Effective Conflict Resolution Strategies for Your Organization: Insights from Dr. Mary Grogan, EdD, PhD

Hello my friends, and welcome to another exciting episode of Negotiate Anything. This show is produced by the American Negotiation Institute and with over 5 million downloads and listeners in over 180 countries, listeners just like you have made this the number one negotiation podcast in the world. Hi, my name is Kwame Christian and I am the founder and CEO of the American Negotiation Institute here at A&I we believe that the best things in life are on the other side of difficult conversations. And we are passionate about providing you with the best content that will help you to make your difficult conversations easier both at work and at home. Lastly, I want to remind you that we offer consulting and conduct trainings both virtually and in person all around the world. Our focus is in three main areas. First, negotiation and conflict resolution. Second, leadership. And lastly, diversity, equity and inclusion. Check the link in the description below to learn more about how we could work with you and your team. And now, without further ado, let's jump into the interview. Mary, thanks for joining us today.

Thank you for having me. It's been exciting just waiting to come on and to meet you. Thank you.

Oh no, it's our pleasure to have you. And so before we get started, how about you get us started by telling us a little bit about yourself and what you do?

Okay, great. Well, I'm a long term educator. I started when I was way before you even needed a degree. So I've almost got, almost got 50 years of education and throughout that time I've taught and been a counselor. I was an itinerant counselor and I've been a principal here in Toronto in diverse cities where there's lots of immigrant refugee, lot of street fights, a lot of women's shelters, a lot of violence pockets. I was always in those heavy areas. And I've also been a principal abroad. I've been in the Caribbean and I had a chance to, to do conflict resolution training with school children there of course, pro bono. And I actually was invited to work on the campus with this security guards who had to deal with Americans who were, who were on campus and to avoid confrontation. Not physical, but there was a lot of times conflict would happen with students on campus. So I trained the security guards in conflict resolution and worked with the local administrative staff to professors and had a lot of fun role playing. And so I've, I have a long history of conflict resolution and I've incorporated into my professionalism and into the way that I deal with discipline in the way that I've parented, in the way that I have my own relationships with friends and Enemies and anybody who I'm in conflict so that I can have difficult conversation. I consider myself a change agent and a leader and a global citizen. So if you have that background, you know that you have to learn how to have a difficult conversation and you have to build that self awareness so that you can learn the skills to resolve conflict, negotiate and find peace.

That's fantastic. And I'm excited for this one. And I've been excited for a while because it's been probably about two years since we've had somebody talk about conflict resolution in the education space in schools. And so today what we're going to talk about is going to be the different levels of communication with conflict resolution. So we're going to talk about conflict resolution at the organizational level with your colleagues, the parental level, and then also with students as well. So let's talk about that organizational level. Conflict within school systems. What does that look like?

I think since I have started as a teacher, there are now committees and their processes in place. But what's interesting for me is that people are very reluctant to use them because they want to avoid the difficult conversation. So I was part of a peace mediation model that started in my board, the Catholic Board in Toronto. And I worked with psychology staff and other staff. And so there are place. It always looks like there's resolution models. But I know when there's a power imbalance, as there is with teachers and principals and with superintendents and regents, people are very reluctant. And I do not know of one instance where the first reaction to conflict was to call a union rather than to sit down. And so that's one of the things I had to do as a principal is kind of re educate. My staff said safe conversations are possible here. And I had to model it. So in my front door, in my school, my last school, it was in a pretty busy, hectic, diverse neighborhood and there had been a lot of shootings and there's some domestic violence shelters, homeless shelters. So it's a very typical mixed neighborhood. And it's funny, I had a big foyer and whenever I made it very clear whoever came to my office in anger because of either a behavioral or a teacher was angry if two teachers were having some problem with either a supply teacher or each other, or a bus driver or the police or whoever, that there was a chair at my front door underneath the statue actually of Mary. And I said, as long as you're sitting there, I don't hear a thing. And when your body's calm, my doors open. But I'm not Having you, I'm, I'm short, I'm five, two. Some of my teachers were much bigger than me. And I, I know my body does not react to somebody standing over me being very angry. So I said, I'm open to any conversation once the body's calmed. And if you can't find a space anywhere in the school, even if you're angry at a child, sit in the front door in the space and anything's possible. You could do anything, you could even shake the statue. As long as you don't. As long as your, your job is to listen to your body first and be like a rock and center in any conversation was possible.

