization. This loss of trust would eventually lead to his/her resignation.

A viable vision creates a sense direction for an organization and its human resource. Therefore to achieve success, every organization must firmly hinge its plans for the future on its Vision. This same viable Vision also would convince its human resource to stay put and spend the rest of their working lives in that organization.

Does your present organization have a viable Vision? - Marino J. Dasmarinas

On respect and humane treatment of your workers

There’s a story about a priest who had a boorish behavior, being the head of his parish he would act as if he was the king and master. He would give unbendable instructions to the head of church organization and he wants it followed to the letter.

His world and instructions were the norms and laws of his parish even if it’s flawed. For the reason of his arrogance and lack of humility the spirit of volunteerism declined. And nobody was willing anymore to give their time to their local church. 

In so many ways a business organization is like a parish church organization. The priest who is the head and leader of the parish church is also like the manager/leader of a business organization. And the volunteer workers of the church are very much like the employees of a business organization.

What differentiates them is those who work for the business organization have a regular salary. However, even if they have regular salaries it doesn’t guarantee that they would work hard and stay longer in the organization. They should also be treated humanely and with respect otherwise they would resign.

Why? This is for the reason that workers are humans they have feelings and emotions.  They value organization and organizational managers/leaders that treats them with respect and dignity. Many business managers and leaders have this mindset that salary only is enough to make an employee work hard and stay in the organization.

But it doesn’t work that way, salary even if it’s big will not make a worker work hard and stay. Humane treatment, respect and the feeling that they are treated as a family would make them work hard and stay longer even forever in your organization. – Marino J. Dasmarinas 

Keeping calm under a heightened situation

Can you avoid a tense organizational situation from getting out of hand? For example, you were suddenly confronted by an angry co-worker who is shouting at you? Should you return the favor by shouting back? Or should you remain calm under that heightened situation.

Many would return the favor by shouting back because nobody wants to be insulted by anyone. This is our normal reaction we fight fire with fire and we will look for those who’ve thrown stone at us. But is this the right action to do? To fight anger with anger to get even with those who are angry with us?

Mahatma Gandhi an advocate of nonviolent resistance once said that, "An eye for an eye would only make the whole world blind.” What does this profound statement mean? This simply mean that we should always remain composed when we are under a tense, heightened and stressful situation. In this case being shout at by an angry co-worker.

It’s always not wise to angrily respond to somebody who is provoking you for the simple reason that it may get out of hand. And you end up being dragged into their level. What you should instead do is to always take the high road by not stooping to his/her level even if it’s oftentimes difficult to do.

For example, what would we get if we throw mud at those who are throwing mud at us? We end up being forced by them to react the way they want us to react. Thus we are no different from them.

The wisdom filled action that we should do under this stressful and heightened situation is to keep calm and never fight anger with anger. By doing so we simply show our composure, education and breeding.    

After the hot situation has died down as it always will. it’s now your time to civilly call the attention of the person and ask him/her why she did that unfortunate action. You could do this by using the proper channels of communication so that the misunderstanding could be properly and amicably ironed out. – Marino J. Dasmarinas  

Email or face to face communication?

Santiago is a millennial manager and he is the typical millennial who is well versed on modern communication. And he loves to maximize the usefulness of this modern vehicle of communication. He therefore sent out a memo to his staff mandating them to use email as the primary method of official communication. So that they could maximize and have full utilization of office time.  

They immediately adopted the instruction to use email as primary instrument of communication. However, after one month Santiago noticed disharmony amongst his subordinates, there were walls that divides them and team spirit was non-existent in the function of his people. 

Using email as a vehicle for office communication is helpful. However, it should not be utilized as the only method of official office communication. Why? For the simple reason that it would eventually create division, chaos and disagreement amongst the people working in the organization.

For example, when you only use email as the primary mode of communication it limits clear understanding on the issues being discussed. It hinders immediate actions, feedbacks and reactions. It will eventually promote disunity instead of unity and it will hasten the buildup of walls as a replacement for bridges of communication.  

Hard to believe? Simply imagine a family which is by the way a micro form of organization. The parents represent the managers/leaders and the children are the subordinates. Let us visualize them as using emails as their primary vehicle of communication.

This micro organization called family would soon have a very restrictive mode of communication. For the simple reason that email communication will not help in clearly clarifying family issues most especially sensitive family issues. It would sooner or later promote disunity, ambiguity and friction inside the family. Pretty soon there would be a broken family and wayward and misguided children.

Same goes for a real life organization when it uses email as the primary vehicle of communication instead of partnering it with face to face interactions. – Marino J. Dasmarinas    

An Effective and good Manager/Leader is a good Listener

There is story about a father who was so focused on his responsibility to provide for his family. He would go to work early and go back home late. And his reason is he simply wants to provide the best that he could provide to his family that’s why he works doubly hard.

