Situation

Trainers at a large training facility conflicted with middle management about new policies regarding training procedures.  After the initial policy information email was sent from Management, one of the trainers replied to all with a contentious rebuke of one specific policy.  This created a cascade of replies, anger and ultimately the threat of sanctions from middle management on one side, and solidarity by the trainers on the other.  

Conflict

While middle management fears that they are facing a ‘revolt’ and how this could reflect on them by upper management, the trainers felt they were being disrespected and unable to continue to function at the level of quality their trainees have come to expect.  They also would have liked to be consulted as to some of the new policies, for there is some merit to the intent of them, yet the implementation was insulting.  Upper management is keeping a close eye on the outcome of this dispute to gauge whether they placed the right manager in the role to replace the recently retired previous one.  Middle management has therefore decided to bring in a mediator to act as a facilitator to this discussion, in order to keep the proceedings professional and confidential, and has therefore contacted Fresh Start Mediation to help resolve this dispute.

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Mediation Outcomes

• The previous manager would always consult with the trainers. They were always professional in their discourse, and understood that sometimes things just had to happen, but they were given the support and environment in which to reflect on these issues. 

• Since the new manager arrived, the spirit of collaboration, in the eyes of the trainers, seemed to disappear.  Where they felt they had input before, this new manager had a different approach they felt disrupted the culture that already had been established. 

• The new manager had been a trainer in their previous position, and had been given this opportunity to run a new branch, and felt that the previous culture was lacking professionalism, and had made it a goal to shift the culture somewhat, believing this was the mandate from Upper Management.

• The mediation process involved holding private meetings, or caucus sessions, that invited both sides to be able to confess perhaps some of the deeper issues involved.  The main issues discovered through this process:

  • One of the trainers had also applied for the new Manager role, and had they been hired, would have handled some of this quite differently. 

  • The ‘Reply all’ was in error, as it was supposed to be sent to someone else in a private message, but stands by it, as it seems to have been the catalyst for change.

  • The new manager was afraid that their position would be at risk if this was handled poorly, and simply wanted the respect the position required in order to be effective. 

  • The ‘Reply All’ was a public rebuke, which showed disrespect, that therefore threatened the managers ability to maintain their authority. 

  • After all, not long before they were one of the trainers and these ‘new’ policies were standard practice at the old branch, which, in turn, padded the resume and assisted in the promotion to management.   

Solutions

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• The solution involved finding common ground between the two main parties involved.  The trainer apologized for the public nature of the email, and the new manager, upon realizing that the trainer had managerial ambitions, would do what they could to help them achieve that goal. 

• A new monthly collaborative meeting would be held, where management and trainers would have an open forum to discuss what was, and what was not working.  This meeting would be chaired by the trainers in order to help those with managerial ambitions succeed.

• This collaboration meeting was later established by Upper Management, to all other branches as standard company policy.