That's fascinating. So there are a few things that I want to pull out from that. First, recognizing that within a leadership structure, you have to model that behavior. You can't just put forth a mandate and say everybody. You have difficult conversations at a higher level and stop avoiding them. But you recognize that in addition to making that message, that proclamation, you also have to model that behavior. I think that's really important just from a leadership perspective. And then the next thing is with the psychological safety that you've created within your own space. And I think that's really important. And so let's focus in on that term safety or psychological safety. What does that mean in the context of difficult conversations?

Well, you know and I know that whenever we're having a difficult conversation, our body reacts to a flight fright or some kind of either paralysis or it may go into an aggressive shaming, blaming. And so my clue is always the finger pointing of shaming and blaming. Or often it doesn't go anywhere, it usually escalates into something else. So that whole safety is about setting up rules for conversation. The rule is we stay in our seats, our hands stay in our pockets if you find yourself agitated. And that the conversation can begin with a framework, with an agreement of the rules. And the minute you can't manage, we need to call a break so people can actually leave, get their bodies centered, get a drink of water, paste, and there'll be no punishment. There's never punishment if you're self aware enough to recognize. I can't go further because sometimes when people come together with conflict, there's such a long history that you're not aware of. And I don't want to trigger people, especially children, who don't have the capacity almost to name those traumas and sort that out. Their only way is to behave in a way that feels normal, what's learned. So it's not Safe for them to get triggered either. So the tone has to be safe. And what I find is when people are not used to that, they actually act up to test you. They may give you that body look that says, you know what, I don't believe you or I don't respect you. But at the same time, their words are saying a different thing. So if it's not integrated, I know we need to stop, we need to freeze, review the rules. And I think that that climate of. It's my job as the leader to set the rules and set a tone. I also insist on safety. To begin all stories with I. So if you and I are having a fight and I come in, it's usually, as you know, usually people start with, he did this to make me get in trouble. That's how kids talk. And it's amazing when people work with kids, that's how they end up talking. He get me angry. I had to kick him out because he was rude or she didn't. She started arguing and you know, the foul language. So I had to. She made me throw her out. So I never started conversation unless people were centered enough by taking responsibility for their own story. So it's your story. I don't have to agree with you. I don't have to, like, you could be lying. It doesn't matter to me. But you have to narrate your story beginning with I, not you. So it reduces the shame, blame, and my job. If I want to be heard, I have to wait till you're finished. So I always go back to the head because it's a clear way to get a story. And if it goes into the feeling, I will still go back to the head to make sure we get the whole story before we start any negotiation or otherwise. We'll just trigger off other areas. So those are the ways that I manage safety.

Does your company invest in professional development training? If you believe that your team would benefit from a negotiation work workshop, all you need to do is go to our website, fill out the workshop request form, and then we'll set up a time to chat. These workshops are completely customizable and we've done them all around the country. Negotiation and conflict resolution skills are beneficial across all professions, but they're especially useful in procurement, purchasing, sales, sourcing, and contract management. Our calendar is filling up quickly and we even have some workshops scheduled for next year if you think you might want one. I'd suggest reaching out soon so you don't miss out. Check out the link in the description to learn more and we will be right back after this. That's great. And I want to focus in on the pause, the power of the pause here, because I think when it comes to us as professionals, it's really easy for us to say, hey, I'm busy. I'm busy. And we make mistakes when we're busy because we rush and. And there's going to be a lot of pressure that people feel, you potentially and the other party, to resolve this problem quickly or address this problem quickly. And what you're recognizing is that before the negotiation even begins, we're negotiating the rules of engagement. And part of those rules, one important part, is going to be managing our emotions before the conversation even begins, because it sounds like you were unwilling to start a conversation until that person was at a state of higher levels of equanimity.

