KM for Conflict & Change Management

The following story was developed for an Africa healthcare organisation in order to give people a picture of “where we are” following interviews conducted in the discovery phase of a change project. The story is designed as a point of feedback and reflection and is deliberately left as a cliff-hanger in the African storytelling tradition; what happens next is dependent on the listeners who are challenged to tell the rest of the story. In old Africa, these stories are called African Dilemma Tales. Such stories may be allegorical – many of the things described may not actually have happened and the characters might not be real. The story is designed to create a shared understanding that we are all involved in a process and that our values, attitudes and beliefs create the experience of the complex system we call an organisation. The story also allows us to talk about complex realities in a new way.

Author : Shastry Njeru, Midlands State University, P. Bag 9055, Gweru, Zimbabwe

Abstract

Author: Dr Andreas Gerhardus (Dries) Velthuizen

Organizational Affiliation: Centre for African Renaissance Studies, University of South Africa (Academic Associate)

Contact Details: dries@africanwisdom.info - Mobile: +27834736478

ABSTRACT

Author : Dr Michele Ruiters (DBSA, Research Unit)

Abstract

Dr. Arun Gandhi, grandson of Mahatma Gandhi and founder of the M.K.Gandhi Institute for Nonviolence, in a lecture at the University of Puerto Rico, shared the following story:

I was 16 years old and living with my parents at the institute my grandfather had founded 18 miles outside of Durban, South Africa, in the middle of the sugar plantations. We were deep in the country and had no neighbors, so my two sisters and I would always look forward to going to town to visit friends or go to the movies.

One day, my father asked me to drive him to town for an all-day conference,and I jumped at the chance. Since I was going to town, my mother gave me a list of groceries she needed and, since I had all day in town, my father asked me to take care of several pending chores, such as getting the car serviced.

When I dropped my father off that morning, he said, "I will meet you here at 5:00 p.m., and we will go home together."

Mikhail Mikhailovich Bakhtin (1895-1975) was a Russian philosopher, critic and scholar who wrote many influential works of literary theory and criticism. His works, dealing with a variety of subjects, have inspired groups of thinkers who have incorporated Bakhtinian ideas into theories of their own. These thoughts on language use are particularly interesting in Change Management and Conflict Management and include:

Stories are vitally important in times of change – they bring a sense of meaning and purpose to the human experience. Stories contain elements that enable us to 'travel forward in hope', even if we don't like our fellow travellers. Clearly managing the story of 'what is going on' is vitally important in situations of conflict and change. This is because people resort to violence and brutality when the story collapses. In change and transformation management, the work of the storyteller may include:

• Accessing the conversations that are occurring in the situation. Experience has shown that this role is best accomplished by an ‘outsider’ who does not have a particular affiliation to any party to the conflict.

• Helping to understanding the possible impact of these stories in the situation - especially if they evoke emotional responses or build 'vicious' or 'virtuous' cycles
  

In terms of aggressive behaviours, one could imagine a continuum between Active Aggression (which includes violence & brutality) and Passive Aggression. Passive-aggressive behaviour refers to passive, sometimes obstructionist resistance to authoritative instructions in interpersonal or occupational situations. Sometimes a method of dealing with stress or frustration, it results in the person attacking other people in subtle, indirect, and seemingly passive ways. It can manifest itself as resentment, stubbornness, procrastination, sullenness, or intentional failure at doing requested tasks. For example, someone who is passive-aggressive might take so long to get ready for a party they do not wish to attend, that the party is nearly over by the time they arrive.

When most of us were at school failure was seen as something that was negative, should be avoided and often worth punishment. And yet most learning theorists agree that it is only through failure that we really learn – as opposed to just memorising. Failure is useful when it helps us critically appraise our own performance. This is evaluation is an example of feedback. A simple way to think of feedback is experiencing the output of your own performance as a new input.

Students of psychology and education are becoming increasingly aware of the vital role that feedback plays in how we learn. All complex systems (like your body, your organisation, your family, your community) change their behaviour or learn through feedback - even if this means weaving in and out of the best path (like Wiener’s boat example) rather than sticking to the best path in any strict way.

