Conflict in the Workplace

The incident that took place at the University of Alabama-Huntsville in February 2010
was outrageous. In the episode, three people were killed, and three others were seriously
wounded. During the course of a routine meeting at the biology department attended by
approximately 12 people, professor Amy Bishop stood up and began shooting those closest to
her with a 9- millimeter handgun. Amy was a biology professor at the university who was
charged with one count of capital murder and three counts of attempted murder. Later on, in
2012, Amy was sentenced to life imprisonment.

My research regarding this case involves contemplating several factors that are
responsible for this event. Firstly, I found that in March 2009, Amy had been denied tenure at the
university and that it was her last day, the day shooting happened. It is pretty obvious that she
couldn't handle the stress of her tenure ending and that made her take this step which resulted in
a brutal murder. Secondly, due to the attention Bishop attracted as a result of the shooting,
previous violent incidents in which she had been involved or implicated were reevaluated. In
1986, she shot and killed her brother in Braintree, Massachusetts in an incident officially ruled
an accident. She was also questioned, along with her husband, after a 1993 pipe-bomb incident
directed toward her lab supervisor. All these past incidents of Amy reveal that she was a
psychiatric patient and this fact was ignored, which resulted in many losses.

In 2003, Amy joined the faculty of the Department of Biological Sciences at the
University of Alabama in Huntsville as an assistant professor. She was teaching five courses
prior to the shooting. Previously, she was an instructor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.
According to her friend, Amy had written three unpublished novels. One featured a woman
scientist working to defeat a potential pandemic virus and struggling with suicidal thoughts at the
threat of not earning tenure. Several colleagues of Bishop had expressed concern over her
behavior. She was described as being a strange and notably crazy woman. One of these
colleagues was a member of Bishop's tenure-review committee. After Bishop's tenure was denied
and she learned that this colleague referred to her as "crazy," she filed a complaint with the Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), alleging discrimination based on sex. She cited
the professor's remark to be used as possible evidence in that case. According to the professor,
Amy had a pattern of erratic behavior. The things which she did were abnormal. She was out of
touch with reality. Amy was also reported as a poor instructor and unpopular among her
students. She dismissed several graduate students from her lab, and others sought transfers out.
In 2009, several students complained about her to administrators regarding her ineffective
behavior in the classroom and had odd, unsettling ways. Another important thing is that Bishop
was suspended without pay retroactively on the day of the attack. Bishop received a letter of
termination from Jack Fix, Dean of the College of Sciences, which did not state a reason for her
dismissal.

The incidents that took place in Amy’s life such as annoying comments about her crazy
behavior by one of the professors, a termination letter from the Dean without giving any proper
reason might have impacted her life and provoked her to take such a devastating decision of
killing people. There was a slight chance that the university could have saved the situation after
observing her weird behavior with other professors and students, rather she got the dismissal
letter from the university. From this instance, it can be analyzed that sometimes faculty members
and administrators fail to understand, guide or assist a mentally- ill faculty who needs support.
Furthermore, students who face such situation have resources on the campus to deal with their
illness, but problematic faculty is often ignored and treated as abnormal or difficult personalities.
Most of the times, mental related health issues are neglected. This could have prevented the
situation if people would have been aware of Amy's signs of a mental issue. It is our
responsibility to watch for such signs of stroke in people and aid them to medical attention.
Dismissing helpless psychological aspirants because they don't make a good fit may not be the
solution. Instead, helping them to get out of the situation should be. It is easy to notice the signs
of stress which might help the person to avoid the bad fortune.

Furthermore, we can say that the tenure process itself may be partly to blame. Perhaps we
need to examine the pressure we are putting on all people in academia. Increasing
competitiveness. Increasing stress. Increasing strain. Productivity over quality. There is little or
no life-work balance in academics nowadays. The bar to gain tenure or to get promoted has risen
to nearly impossible heights. The burden to teach well, to have a great research program, to bring
in grants, to engage in community and college service is increasing the stress on people. The
institution just wants more and more and more. It is not psychologically, medically or spiritually
healthy. Under such pressure, some people face psychologically, start to fail medically, or begin
to have a spiritual crisis. This woman obviously had some mental problems, but the pressure in
university and the pressure to gain tenure, and her subsequent denial of tenure were likely
contributing factors in her loss of control. However, we shouldn't be so quick to blame the tenure
process. Tenure is not relevant. Divorce and child custody are not relevant when a father kills his
ex-wife and kids after becoming mentally deranged over the divorce. In the same way, economic
inequality is not in question when an armed robber kills a bank guard in an attempted crime. It is
important to address problems in any of these areas where they exist. But most people who
commit crimes are in some occupation or under some perceived stress. The fact that a shooter
can share characteristics with anyone who at times are frustrated and overwhelmed by life's
challenges does not and should not allow us to take our attention off of a woman who just took
three lives and put three more in jeopardy.

