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What To Do When Your Employees Don’t Get Along

What To Do When Your Employees Don't Get AlongHere are some helpful steps you can take to work things out when your employees don’t get along and there’s anger, drama and conflict.

One of the hardest things you are likely to go through as a business owner is being in the middle of a conflict between two or more employees. 

The staff you hire are, like the rest of us, only human, and humans do not always get along with one another for whatever reasons. When this happens in the workplace, it can, however, be incredibly disruptive to the business as a whole. So it is important that you step in and try to resolve the issues as soon as you can.

No worries I’m here to help. I love to support teams of all kinds and help them to get along better.

As you might know, I am a bestselling personal development author with about 2 million books sold globally.

Plus I created an online program to help people to reduce drama and conflicts called Manage and Avoid Drama Llamas.

I love sharing insights and strategies to help employees and companies to be more successful and happy in their work. So read on for some methods to help when people at your company don’t get along.

Tips For When Employees Don’t Get Along

Below, you will find some of the most sensible steps you can take to work things out when your employees don’t get along:

1. Get to grips with the issue

If you want to be able to resolve the conflict between your employees, you must first understand the nature of the problem. Talk to each employee involved separately to get their perspective on the issue without any judgment. Speaking to everyone should help you to get to the root of what is going on before you decide what your next move should be.

2. Rule out discrimination and equality issues

Very early on, you should work out whether the conflict has arisen from an issue such as signs of pregnancy discrimination or a breach of Equal Employment Opportunity Commission regulations.  If that is the case, the conflict is likely to be of a more serious nature, and you may need to call in a professional to deal with it. If that is not the case, then doing the below may help you to get things back on track.

3. Encourage them to work out their own differences

If you can, encouraging your staff to work out their own differences themselves is likely to be most helpful as doing so will get them talking, and in the process of doing so, hopefully, they can come to a better understanding of each other’s perspective that will help them to have better relations in the future. Having yourself or an HR person mediate their talks can be helpful if things are likely to get heated, however. 

4. Administer a TKI Assessment

A TKI assessment can help employees to better manage their conflicts and resolve their problems by giving each party a greater understanding of the other’s personality and how they prefer to handle conflicts. It can be very useful in dealing with business disputes of all kinds, but it is especially effective in cases where employees don’t get along and they just cannot seem to resolve the issue without any help. 

5. Avoid taking sides

Sometimes, it is not possible to do so, if one of your employees is acting against the law for example, but if you can do so, you really should avoid taking sides because if one of the parties who are fighting feels like they are being treated better by the managers and business owners than the other, it will only add fuel to the fire and give them yet another thing to complain about. Be as impartial as you can, while also steering them to see the other person’s side if you can and you will find that they often start to come around.

6. Find a solution that works

If you can help your employees find a solution that works for them and which is acceptable to you and the rest of the company, that is often the easiest way to solve problems, for example, if two employees simply do not get on no matter what happens, then if one of them is happy to be transferred to another department, that could solve the problem without too much hassle, or if your employees can agree to disagree, then it really does not have to become a big issue.

7. Issue a warning

If all else fails, the time will come when you will have to issue a warning and perhaps write the employees up on their behavior. This is never an easy step to take, but if they are just not listening to reason, knowing that their job could be on the line if they do not take steps to resolve their conflicts and bring harmony back to the workplace may be the only thing that works.

Dealing with employees who do not get along can be a difficult and delicate process, but it is necessary you do so for the ongoing safety, security, and harmony of your employees and your company. The above techniques will certainly help you to handle all but the worst examples effectively.

Get More Support for Employees Who Don’t Get Along

Explore my therapist recommended online program to help employees to reduce drama and conflicts: Manage and Avoid Drama Llamas.

 

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