But in the process of working hard he was slowly but surely detaching himself from his wife and his children. There was limited personal interactions with them. Why? For the simple reason that he has no more time to listen to them. 

In an organizational setup a manager/leader should also be a good listener. What does this mean? This means that the leader/manager should allocate a portion of his time to listen to his subordinates to matter how busy he is.

The reason behind is through listening you will know the soul of your subordinates. Through listening you would also know the unseen events that happens in your organization which could have implication upon your leadership.

What would happen when you listen to your subordinates? They will look up to you and respect you more; they will see in you a mother or a father figure. Whom they can run into for support when something is bothering their minds.

What is the reward of this on your part as a leader/manager?  Your further cement your image as a good and effective manager/leader: A manager who listens and empathize to the plight of your subordinates.

Through listening you also make your job easier because your will gain the respect, loyalty and cooperation that any leader/manager would want from his subordinates. – Marino J. Dasmarinas  

Stopping sexual harassment in the workplace

Alicia is a twenty-eight years old supervisor in a five-star hotel, she was aspiring to become the section manager of the steward department. So she submitted her application together with the pertinent papers required by the higher position.

After a few days her attention was called for an interview by the manager of the hotel. So, she reported to the office of the manager for an interview. During the interview the potbellied and burly hotel manager asked her to stand and come near him. Then he immediately grabbed her behind and salaciously said to her: “You have a nice behind, I want you in bed with me tonight!”

Alicia fiercely answered back, slapped the manager and she said to him: “You bastard you have no right to do it!” I will report you to the president of this hotel and I will also report you to the police for violating me!” The manager begged the woman not to do it but she had already decided to report his acts of sexual harassment.

Sexual harassers could be a man or a woman and it’s not solely about a person’s desire to have sex with his/her prey. Primarily sexual harassment emanates from a person’s desire to dominate a certain individual. Who is applying for a higher position or who is asking for a favor from a person with a higher organizational authority.

Therefore, sexual harassment is actually about individuals who are power trippers! They use their power as a leverage to take advantage of their prospective prey or victim.  It’s actually very hard to be in conflict with them for the simple reason that they are very powerful!

However, if you want to stop these sex maniacs you have no other choice but to have the courage to expose them! Nevermind if you might be ostracized or even if others will not believe you for doing so.

Why is it that you might be ostracized or others will not believe in you? For the simple reason that these sex maniacs are very powerful and they have their own network of very powerful people to even destroy your credibility.

Nevertheless, you have to have the courage to vigorously expose them no matter how powerful they are! For this is the only way that you can stop sexual harassment in the workplace. – Marino J. Dasmarinas

The leader/manager and the Management function of planning

John is a newly appointed department head in a call center company. Upon assuming his position his first activity for the day was to define the goals and plans of his department. He projected in advance the demands of their clients and through his planning he saw to it that his department would be able to meet their client’s future demand.  

What is the importance of planning in a manager’s/leader’s life in the organization? An effective manager/leader uses planning to implement his plans in advance. This plan is not simply based on their whims and caprices it is rather based on sound method, analysis and projection. When a manager/leader uses the management function of planning it should always be realistic and pragmatic.

 Why is it important for a leader/manager to have a plan? It is important for the simple reason that planning helps the manager/leader create a realistic framework of action. Yet this framework of action doesn’t automatically ensure 100% success. However even if it doesn’t guaranty 100% success it’s always better to utilize the function of planning than not to utilize it for how would you move ahead without planning?

Planning also provides a point of reference where actual performance can always be compared vis-a-vis with the planned target. And if the actual performance doesn’t meet the planned target managers/leaders should make the proper adjustment to meet the realistic planned target.   

Planning also determines a future course of action based on the prevailing environment. That’s why it’s very important not to cast in stone our plans. Otherwise we cannot anymore fine-tune our plans when the business environment is against us. Planning should always be a continuing managerial and leadership function. This is for the reason that the moment the manager/leader stops planning his/her life the organization would also come to an end.

Through the management function of planning the hazy and cloudy future is made clearer, brighter and the future that is unknown is somehow made known. – Marino J. Dasmarinas

When rejection comes your way

Rudy was a newly hired human resource specialist in an information technology company. He was idealistic and had fresh insights that he wants instituted to his new organization. Therefore, he suggested to his manager on how they would specifically identify those who would be considered for future trainings and seminars. However, his suggestion was rejected.

Rejection is part and parcel of your organizational life. There would be instances that you would make suggestion which to your mind is helpful for your department/organization. But more often than not your suggestion/s will be rejected by your boss.

