"It needs said"

There is a theory that if you want to accomplish something quickly, you reverse engineer it and work on that model.

For example!

Let's say you wanted to open a hotdog stand and sell hotdogs.

Well, you'd start with selling hotdogs, and then reverse the process back to the beginning of starting the LLC.

• sell hotdogs

• set up a payment system/accounting system

• ensure people know where to find me- marketing/advertising

• what type of hotdogs do I offer- how will I price them

• research which hotdogs do well

• purchase equipment

• research the best way to cook and sell hotdogs

• file the LLC for the business

• create business name

• decide to sell hotdogs

This can help your thoughts see a clear pattern or process to solve a problem.

What does this have to do with conflict resolution and leadership?

Everything... minus the hotdogs.

I can recall during my time as a Corp leader where I failed to reverse engineer the issues that arose in my organizations until it was too late. One of the reasons why is I would shy away from conflict. I didn't want to hurt anyone's feelings and, in the process, I would assume that if I didn't address it then the problem would go away...

HORRIBLE mindset to have! It never solved anything.

It wasn't until I learned about reverse problem solving that things begun to click for me and from there, I was able to build my confidence to address issues.

A specific event I recall is when two team members were in an argument and boiled to a point where the two of them would disrupt everything and everyone around them.

It finally came to a point where I needed to step in and in fact if I did not then there would probably be a UFC pay-per-view between the two.

Prior to this situation, the "old" me wouldn't have done anything except give the good ol' college effort answer of "let's just be nice folks" and consider that problem solved, or just send an email and hide behind the keyboard warrior mentality.

However, applying what I learned about the reverse working principle allowed me to address this problem.

The problem was two people didn't like each other... but why?

Here is the approach I took to find a solution.

Step One: Don't ask why they don't like each other. Instead, I asked each separately why they felt so passionately that they were in the right.

*This is important is because if I asked them to talk directly about the other person then I would still have been in the room today listening to them. Instead, I asked them to argue their position or feeling which didn't strictly focus on the "beef" with the other person, but more supporting their position.

Step Two: After 3 days of talking to each person separately, I asked them to write down ten solutions to solve the issues they both told me during the individual meetings.

*This is important because I was continuing to shift their focus away from the problem and now engaging them in creating solutions. Psychology has demonstrated that when we write out problems and create solutions, we begin to see the "real" aspect of our thoughts vs. leaving our minds to continuously create thoughts that do not exist in reality.

The other aspect is that creating ten solutions is very difficult when it comes to settling conflict with a person. Wearing the energy down is not always a bad approach.

Step Three: I brought them together after both failed to provide ten solutions (which I knew would happen).

*This is important because what we were discovering is that the problem was more opinioned based vs. actual problem. The fact they couldn't come up with ten solutions also allowed both employees to see where they had unrealistic expectations for the solution. This began to create a common ground!

Step Four: Now, let's solve the problem.

*This is important because now we were at a point where we all three could sit in a room and talk through the situations of why these two didn't get along, and through this conversation, we were able to narrow down to a specific point...

Ready...

Both individuals felt the other always tried to "belittle" them. That's it.

That was the beef. No BUN intended... I mean pun...

Now, why is this different?

Some of us (including me) have been taught that you bring the individuals together right away and hold a grass-roots meeting, or open-share meeting, or whatever term you've heard, and you don't leave the meeting until the problem is solved.

Does this work? It might... but failed more often than it worked for myself and my peers.

The difference here is reverse thinking the individuals to not focus only on the other person but rather to focus on the thoughts, and perceptions of what was ticking them off about the situation.

Here is the kicker... both of the team members thought the same thing!

Shocker! Both had the same feelings.

Here is a secret to solving conflict to remember... more than likely, the situation is a combination of two people treating the other person the way they don't want to be treated... Think about that.

Sometimes the real conflict is we are projecting an emotion we don't like to have projected onto us. Not always, but most often from 10+ years of working employee's cases have given me enough reassurance.

So, if you find yourself as a leader who does not like to address conflict then the problem might be that you don't feel confident enough to solve the problem.

Think about today's lesson and step back to look at your problem and how you can reverse work it back to a solution.

If you still don't feel confident, then check out the resources below!

Never stop serving!