Otherwise, you're dealing with body reactions and. And I can't read you. And when there's cultural differences and you start to cry, my first instance may be in my culture, to put my arm around you and. And especially because I've worked with children, so my first instinct might be to calm you, when in fact, what you really need is permission to cry, because it's part of how you tell your story. Right. So it gives people the freedom to be who they are.

Absolutely. That's powerful. That is powerful. And with your experience within the educational realm, within the school system, what specific types of conflicts do you see come up frequently?

Well, obviously, between children, conflicts all the time. Bullying is rampant. And, you know. And I know that bullying's learned. So I've had many conversations with parents to say, here's. Here's the behavior I'm concerned about. And it may be against culture or body image, or it could be, you know, picking on a smaller child or something. If it's serious, I would invite a parent. And I've had many parents actually get angry at me because I've called them out on something, and often it's because they don't know what to do either. Either they're modeling it, or they don't know what to do with it as well, and they're afraid. So I find that the best way to do conflict when there's an issue with children. I worked in an area where it was supposed to be safe schools, and any physical fighting or weaponry had to be an automatic suspension. So what I did to help myself help the children and the parent accept responsibility was I did the process reversed. I would have the children who were in trouble, usually, always, whether it was fighting on a Bus. Or I could list, we could be here all day. I could tell you lots fun things that they do. And when they're able to tell me their story, beginning with I and come up with their feelings and some ideas around what they needed, not solutions. Because most kids don't have a lot of solutions unless they've had it modeled. They don't know they might make it up. Well, I need Kwame not to go on the same bus ever again, right. So what I like to do is have people work through individually where they're able to come together. And I did it backwards. When somebody needed to be suspended, I'd have a parent in and I'd have the child do the work so that they could re enter what's a way we can make it safe to come back, what needs to happen. Because if it's an unequal power balance with teacher and child, or bully and child, bully and victim, children are not able to know a different way and they don't have the solutions. It needs to be brainstormed, it needs to be experimented, it needs to be tried out. And they're not going to say, I'm not sure I know how to behave like that when my body's angry. We have to do some of that work with them either at home or certainly together. So I try to invite a partnership when it's with children because I'm the child's co parent when they're with me and the teachers are with me and the child needs to feel that safety. So when I've had parents in who are very distressed with what their child has done or hasn't done, my first thing is we're here to negotiate a way to re enter, not to leave. He belongs here, she belongs here. And if it's a child who's had some special needs regarding maybe it's a special learning disability class. Even gifted exceptional parents sometimes feel you're dismissing their child and sending to a bus and you don't want them. Or there's a lot of background for parents feeling scared that their child won't belong with their neighbor in school. So I find that inviting people into that space, letting them know ahead this is a collaborative negotiation process. It is not a problem. We're going to work on a solution. And you don't leave and I don't leave. We put nothing into place till we're all on the same page. So if we can do that, maybe your son or daughter by law needs to go home for maybe the rest of the day. And let's come back tomorrow. Let's do that work now. So when he comes back or she comes back, they can go to a teacher and say, okay, I threw the chair, I cheated on the test, or I beat somebody up, or, you know, I used foul, and here's what I'm going to do next time. Otherwise there's no point in returning. And I don't really believe in suspension. I used to say to the teachers, suspending them. We're putting them on the street. The parent needs to lose hours coming to school. They don't. They're not in the classroom. They don't have the context, and they're only going to back up their own child. So why are we doing. Who are we serving? So I think the whole system of how we view children as being inept, incapable, disempowered, unequal in the power sets off a whole realm of how we set up structures around discipline, how we work with parents, how we set up that whole adversarial system. We can't send them to court, but what we can do is provide a circle, a restorative justice kind of circle approach. I often mediated between two. I modeled for parents. I've had twins who were fighting because one had other gifts than the other. I've done the modeling with teachers. I've gone into a circle and received negative feedback. And it's a process. It's a real culture change. It's a paradigm shift. And you have to be courageous, but you also have to be knowledgeable about what is the process of gathering people in a safe place for a difficult conversation. As you know, there's all sorts of racial and gender comments that happen in any school. And actually, I always open my school year with the whole school. They're telling them what I wouldn't accept. And here's what would happen so that there's not a. A testing I tried to eliminate because they didn't believe me. I had a few schools, and so I would set the rules up. Here's what's going to happen. It'll be a mediated or a restorative justice circle. There'll be negotiation, and you don't return till that's. Till that process is done. And when it is done, I want you to report to your parent how well you did. So I wasn't quick to call a parent unless I had to have a good reason because otherwise the parent leaves with the shame and blame too. So I think the whole system is. When we talk about inviting parents in, we often invite them to a table where they're not comfortable as well. If they didn't go to school in Canada and Toronto, many of my families didn't. They were much more obedient, much more compliant. So they look like they're agreeing, but if they're not part of the negotiation process, then the solution is not going to happen. So I think it's an opportunity to identify those life skills that are strong, build on the strength and identify where the gaps are so that we can teach each other what do we do to connect with each other. I think conflict resolution is the perfect life skill and the perfect leadership skill. If we want our children to be leaders and we don't give them any power to make mistakes, how the heck are they going to lift themselves up? So I ran peer mediation teams here. I actually trained for custody mediation here because I was an itinerant guidance counselor. So if I had a group of kids fighting and they came to my office when I was doing counseling, I wouldn't see them for another week. And you know, and I know that could mean a lot of things. So I started to train whole groups of grade 7 and 8 to be media two day workshops, invite the teachers in and try to engage them so that it became part of the way the language shifted. I own my conflict, you own yours. We both have a responsibility for solution. And if it takes two days, it's okay, let's take 10 minutes, start with that break up, come back, and when we do, you can go back to the yard where you don't need me. But if I tell you what to do, many times with young children, particularly those children that are like 5 to 8 when they're reported, because in a yard situation or even families will tell them, just go, say you're sorry. So they might. But, you know, it doesn't solve that inner hurt and it doesn't stop that shaming that often happens when people aren't heard. So conflict resolution allows people that space to be heard and to build a strong voice of advocacy for themselves. Yeah, most parents aren't used to that. Most parents, I grew up in a very authoritative family. You be quiet, do as you're told, and that's it. But it doesn't really work. It doesn't teach people to be empowered and to love their voice.