Workplace violence is triggered by a lot of things such as job loss, harassment, perceived
injustice. People experience adverse events at all kinds of workplaces all the time. Only a small
fraction resist to violence. I have also faced difficult situations where I was not given enough
shifts to work, harassed by supervisors, passed over for promotion, but none of these events led
me to take any cruel action, though I certainly experienced emotional anxiety and strong
negative thoughts.

For the project, I interviewed my uncle Mr. Ashok Rokade, MD, who is the medical
director of the department of acupuncture and Pain Management. According to his point of view,
managing conflict in the workplace is a time-consuming but necessary task for the physician
leader. Conflicts may exist between physicians, between physicians and staff, and between the
staff or the health care team and the patient or patient's family. The conflicts may range from
arguments to major controversies that may lead to dispute or violence. These conflicts may have
an adverse effect on productivity, morale, and patient care. They may result in high employee
turnover which will certainly limit staff contributions and affect efficiency. He further added that
legal process is now readily available for those who feel that they are working in a hostile work
environment. The hostile environment may be the result of abusive behavior by other employees,
supervisors, or physicians. The abuse may take the form of a demeaning attitude, ridicule, off-
color jokes, sexual harassment, or even physical violence. My uncle had a minor incident of
conflict in the workplace. He was being abused by a physician who worked under him for
several years because of some personal issues. He was drunk and mentally ill. In this situation,
he did not take any action against him but treated him as a doctor and helped him to get out of
his bad situation. However, societies have significantly decreased their tolerance of disruptive
behavior. My uncle never had any experience of threat in his workplace, but he always makes
sure to try to handle the situation by being non-threatening, taking verbal control by using a
calm, controlled voice, being clear and respectful. He says that physicians, both male and female,
often have hard-driving, type A personalities and little training in interpersonal skills. They may
have high IQs but lack emotional intelligence.

Next, I interviewed a 62-year-old man named John who is working as a salesperson in a

hardware store. There are several younger employees in the store who consistently treat him with
disrespect, making nasty comments about his being old, slow and "computer illiterate" because
he is still not very good with the online inventory system. At first, John left off the comments,
but now he is getting tired of them. He politely and privately discussed the issue with the
younger employees and asked them to stop troubling him. Instead, the younger person told John
that he was being too sensitive, and the bullying has gotten worse. Eventually, John approached
the store owner to talk about the situation. The owner like John but is not ready to get into the
employee’s issues. John notes that since many of the insults reference his age, they could
constitute illegal workplace harassment. The store owner became defensive and continued to do
nothing about the situation. Eventually, the bullying began to affect John's health. He quit his job
and then applied for unemployment benefits, arguing that his employer's failure to address the
age-based harassment created a hostile work environment. John not only won unemployment
benefits but is now involved in a lawsuit against his former employer.

Next, I interviewed one of my colleagues, who works part-time as a student worker in the
dining services at the University of South Florida. He shared an experience with me about his
work culture. First of all, the management at his workplace did not train him on any of the things
that are required in the dining. He learned everything by himself or by observing others. The
work was not assigned according to the position offered. A dishwasher works as a food service
worker and vice versa. Everybody was given different work but one who works in dishwashing
will be assigned the same. The management is little biased over there. So, this made my friend
little frustrated because he was always given a work of dishwashing. So, he faced a lot of
conflicts in the workplace. This way he was not happy with the job because of the biased nature
of the management. He got into stress and decided to quit the job. But, then, he was threatened
by the manager that if he won't do the remaining shifts then he will be recognized as non-
rehireable at the university. This way the conflict at the workplace can be very stressful if the
higher authorities have low EQ.

