Conflict As a Part Of Companies

Conflict as a part of companies

Companies all over the world have conflicts within their organizations that have to be dealt with every day, and often this conflict stems from the simplest things. One are that can lead to increased workplace conflict is change to procedures within an organization. Many companies have had to deal with the implementation of electronic systems to theirorganization and getting their employees to get used to them has been a challenge. Large companies that have offices all over a country (or even worldwide) have found technology to be a helpful tool, yet whenever there is a problem with implementation or changes to the work dynamic, these systems can be seen as barriers, and this may lead employees into conflict. This essay will review and analyze aconflict situation between two employees that work for the same company.

Qualtec is a Mexican owned company that operates in two important cities of Mexico, Guadalajara and Leon. This company is facing a problem between two of its best employees. Gabriela, who works in Guadalajara, is the manager of the order, processing, distribution and shipping area, and Marina is the top seller of the wholecompany (accounting for 80% of the product sales for the company by herself) and operates in Leon. Three years ago the company had a split and since then, these two employees started to depend on each other and had to start a process of communication which was done via email, there was also a change in the system that the company used. The modus operandi of this company consists of an order entry ina system (which Marina has to do) and the authorization and shipping of merchandise (Gabriela's task). Marina is very disorganized with her orders and has a very delicate humor, which leads to a conflict whenever she needs the merchandise to be sent, because Gabiela cannot authorize the shipping if it has not been entered to the system.

Every week the conflict is present and grows, and becauseMarina is aware of her superiority, she calls Ana (the CEO) and threats to leave the company. Ana knows that Gabriela is achieving the company’s expectations of her (by following all the procedures) but also knows that she is not being flexible about this situation and isn’t trying to help Marina (even though Gabriela knows the company could not survive without Marina, and that’s therefore shecould lose her job).
It is important to mention that, in the conflict that was just analyzed, I played a role of observer which means that I was actually not involved in the conflict but I was close enough to perceive it and get the enough information to make this review of the situation. My perceptions about this conflicts are that both employees are not trying to work together, on one side Marinaknows that she has to enter the orders but she is very busy (she does;t even worry if orders are entered, and whenever she needs the merchandise she just calls and complain about it. On the other hand, I believe Gabriela is in a position where she can just decline the shipping of merchandise and because she is not dealing with customers she does't get frustrated about the delivery.

Thisconflict can be classified as a negatively conflict because it makes the process dysfunctional and there are hurdles to achieving common goals in the organization (De Janasz, Dowd, Schneider, 2009). One of the sources of conflict that is present in this situation is the limited resources which have led to an intra-group conflict. De Janasz et.al (2009) state that limits on resources commonly result inconflict, as people are forced to compete for their "fair" share of the resources that are available. There are not infinite resources (merchandise) for Gabriela to send Marina within the company, so therefore it is necessary to adhere to a procedure which Marina is not following so they can have a proper organization of orders and be able to serve all clients. Miscommunication is another problem...