Right. And one of the things that I heard you mentioned a number of times, Mary, is the fact that this is a process. And so we talk about, we've talked about conflict resolution as a mindset, conflict resolution as a paradigm shift within an organization, and also as A process. And so within the system, the school system, how does that process look?

I guess it depends. I think the process is not well known, to be frank. I think the structure's there. I think the policies are there. But if I went to a staff tomorrow and said, if there's ever a problem, has anybody been through it? Does anybody really. If a parent went through the process to resolve a conflict at the school level, at the board level, has anybody here been through it? And most people will say no. So I don't think there's that much experience with working through that process. And my experience is they start to identify who has those skills rather than. There's an assumption that if you're the leader, you're the superintendent, that you've had some training. So you may have had some training, but if you're going to sit behind a desk with two parents without a desk, that whole body message is around. I'm the authority. So it's not a. It's not an equal circle of power. So that's limited. So that process has to be engaging. It has to be open, like a circle where we're all at this. Whether I don't care if the child's five. So many times when a parent may have a problem with something, maybe it's a gifted program that they weren't doing well. Whatever the issue is, there always should be a conversation with family, and then there should be a child brought into the circle for them, either through a picture or some preparation to tell their piece. I've had many parents push for a child to be admitted to a gifted program, but that child didn't want to leave the basketball team, and he wasn't going to do it, no matter how much people told him he was bright. So what I had to do is make sure he bought in or there was going to be a conflict. He wasn't going, she wasn't going. So they didn't. They were afraid to lose that position on the. There's crazy things all the time. So I think there are policies and I think there's procedures, but I think few people have the confidence to go through a difficult conversation when there's a power imbalance.