A paradigm is a self-consistent set of ideas and beliefs which acts as a filter, influencing how we perceive and make sense of the world. The way in which we often structure our organisations is based on the model of a Egyptian pyramid and is an example of a paradigm. Other examples of paradigms include – how to make bread, what a bed looks like, the characteristics of a chair that lend the idea of “chairness”, the general features of a ship or an aircraft and so on. The term was first used by Thomas Kuhn in “the structure of scientific revolutions” (1962) to describe the the impact of change within the ruling theory of science when fundamental assumptions changed. Kuhn argued that the history of science is not a linear and continuous assimilation of facts but rather a number of revolutions in which new paradigms or new ways of seeing the world, entirely replace the old. Some of his conclusions include:

While we all know something about power, working in conflict or change management requires a clear understanding of power and how to decode and understand it. So what is power really and how is it constructed? Our world identifies certain individuals as 'having power' and then proceeds to make them more powerful by talking about them in the media. Politicians, high profile business leaders, characters from the entertainment industry and those frequently in the public eye are often said to examples of ‘powerful people’.

A useful way of decoding any phenomenon is to go beyond the 'what is it?' question and rather look at 'what does it do?'. In organisations, power can do many things. It can speed things up, slow things down, alter trajectory, transform our understanding of ‘what is going on’ and divert attention to something altogether different. We each have some measure of power and your position of power could be defined by:

This Knowledge Management Toolkit for the CPR Practice Area was prepared by UNDP’s Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery in response to requests from members of the Crisis Prevention and Recovery Practice Network for guidance on knowledge management tools and techniques. This toolkit aims to explain the theory and outline the tools used in knowledge management for UNDP staff working in crisis and post-crisis situations. It is targeted at both BCPR staff and members of the wider Crisis Prevention and Recovery (CPR) Practice Area within UNDP. However, many of the suggestions given here are not strictly CPR-specific and can be applied to knowledge management in other UNDP Practice Areas.

SOWETO analysis adds two critical categories to the traditional SWOT analysis and helps ask a powerful guilding question; So Where To Now? SWOT analysis is a strategic planning tool used to evaluate the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats involved in a project or in any other situation of an organization requiring a decision in pursuit of an objective. It involves monitoring the environment of the organization with the aim to identify the key internal and external factors that are important to achieving the objectives. It can be used to develop a plan that takes into considerations many different factors and maximizes the potential of the strengths and opportunities while minimizing the impact of the weaknesses and threats. The SOWETO analysis adds Outcomes and Environment to the matrix.

Open Space Technology (sometimes called Open Space) is a self-organizing practice that allows diverse people in any kind of organization to create meetings and events with a difference. It is known to stimulate positive energies and achieve useful, well-documented results. Participants of an open space event create and manage their own agenda of parallel working sessions around a central theme of strategic importance. By inviting people to take ownership and responsibility for what they care about it stimulates the emergence of the inherent creativity and leadership in people, establishes an ideas marketplace of reflection and learning. The technique can be used to work with groups - some say between 5 to 800 people, for events of two hours to several days. It works best when work to be done is complex, the people and ideas involved are diverse, the passion for resolution (and potential for conflict) are high, and time is very limited.

An overview of conflict using African conflict resolution initiatives as a case study of KM for conflict resolution, revealed that the methods used by African institutions are not adequate to manage knowledge to eradicate the causes of conflict, provide early warning of conflict, or produce a synthetic knowledge product for wise decisions and successful actions. However, the literature alerted the researcher to a few important themes related to the research problem that will serve as focus for field research to learn additional KM principles and practices that could be applied to conflict resolution. The following themes were identified to investigate how knowledge of Africa should be managed to promote positive outcomes for Africa:

Based on the work of Abraham H.Maslow, here are some of the words and phrases that could be used by leadership and management in a conflict situation to suggest positive approaches to dealing with conflict:

• We're all doing our best

• We all need to be complimented for a job well done
• We all want to be told how we can be better at what we do
• We have similar goals - we all want to grow as individuals, get satisfaction from our work, become more confident and have high self-esteem
• Nobody likes wasting time, effort and energy in conflict
• Suggestions and feedback benefit us all
• Sharing ideas stimulates new ways of achieving what we all want
• We all want our work to be meaningful
• We like feeling capable and competent
• We all have the wisdom to make wise choices
• We all need freedom to try out new ideas or plans. When they fail, we learn more than when they succeed
• We all gain when we expect goodwill in others
  

Stress is unique to each one of us – it is an internally generated response based on what we think is going on. Stress also often accompanies situations of conflict. If you feel stressed and worry about how you will manage to continue feeling stressed, try practising the following clinically proven methods:

• Worry about things You can't control eg. about swine 'flu, the stock market, tsunamis, earthquakes, the ozone layer etc..

