As helpful as conflict resolution can be, the ideal is to prevent conflict from happening altogether. Positive relationships are the foundation of conflict prevention.
It’s impossible to fully prevent conflict, as any relationship will run into issues along the way, but there are several tools and techniques that you can use to give yourself the best chance of preventing a conflict, or at least of addressing it early on before it escalates.
Because conflict prevention is really about meeting unmet needs before or in the very early stages of conflict, communication tools in particular will be the most useful tools in these situations.
Thus, separating people from problems starts with how you speak to someone; using I-statements allows you to own your feelings and needs.
EXAMPLE
Saying “I am upset when I come home and find the kitchen a mess. It makes me feel like I'm being ignored and that nobody takes my needs seriously” communicates the issue, your need, and your feelings. Whereas “You are so sloppy. Why don't you ever clean up the kitchen?” is an accusatory, blaming statement.Blaming statements escalate a conflict, while I-statements really help separate people from problems.
While people often tend to be accommodating in order to avoid conflict, giving in and not speaking up can lead to underlying resentment, which can, in turn, cause tension that escalates into conflict.
As you’ve learned, active listening means listening to not only the content of someone's speech but to the underlying emotions as well.
In other words, active listening requires that you hear a message on two levels.
When you hear something through active listening, whether it be the emotion or the actual content of what the person is saying, asking questions like:
Practicing these communication skills on a day-to-day basis will help strengthen and maintain relationships, which is the foundation of conflict prevention.
You could practice these communication skills with a spouse or significant other, a friend, or anyone you communicate with on a regular basis.
When issues arise, simply setting aside a time to actually sit down and talk about those particular issues is a great first step.
This is particularly true if you both tend to be busy,and don't have time to visit some of the smaller issues before they begin to escalate. Setting aside this time to talk will allow you to raise the issue, and then use the communication skills to discuss it.
In addition to separating people from problems, these skills can also be used to separate interests from positions.
EXAMPLE
You and your spouse are doing financial planning. You want to put more money into savings, but your spouse really wants to put that money toward a vacation. These are opposing positions, but there may be some mutual interests beneath them. The goal is to figure out how to work together to meet those mutual interests. Simply understanding that you can separate positions from interests is very helpful when having a discussion that seems difficult.Source: Adapted from Sophia tutorial by Marlene Johnson.