Let's talk more about that power imbalance and what the actual impact is. Because I think for a lot of teachers, let's say they're talking to a parent or they're talking to a student, they often hide behind that power imbalance and try to dictate what the solution is going to be. And then they get frustrated at the parent or the students, because they didn't simply comply. But then if you look at it from the other perspective, the student and the parent, they don't feel as though they're being respected, they don't feel as though they, they are safe to fully engage. And as a result they hold back and they don't really have the conversation in a meaningful way. And so for the people who kind of hide behind that power, what would you say to them to help them to feel a little bit more comfortable relinquishing a little bit of that power so the other side can engage?

I would say if that's happening, if you're getting your parents compliant and you're operating on a two legged stool, if the parent, the student and the teacher are not on a level playing field where they're all able to listen to the prospectus before they move to any solution, then we need to all do some training. Because it shouldn't be a matter of who has power. It means we don't know how to do it. Clearly it's not producing results when you keep doing the same thing over, over and you still have the same family with the same problem, with the same or a pattern of some kind. This is just an invitation to pause, reflect, reach out, ask somebody else to sit in with you. Come in. And I think the preparation, I think people need to be prepared. This is the process that we're going to go through. You're going to have your time and I'm going to have mine. I have 20 minutes. If that's not enough, we're going to split for we'll come back next week because we haven't got it solved. And I think we all are rushed and we try to do the best we can. And if there's an ongoing conflict and it's still repetitive, it means I haven't hurt your side. You haven't been able to tell me what the anger, what the mistrust is about. And I have to be strong enough to listen and not take it personally.

That reminds me of something Brene Brown said. She's always talking about vulnerability and she says one thing about vulnerability is that it takes a very strong person to be vulnerable, but it also takes a very strong person to be able to receive somebody's vulnerability. And sometimes we take it personally and we make their problem about us and not about them and it fractures the relationship. There's less trust and then less vulnerability going into the future.

And you know, part of the teaching training is really more curriculum. I mean they do do behavior and they do do class management and they do all sorts of things, but they've never really teach conflict resolution. What does that look like when you're teaching 7 year olds as compared to 14 year olds? What is that? What are the kinds of issues that 14 year olds, 15 year olds who like the girls and like the boys and all that other stuff gets caught in? How does that work? How do I talk to you differently? Because I'm going to have to. So many times primary students, I used to use a paper. They didn't have to use words because they don't have them. So I've had many kids who were sent to the office, they came down, they didn't do it. Typical. He did it, she did it. I say, okay, you know what? You're in the chair, you're still mad. Here's a piece of paper. When you finish your picture, come in and sure enough, their foot was hitting the kid's head. Their foot was in the air. They say, he fell on my foot. Really? Your foot's up? Kids, art will tell the truth. So I used to laugh a lot. I had a sense of humor and say, you know what? I don't know how hard his head hit your foot, but yours is in the hair like you're playing football. Was it football or were you in a bathroom somewhere? Were you in a hall? You're not playing football in the library. So out of that comes a real appreciation of developmentally where children are. If you are called to this work, then you have to see people as whole people. Mind, body, spirit and development is not even. And they come to you wherever you are, whether you're the parent or the teacher, with their own experiences. So we can't throw it on them. This is how I was when I was a kid. Some of the children I've worked with have come from refugee camps. They have their whole understanding of authority. They don't trust a lot of authority sometimes. Or people have had war like they don't trust. They may be grieving, they may need to solutions outside of around their emotion that they can't manage, you know. So you have to figure out what it is that is their story before you figure out what will we negotiate. So I've had many children who move so many times they had no friends by the time they came to especially foster children. And if I knew that they weren't ready to go out to a yard because they didn't have friends. Especially kids when they don't have a ball and I would find a Buddy and make sure that they had a game of checkers on the floor or something so that they had a plan. If things got out of hand, they didn't have to come to me. Too often we have this dependency and a hierarchy of power that disables people. Children can do amazing things if they watch us model it, if they watch our language, if they get. They get coached about how to expl. Most kids know mad, sad, glad, and that's about it. But if you start teaching emotional literacy, even in your class, through the whole school, I used to have themes. So this is a conflict peacemaking month. Everybody has to find some lessons. Language of emotion. I don't want to hear mad, sad, glad. I want to hear three other ones. And then we're going to have some role playing and have some fun learning. I mean, conflict resolution is so much fun to teach because they can play the teacher, too, and tell you an awful lot about what's wrong. And so, you know, I think it's got to be fun rather than the serious conflicts with us. It's part of us.

