Irena Harkison, a partner in Health Law at a top-tier legal firm, LKW International, was concerned about how she could handle an ongoing dispute between two of her staff. Di Stewart had been with the firm for six years having worked her way up from graduate to senior associate, and Patrick Callaway had joined three years ago as an associate and been promoted quickly to senior associate. Irena respected both of their legal abilities and considered them conscientious, competent and valuable employees. Over the last nine months, however, Irena had found herself spending increasing hours weekly with both staff listening to concerns each had about the other. Given the demands of the practice in providing advice to the Health Department on handling COVID-19 in the hospital system, Irena found her patience wearing thin. She had tried a range of remedies without any success. She wondered how she could help Di and Patrick come to an agreement about their polarised positions and how the dispute had reached this point. Irena set up a session with Di and Patrick for the following Wednesday at which she planned to discuss this conflict. She wanted to explore how the conflict had escalated, its impact on the practice, and come to some agreements about resolution. To help her thinking, Irena drew up a list of how Di and Patrick had each presented their issues to her on the circumstances to date. Di Stewart had joined LKW International as a law graduate and had completed a rotation in Health Law, which she enjoyed as she found the area offered lots of opportunity and she really appreciated Irena’s style of management. Irena had offered Di the role as solicitor then promoted her three years later to associate then after another two years to senior associate. Di was happy with her current role though she had thought about becoming a partner but wasn’t sure that dealing with so many cases and being responsible for generating billable client hours was what she wanted. Di found working with Patrick difficult. Though they were both at the same level, Patrick had been given the lead role in the COVID-19 hospital agreement cases. Di could see that Patrick’s experience as a Nurse Practitioner meant he should understand the practice of the hospital system, but she just wished he wasn’t so quick to point out his importance and where he was headed. During the first case she worked on with Patrick he was very singleminded and had demanded that she complete the tasks in an unreasonable time. Di was more relaxed about deadlines and felt her length of tenure with LKW International gave her a better understanding of the ebbs and flows of the work. In the case wind-up conversation Di tried to discuss her views but Patrick didn’t listen. The problems weren’t resolved. In the second case, Di reckoned Patrick was on a power trip; he was really picky about how the agreements were drafted and kept returning documents just because of the layout or a misplaced apostrophe. Di thought this controlling approach was typical of someone of Patrick’s age. It naturally added delays to getting the documents drafted and in the third case this blew up as a deadline was missed. Di had been talking to Irena and some of her colleagues and they had agreed that it wasn’t her fault, it was Patrick’s unreasonable focus on items that added no material advantage that was to blame. For some time now Di had felt that Patrick was trying to get her moved or even get her dismissed. She didn’t trust him and felt that his much-mentioned Nurse Practitioner experience was a bit suspect as she often had to point out to Patrick areas where the hospital system practice was different and correct some of the documents. Di had raised her concerns with Irena and constantly asked her to speak to him about how he was treating her. Patrick Callaway had been a Nurse Practitioner for three years prior to studying law. After graduating with high distinction in his law degree, he worked with a mid-tier law firm specialising in health, progressing quickly from graduate to solicitor and then joined LKW International as an associate in Health Law. Within a year, Patrick had gained a promotion to senior associate and now had his sights set on becoming a partner. Patrick was very clear on his career path, seeing that his previous qualifications and his past and present experience equipped him to be successful as a partner in Health Law. He had deliberately put himself forward in a range of cases, some of which were quite complex, to gain experience and portray himself as a skilled lawyer. Patrick had worked with Di on three cases in the last year, each time taking the lead, and in each case finding it harder to deal with her approach. Patrick was very deadlinedriven and was prepared to work through the night to deliver the client outcome. He wanted Di to deliver the case components immediately and struggled with what he saw as her ‘don’t worry, she’ll be right’ approach, which he felt reflected her youth. After the problems with the first case, Patrick had sat with Di and discussed the main conflict issues but despite all his arguments she wouldn’t see reason or accept the need to change her approach. During the second case, Patrick could see that Di’s legal skills were inferior and her lack of dedication was causing problems in delivering required outcomes to the Health Department. He became concerned that Di’s incompetence would reflect badly on him and ruin his chance of becoming partner. He began to keep detailed notes on tasks allocated and Di’s approach, which he raised with Irena and with Narim, the managing partner. During the third case, Patrick knew he had to stop working with Di as she had failed to deliver the last COVID-19 hospital agreement on time and he had been left to deal with the commotion. Patrick had spent some heated moments with Irena detailing Di’s ineptitude and was preparing his case to take to Narim. He spent some time with some of the other partners explaining what was happening and assuring them that he had done his part and he was pivotal to the Health Department relationship. In all his conversations Patrick stressed that he thought Di’s actions were more than ineffectiveness and were actually deliberate attempts to halt his path to partner.
Questions Mainstream
1 What form of conflict is exhibited in this situation? What do you see as the causes of the conflict?
2 At which stage of Glasl’s conflict resolution would you assess Patrick and Di are at? Provide some examples.
Critical
1 How does power form the basis of the conflict?
2 What are the pros, cons and relevance to the situation of each of the conflict management approaches of avoidance, accommodation, compromise and competition?