• Never exercise - Exercise wastes a lot of time that could better be spent worrying. This will help you to stay at least 25% over your recommended weight. Junk foods, sweets, and coffee are particularly helpful here.
• Eat anything you want – and remember to avoid fruit and vegetables.
• Take plenty of stimulants - Caffeine, nicotine, sugar, sweeties and sugary soft drinks (especially colas) will help generate an adrenaline response in your body which will make you feel anxious and paranoid.
  

A clear understanding of the strategies and tactics available in conflict situations is vital for both facilitators and participants in conflict. The ability to engage conflict in a proactive, measured and rational way is vital in helping achieve your objectives, and so it is important to understand some of the available strategies and tactics beforehand:

• Avoidance this is a classic passive aggressive strategy and includes postponement, control process, resorting to formal rules , equivocation , ignoring the conflict , 'fogging' or misunderstanding the position and the argument

• Maintain quid-pro-quo or eye-for-an-eye conflict that brings up the injustices of the past and the associated emotions, agreeing on rules for maintenance going forward
• Reduce inquire , fragment , compromise, write research & position papers, compromise, develop “strategic ambiguity”, create partnerships, highlight common interest
  

The following factors may be causes or complicating factors of conflict:

• Time

• Structural design
  • task interdependence , power distributions , resource scarcity, goal incompatibility , uncertainty
• Personal Differences
  • Faith , Ego , Experience , Personality , Prejudice , Poor training , Oversensitivity , Values , Aims , Substance use (Caffeine & other stimulants / narcotics may amplify and distort the emotional impact of conflict situations)
• Communication - miscommunication (semantics and cultural differences) & Signal to Noise (S/N ratio) of communications & poor listening skills

Behaviors that may cause/complicate conflict

• Intellectual

• Emotional
• Interpersonal
• Managerial / Leadership
• Communication - miscommunication (semantics and cultural differences) & Signal to Noise (S/N ratio) of communications & poor listening & storytelling skills
  

The premise of conflict prevention is that conflict can be averted through the building of trust between role players, coalition formation and negotiated settlements. Conflict prevention mechanisms must be in place, supported by early warning and risk assessment systems. Perhaps the most important integrated project for creating a peaceful and secure environment for African development is the establishment of a CEWS of the AU. According to the Protocol of the Peace and Security Council (PSC), timely information collected through a CEWS will be used by the Peace and Security Council on potential conflicts and threats to peace and security in Africa. The CEWS will be linked to regional situation rooms. Decisions on the best course of action will be based on this intelligence, and should preventive diplomacy fail, peacekeepers may be deployed to prevent violence.

The vision of the AU is based on a united and strong Africa and on the need to build a partnership between governments and all segments of civil society in order to strengthen solidarity and cohesion among the peoples of Africa. As a continental organisation, it focuses on the promotion of peace, security and stability on the continent as a prerequisite for the implementation of the development and integration agenda. African leaders should therefore be held accountable by the people of Africa to deal vigorously and effectively with conflict resolution and the implementation of good governance principles. (Venter 2005, 139).

This overview attempts to present useful key ideas necessary for the development of a community animation model in language that is clear and empowering in such a way that it emphases the application of Know-How. The structure as presented here draws together experiences from using the following models in an African context: Isivivane for Change and Transformation (Banhegyi 2001-2007) Isivivane . Additionally, the model draws inspiration from models developed by Walsh & Ungson (1991), Collison & Parcell (1998), Nonake & Takeuchi (1995) in that it emphasises the cultural context, group dynamics and linkages between participants. The approach stimulates a community into action and provides a basic know-how useful in the design and support of a sustainable system and guides a user through that which needs to be done in order to attain success.

If you are new to social media and are still exploring the area, here are 4 steps to help you get the best out of it:

• Step 1: Explore - search & browse for content that interests you. Find out where your friends, colleagues and peers spend their time on the web. Particularly look for notable commentators and figures in the area in which you are interested, subscribe to their personal blogs and follow the comments and conversations.

While there are a number of models available for practitioners of KM to help implement KM projects, few models have tried to deconstruct KM itself and how it works. Understanding a complex dynamic is often best done by adopting a metaphor; a good metaphor can go a long way and serve you well in understanding a complex system.

A reminder about metaphors