All of the three interviews had one or the similar conflicts that they face in the industry. It
is very important to understand that where there is a human, a conflict will tend to happen. But,
the peace is also in the hands of humans. So, certain steps are taken to ensure a good
environment in the workplace. According to their thoughts, workplace violence is occurring at
almost all places, industries, professions and throughout the world. There isn't one such place
that people are working freely. Everywhere there is stress. The overall lifestyle and increasing
use of technology are also responsible for affecting the health physically and mentally. Every
person should aim to have a high EQ which will be useful for himself as well as for the others.

Many experts in the workplace and organizational psychology note that workplace
conflict isn't always negative. When conflict is handled in a healthy way, it can lead to growth
for everyone who is involved. It can also lead to new ideas and the evolution of processes within
the business. In addition, a willingness to address conflict often prevents small annoyances from
becoming larger problems that can harm morale.

Conflict resolution is a daily occurrence at work that can either propel or disrupt the
momentum for a leader, a team or the entire organization. A toxic environment is formed in the
workplace when leaders allow conflict to fester rather than confront it. Managing conflict can be
a tricky thing especially when we are not familiar with the larger ecosystem in which the
particular individual or department creating the conflict operates, and how efforts to resolve
conflict will reverberate throughout that ecosystem. The workplace is fueled with so many
concurrent agendas that we never know which ones may be affected while resolving conflict
solely to benefit and advance our own.

Leaders must act responsibly to be respected. Leadership is a serious responsibility that

primarily involves developing and guiding the full potential in people, teams and the
organizations. An important part in the process of developing potential is to know how to
analyze conflict and when to seize the opportunity within the conflict before a healthy tension
turns into a disturbing situation. In this case, many leaders would try to avoid tension to create
the appearance of harmony. However, by doing this, they are unknowingly making it worst while
creating problems and internal disruption among employees. A leader must always remember to
neutralize or minimize conflict, not allowing it to grow. Unfortunately, in their attempts to keep
the peace at work, leaders often create artificial, untrustworthy environments. This is what
happens when we are more concerned about being well-liked, avoiding a negative reputation, or
being put into a situation that might reveal your leadership vulnerabilities.

To prevent conflicts, a professional code of conduct should be adopted by the companies

as part of group practice policies. Ground rules make it easy to discipline, as they take
personality out of the equation. A disciplinary structure should be developed so that the
mechanisms and the referral pattern to higher authority are well understood.

Understanding how conflicts arise is important in their prevention. From an employee's

perspective, triggering reasons include lack of communication, colleagues who don't pull their
weight, unfair criticism, silly rules, preferential treatment, sexism or racial inequality, being put
down, unreasonable expectations, and verbal abuse. On the management side, problems arise
from poor communication, inappropriate responses, poor prioritizing, personal work interfering
with professional work, and clock-watching. Pitfalls that leaders should be careful to avoid
include taking people for granted, failing to keep promises, failing to take responsibility for one's
own errors, and failing to practice what one preaches. The key to survival as a leader is to
develop emotional intelligence and to generate it in the work environment.
 Emotional intelligence has been recognized as necessary not only to be a successful
leader but also to be successful in life. A high mental intelligence quotient revolves around a
narrow band of linguistic and mathematical skills, whereas emotional intelligence involves self-
awareness, management of emotions, empathy, people skills, and motivation. The development
of interpersonal intelligence allows understanding of other people, what motivates them, and
how to work with them. This not only enables leaders to get inside the other person's head, but it
also lets them understand and recognize their own emotions, making control of those emotions
easier. If emotional control is lost, smart people become stupid.

The other factor is anger which is the most difficult mood to control. It can be energizing,
exhilarating, and even seductive. It fuels itself and eventually becomes a rage. Rage is a state
beyond reason that revolves around revenge with no concern for the consequences and with
minimal awareness. Early intervention provides the best chance of successfully defusing the
angry situation. A cooling-off period may actually exacerbate the anger. Leaders should stay
cool, avoid direct accusation, be good listeners, and repeat the argument in their own words to
demonstrate that they are trying to understand the problem. Asking a meaningful question can be
a powerful distraction. However, if all is lost, the leader should leave and return another day.
Out-of-control emotions can paralyze cognitive function.

This way, by taking considerable efforts and several steps in the organization, many
conflicts can be handled peacefully without harming the work environment and attempts are
made to avoid negative conflicts, especially which results in a deadly encounter in the
workplace.
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