Absolutely. And what I'm recognizing here is that there's value in doing the types of trainings that you do at all levels. So for the teachers, for the parents and for the students. Because if everybody can really buy into this whole process of conflict resolution, if they have higher level skills, they have more of a vocabulary, vocabulary that they can use that most people can understand, then you're going to be putting yourself in the best position to actually productively engage in conflict within your organization.

There is good curriculum out there. But again, with all of what's happening, you know that I know people are so worried about the literacy skills and their math skills. And of course, with the COVID and you know, this is there's a real fear that the students are going to be left behind. But it's not just literacy that gets us through. And what we're seeing on the streets with the Black Lives Matter, with the kinds of things that are happening globally with protests, right down to the vaccinations. This is a perfect time to talk about how do we help our children prepare for the real world where they can make a difference, where they stand in their own body, in their own language, in their own little peer group, their own neighborhood. What do they do when they see conflict? How do they respond? What awareness do they have of their own thinking? Have they imagined what it would look like if there was another way other than violence or name calling or whatever the issue is? And how can they Learn that in a world where they're seeing so much violence.

Yeah, no, I think it's important. I think that it's. It's more important now than ever.

Exactly.

We have the opportunity. We have more resources now than ever when it comes to teaching this. So that's one of the many reasons I really appreciate the work that you do, and I know we're coming up on time here, but before you go, I want to give you an opportunity to tell the listeners about the. Again, about the work that you're doing and your book and how they can get in touch with you.

Okay. Well, I am in Toronto and my webpage is marygrogan.com. anybody that comes through the. The webpage can get in touch with me for a conversation around coaching or training or consultation around any. Anything related to conflict, because conflict is part of my new book, A Reflective Practice Approach to Building Leadership Capacity. And C. One of the seven Cs of global leadership is in the communication chapter, where we look at what is a conflict resolution process look like? How do we do win Win approaches? Where are you as a leader and what do you need to learn? Where do we need to go to learn that? How can we adapt that into our leadership style? So I've put it in a very natural way, integrated into my book. And my doctoral work looked at professionalism. So reflective practice was all part of that building awareness of our own competency as a leader. And I think in the past, we used to think about leaders as being the one in position, but I think we can no longer do that. The paradigm shift is every person standing is a leader. We influence each other. Children influence each other. The way they have table manners or not. The way that they play in the yard, the way that they come into a room. We need to recognize our power as human beings. And I mentioned the book Global Leadership because I believe in the Ubuntu principle. If I move ahead and you don't, then I haven't moved anywhere. So my responsibility is to bring you along, and in doing that, you bring me to where I need to be. Something needs to shift in me so that we're connected. So that's why my book is seven C's of Global Leadership. You can get an E copy off Amazon for sure, or you can go on and order and get in touch with me through my website.

Fantastic. Mary, thank you so much. We really appreciate it.

Thank you so much for having me and God bless you for all the work that you're doing to educate. I listen to your podcast as I walk by the lake here in Toronto weekly.

Oh, that's great.

And start to quote you. So I really appreciate having being on this podcast with you today. Thank you so much.

My pleasure. Have a good one. Congratulations. You've just joined an elite club by listening to a full episode. You're now officially on the Negotiate Anything team. So welcome aboard. What most team members do is they subscribe to the podcast because that allows them to automatically get the latest episodes of the show. The best things in life lie on the other side of difficult conversations. Keep learning, keep practicing, and keep getting better. Your relationships will improve, your career will soar, and you'll have the confidence you need to get the most out of these crucial conversations. Again, thank you for joining the team. We're excited to have you, and I will see you in the next episode. I'll catch you later.