Written by: Izabela Puchala, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Artificial harmony can seem idyllic and seductive to many leaders. What's there not to like? No one is arguing, and there's no need to deal with intense emotions. However, when we look underneath the surface, we discover the cracks in trust and psychological safety. They are the reasons our team members hold back from engaging in passionate discussions. Artificial harmony kills creativity, commitment, and momentum to achieve great results. It keeps our relationships at a transactional and superficial level. Without a healthy conflict, our team is floating in the land of status quo, compliance, and individual status management.
In this short article, I'll share how to recognize artificial harmony in the team and identify what might be holding us back from engaging in a healthy unfiltered discussion. We'll also learn how to role model a healing conflict for others.
Recognize artificial harmony.
There are many signs of artificial harmony, as described by Patrick Lencioni in one of his books. One of my favorite ways is to review the energy in our team meetings. Are the team meetings boring? Is there little passion coming from the team members discussing issues? Are the most pressing problems even brought up in the discussions? If this resonates, we might be dealing with artificial harmony in the team. Now, what? Should we start mining for diverse opinions to stimulate conflict? I bet most of us are already doing it, but not much is coming back from the team. This is because the foundation of trust needs to be built first.
Build trust instead of resentment.
Who do you trust more? Someone with whom you've always had an amicable relationship without any disagreements or with whom you've been able to argue and work through issues passionately? In which bucket would your romantic partner fall? How much deeper is the relationship in the latter case, right? It's incredibly healing to authentically express ourselves and feel heard by the other person, even if they disagree with our position. Witnessing someone opening themselves up to shift their perspective, even if that's not where the discussion ends, will generate trust.
Compare this with conflict avoidance. We often mistake it for taking the high road by sparing the other person's feelings. In reality, we keep our relationship superficial and deprive it of the opportunity to evolve. Since conflict energy often signifies an unspoken request for a change. As Brene Brown said, "when we avoid certain conversations and never fully learn how the other person feels about all of the issues, we sometimes end up making assumptions that not only perpetuate but deepen misunderstandings, and that can generate resentment.”
Not all conflict is toxic.
But hold on, is a conflict not toxic? Sure, it's unhealthy if a dispute is not about the issue but the person. However, there's more to that. To identify our unconscious conflict conditioning, we can take a personality questionnaire like the Enneagram or reflect on our cultural and family background. Suppose we grew up in an environment where conflict led to belittling, contempt, and violence. In that case, we're likely to believe that conflict is destructive and avoid it entirely out of fear. If we grew up in a family where conflict was a doorway to otherwise rare emotional expressions, we're probably instigating it, believing that showing extreme feelings means caring. Whether it's avoidance or instigation, in both cases, we act under the influence of negative emotions driven by our fight-or-flight response which is a land of toxic conflict.
Assess your conflict readiness.
Where is the territory of the healing conflict, then? From the research on Positive Intelligence, we know it exists in the land of positive emotions. Imagine each of our relationships is an allotment with beautiful flowers of empathy, curiosity, vulnerability, and trust. Weeds, such as frustration, sadness, anger, or disappointment, will pop up from time to time on our patch. They give us signs that something needs addressing in our relationships. If we pretend not to see the weeds, they will gradually take over our garden. How do we need to deal with them, though? Not through a full-on attack on the patch, as this will destroy everything. The three questions below will help us decide if we picked the right tools:
Empathy - Am I willing to put myself in the other person's shoes and see things from their perspective?
Exploration - Am I willing to put aside my judgments and explore the issue with a beginner's mindset, like a curious anthropologist?
Innovation - Am I willing to accept that the other person might be 10% right and build on their idea rather than defend mine?
Self-regulate for healing conflict.
If we cannot answer "yes" to all three questions, we must self-regulate before engaging in a conflict. Self-regulation will empower us to acknowledge and process our feelings instead of blaming them on others, which might look like, "He/she/they makes me angry." It will help us direct our thoughts and emotions to be at the choice of our response during the interaction. In this short video, Dr. Nicole Le Pera explains the self-regulation process to achieve conflict readiness:
Acknowledge the feeling
Sit with the feeling for a couple of deep breaths
Notice the different sensations in your body as you stay with the feeling
Journal your feelings and insights from the experience
Conclusions
Artificial harmony is a recipe for superficial relationships with our team, romantic partners, and ourselves. On a personal level, it leads to disconnection from our intuition by pretending we're not bothered by the issue. On the interpersonal level, the longer we don't address the situation, the more resentment and cracks in the trust we'll generate in our relationships. Conflict can be toxic if we enter it from a place of negative feelings in a fight or flight response. It can also be incredibly healing if we role model empathy, curiosity, and willingness to shift our perspective during the interaction. We must acknowledge our negative emotions about the situation before embracing conflict. If we try to swipe them under the carpet, they're likely to sneak upon us in the most charged moment of the discussion. The four-step self-regulation process will help us prepare for a heated debate and be at choice rather than react. Understanding our family environment and identifying our personal conflict preferences through tools such as the Enneagram will increase our awareness of the otherwise invisible baggage we bring with us.
If this article resonates with you, drop me a note, and we can chat about how to empower you and your team to embrace healing conflict and move from superficial to deep relationships.
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Izabela Puchala, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Izabela Puchala is an expert in leadership and organizational development. She has an MSc in Economics and a Postgraduate degree in Gestalt Psychotherapeutic Counseling. As a Certified Enneagram Coach, Izabela helps international and dispersed teams go from transactional and artificially harmonious culture to trust, cohesion, and fun. Her clients include the BBC, Salesforce, Planet Labs, and YPO (Young Presidents’ Organization).