Would you take that rejection personally? Of course not! You take rejection in your organization in stride. Don’t take it personally otherwise you end up as a loser, take rejection as a challenge to make your work better and to work harder.

Perhaps when your idea is rejected you could silently say to yourself: “You rejected my input, so I move on without any ill feeling against anyone." This is the correct attitude to make when your input is rejected. You can also make a positive spin toward it by using it as your motivation to work harder.

Rejection of your idea or input should not stop you from giving your insightful input/s when there’s an opportunity to do so. Why? This is for the reason that every input that you recommend is a testament of your knowledge or insight.  

However, if you notice that after a year of giving insightful inputs your boss or your organization has not considered any of it. Perhaps, it’s time to look for greener pastures in other organizations who will make full use of your talents. – Marino J. Dasmarinas   

Prove your critics wrong

Santiago was promoted to become the head of their organization’s human resource department he was the youngest amongst the aspirants. After his promotion a poison letter was circulated besmirching his person and credibility. He took the attack on his person in stride and treated it simply as part of the hazards of his new job.

Critics and criticism are part and parcel of organization, they exist for only one reason and that is to bring you down or even destroy you. However, would you allow your critics to bring you down? Of course not! So what are you going to do? You don’t have to confront them. You simply have to prove them wrong and you have to use them as motivation to work even harder.

Many Leaders of managers commit the mistake of stooping to the level of their critics. Therefore, they confront their critics and this confrontation sometimes lead to verbal tussle or even physical wrangle. But it should not go to that extent because the moment you confront them you only are feeding their arrogance and their thirst for violence.

It’s useless to confront your critics instead, prove them wrong by working hard: let your positive work attitude do the talking. Thus, you take the high and educated road, the road where you will earn respect and esteem from your superiors, peers and subordinates. 

The road which will lead you to another promotion when the right opportunity comes. – Marino J. Dasmarinas          

Let the axe fall where it may fall

What would you do if your friend who happens to be your subordinate is caught by your security guard doing something illegal in your office? For example stealing of office supplies, should you exert effort to protect your friend by whitewashing the offense?   

Or you will not exert any effort to conceal the offense and let the investigation take its natural course until the truth is ferret out? Many organizational leaders and managers will do the right action by letting the natural course of events unfold.

Yet many would also try to protect the friendship or brotherhood by concealing the offense until it’s forgotten. So the offender will escape from any punishment however this is not the right course of action to take. For the reason that the moment the manager/leader does this he is actually telling his friend to do it again and again and again and he/she becomes party to the offense as well.

Yet we all know that crime does not pay sooner or later it will be payback time so the offender will be caught. And the manager/leader/friend will be unmasked as the protector. Why? For the simple reason that this is the natural flow of karma.

Therefore, to avoid any future complication and problem never protect an offender in your workplace. Let the natural flow of justice takes its course even if the subordinate offender is your best friend, fraternity brother or sister and the like.

In other words: Let the axe fall where it may fall for it will enhance your value as an effective, competent and impartial leader/manager.  -  Marino J. Dasmarinas       

How to solve infighting in your organization

Billy is the Chief Executive Officer in an organization that has a population of two hundred workers. Every now and then behavioral issues would crop up amongst his department managers, supervisors and workers. Foremost of these behavioral issues are infighting which eventually results to disharmony, friction and divisiveness.

How should the CEO solve this infighting in his organization? He must solve it without partiality to anyone or without fear or favor. For this is the best way to extinguish organizational conflict. If he would favor a certain group or personality for the reason that he is close to them, he would certainly not be able to solve it.

When a manager/leader smells infighting in his organization he must take action to solve it at the soonest possible time. For the simple reason that every second of inaction would disrupt the smooth operation of his organization.  For example if he was told that there’s a blossoming conflict amongst his supervisors he must therefore immediately look into the veracity of this information.

If he finds out that this information is true, he must immediately intervene so as to disrupt and immediately heal the conflict. He can best do this by privately calling the attention of the parties involve. Why privately and not publicly? For the simple reason that organizational conflicts such as infighting can immediately be solved privately and not publicly.

In the privacy of your office you meet and talk to the parties involve without any partiality. And if possible arrive at a solution of the infighting during the same meeting. This is for the reason that organizational problems and issues should be solved at the soonest possible time. Otherwise it would hurt your organization and your leadership. 

In talking with the parties involve blame game should be out of the picture immediately. Resolution to the infighting should be arrived at based on the issues and not on the involved personalities.

Lest I forget, the tenor of the meeting/talk should always be diplomatic never strong or hateful. As the Bible says: “A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. (Proverbs 15:1).” – Marino J. Dasmarinas