Ep. 16: Intra-Organizational Conflict Confidence In Conflict

On this episode, Allen Oelschlaeger is joined by Mike Panebianco, a past vice president of the Southwest Airlines Pilot Association (https://www.swapa.org) and president of MRH (mission ready human) Performance, a consulting organization focused on peak human performance.
The discussion focuses on the issue of intra-organizational conflict – i.e., conflict that is internal to an organization (rather than with clients or the general public).
Some of the core principles discussed include:
- Even at organization with strong values like Southwest Airlines, intra-organizational conflict still exists. Conflict is inevitable within any organization or team.
- In most organizations, intra-organizational conflict is a bigger problem than the conflict that occurs with clients (patients, students, customers) or with the general public.
- The impact of intra-organizational conflict is significant: sick leave goes up, stress-related illness goes up, turnover goes up.
- In many organizations, conflict avoidance is often a bigger problem that in-your-face conflict
- The airline industry has done a great job of training such that conflict avoidance within the cockpit is a rarity.
- The Total Quality Management movement was largely based on training people to address issues head-on rather than avoid conflict.
More about Mike: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-panebianco-7478bbb