As the complexities of the cannabis industry increase, so does the potential for conflict, both internal and external to the cannabis organization. Cannabis businesses should sharpen their conflict resolution skills and even embrace conflict as an opportunity to drive creativity, alignment, and growth.
We train people to be experts in managing technology, numbers, finance, and the law. But this most fundamental characteristic of human interaction – conflict – is something we are somehow just supposed to figure out as we go along, but we don’t.
Not knowing how to handle it, we prefer to ignore it and hope it goes away. The bad news is that it won’t go away; unresolved conflict festers and grows. The good news is that it doesn’t have to be that way.
In Ancient Egypt, conflict was called repdat. In Javanese, konflik. In Hmong, teeb meem. While the definition of ‘conflict‘ is pretty much the same in every culture, ‘conflict resolution‘ is a different animal. Cultural constructs and historical contexts influence the meaning and practice. In English, conflict resolution is frequently interconnected with sports terminology and industrial disputes. In Arabic, it revolves around honor and Islamic ethics. In Hebrew, it’s tied to military metaphors.
Those constructs and contexts can influence business relations globally. It’s a pervasive challenge, and now as the cannabis industry expands its reach globally, the potential for conflict is on the rise – internally and externally. Add in a complex cannabis organization adds new opinions, customs, conventions, and personalities.
One of the most comprehensive studies ever done on the issue, #0excludeGlossary by CPP Inc. in its Global Human Capital Report, found that in 2008, U.S. employees spent approximately 2.1 hours per week involved in the conflict (as defined as #1excludeGlossary may have some merit in conflict resolution practices. What many call #2excludeGlossary can actually enable innovation and creativity when applied appropriately so conflict can have a beneficial component.
Having open discussions with disagreement encourages people to be candid and opens up points of view and perspectives. If employees are working in an environment with openly shared ideas and critiques, you can build, and then innovative solutions can emerge.
So what happens if progress is unlikely to continue and it is time to throw in the towel? There are always going to be times when people have conflicting views. If you can’t build an agreement, you might have to go your separate ways.
It’s okay to say ‘No!‘ Negotiation is sometimes saying ‘Yes‘ to maybe the better of the worst options. But conflict resolution and building an agreement could still be the genesis of something completely new. Many of the tools we use create options that support both parties and might be better than either extreme.
Let us know what you think.
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