Conflict Resolution in Coaching with Chris Grygo and Jessie Punia

Chris Grygo: I think about conflict as any kind of tension that somebody is holding, either within themselves or much more commonly with other people that they’re working with, living with, or engaging with day to day. Conflict is a natural part of life. I mean, all of us have conflict, and for me, the conflicts that get addressed in coaching are usually the ones that are rising to a level of interfering with something that’s important for somebody.

Shawn Hesketh: Every conflict is completely unique depending on the particular circumstances in your client’s life, and as coaches, we can help our clients resolve those conflicts. Welcome to the Coach Factory Podcast. I’m your host, Shawn Hesketh, and when it comes to managing conflicts, there is no one-size-fits-all all approach. So how do you navigate that conversation with your client?

Chris Grygo: So certainly, the clients that I see, they’re coming in sometimes with just their own conflicts, something about the way their lives are structured, something about the way their work unfolds, the situations that they’re in. There’s just some kind of fundamental tension, let’s say, between their values or what matters to them and what’s actually playing out, or there’s a tension between their ideal state, their ideal condition and the one that they find themselves in, so that’s one set of conflicts that I see.

Another, of course, are interpersonal conflicts, and that could be with one person or multiple people. And this again is where folks are at odds, either around their perspective on a given topic, subject, something happening in the business, or just the ways that they’re working. So there’s some kind of interpersonal tension, ways of engaging that people are trying to navigate. And I also see sometimes conflicts that people are experiencing that are broader, something about the workplace, a fundamental misalignment between the direction of things that are happening in their workplace, the way the work feels day to day, the ways people engage in it. Something like that that’s more structural to the ways a business works or an organization works and the ways that they want to be working as an individual.

So when people come to me with a conflict, of course, I want to get a sense of what’s going on and what the context is. The other big thing that I as a coach in conflict want to think about is what matters to this person? So I ask them a lot about what is it that you want to see? What would be an ideal outcome for you? What would you like to see? What would be a best-case scenario? And sometimes, we play with multiple scenarios. What’s the very best-case scenario? What’s a likely and viable solution or outcome that we can come to? And I like to get them clear about what won’t work for them or what would be a solution that’s not really very satisfying at all. So we start there with for the sake of what are we trying to go about this whole resolution anyway? What’s the outcome that we seek?

Shawn Hesketh: Once you’re clear on the outcome or resolution your client wants, it’s also important to understand the underlying factors that may be at play behind the scenes, including interpersonal dynamics. Jessie Punia is the president of August Public, and she’s built much of her coaching on helping businesses resolve conflicts in teams. And understanding those personal goals, especially how they differ for each person involved, can help your client get clarity on the big picture.

Jessie Punia: The most common place where I see conflicts arise in organizations is nearly always, I’d say nine times out of 10, always around decision making and specifically a lack of clarity around who gets to make what call. So sometimes, that can be amongst peers, so peers in this tug of war around who gets to make what call, who gets to provide advice and who gets to make the final call. The biggest misunderstanding when it comes to conflict is that it’s interpersonal. I work with folks who say, “Sally and Bob don’t get along.” And usually there is something structural. There is something in the ways that we interact with each other that is creating them or pushing them into some kind of conflict.

When I’m working with teams, I see varying levels of conflicts ranging from day-to-day logistics, running the team, that level of conflict that usually gets swept under the rug and people just suck it up and move along. And then it can get into escalating levels of conflict, I would say, all the way to the top of the house which requires maybe a third party to step in and mediate or participate when it comes to conflict.

Shawn Hesketh: Jessie’s experience with teams highlights just how critical it is to identify the underlying source of the conflict. The next step is asking the right questions and directing your client to look at their own tensions and tendencies before you dive straight into solutions.

Chris Grygo: For me, this is part of the core coaching questions we would ask anyway at the beginning of a session. What do you want to focus on today? Why does that matter to you, or what about that’s important? How will we know that we’re making the kind of progress you desire? And then where do you want to start? So that’s just how we always start a coaching session, and for me, it’s that simple with the conflict resolution piece.

Now, the other frameworks that I have found to be useful are classic ones, so I’ll just point to books like Getting to Yes, which is a very old conflict resolution book. A framework that can be helpful is something called BATNA. What’s my best alternative to a negotiated agreement? That’s what B-A-T-N-A stands for. What’s my best alternative to a negotiated agreement? And that’s what I’m trying to get at when I ask people what are the solutions that are going to work for them?

And that’s important to me because it can happen that people will find some relief in any solution, and then a little bit down the road when they’re in it, realize they left a bunch of stuff that mattered on the table. Or they didn’t really have a way to think, what’s a win-win or my very best outcome? What are a couple of good outcomes that’ll work? And also, when will I say, “No, this isn’t going to work for me,” in a conflict that I’m navigating?

So once we have a sense of what do I want to get out of the conflict and what are my moves if this doesn’t work out so well? Then I want to start to help the client I’m coaching to explore what are their what we call in somatics condition tendencies. What are my habits when I find myself in conflict and those tensions arise? And the three big ones that I often orient to just to keep it really simple are is the person I’m working with likely to move? Do they describe moving against conflict when they face it? So some disagreement comes and they’re going to move against that, they’re going to really continue that conflict escalation.

Are they going to push into it, which is really lean in heavily to their point of view to try to convince somebody of the rightness of that so that people relent? Or are they avoidant? Are they going to pull back and pull away? And it’s really important, I think, for clients, once they know what they want out of the outcome to know, “Hey, and when I get into this situation, I’m probably going to either fight because that’s just what I like to do, I’m going to try to convince and lean in because I’m an advocate, or I’m going to pull back and avoid because that’s more comfortable for me for whatever reasons.”

And each of those helps because if I know somebody tends to move against in most of the situations they’re in, then we want to start to talk about how does that serve them and not serve them, and what are some alternatives? If they lean in heavily, including by accommodating, they’re going to just lean in and say, “What can I do? How can I help? How can I make this better?” What did they give up in that situation or what’s left on the table? And if they pull back and avoid and just say, “Oh man, conflict, I’m out.” What does that leave? Again, what does that leave unsatisfied? Because ultimately, I’m still orienting toward what’s the outcome. What is it that they really want to achieve and why does that matter?

Shawn Hesketh: This default reaction to conflict that Chris is talking about goes beyond just the mental response. Somatics is the practice of using the mind-body connection to help you survey your internal self, listen to the signals that your body’s sending, and then understand the ways that you hold onto your experiences in your body, and it’s central to how Chris prepares his clients to feel in control when they face conflict.

Chris Grygo: It’s basically your embodied experience of what’s happening here and now. Many of us have embodied practices of some kind where we go to the gym, we run, we swim, we do yoga, we do meditation, and all of these are kinds of somatic practices. So somatics is your embodied leadership, your embodied transformation, your embodied living, and that’s a powerful approach in my experience because it helps people get really clear what’s happening for them. They can actually feel it in the moment, and then they could use the information they’re feeling in the moment to adjust, adapt, and choose their next move.

Shawn Hesketh: But how do you turn somatics into hands-on tangible practices? As a coach, your unique skills in drawing clients toward awareness allow them to feel in control of both the process and their response.

Chris Grygo: So what semantics looks like in a conflict situation is to have a client talk about a conflict that they’re in or a conflict that’s pretty typical for them. And as a coach, I’m going to do a number of things, which is I’m going to be listening of course for the words, the assumptions that they’re bringing in. I might ask them questions about so what happens for you in that moment? Or what do you find yourself doing in that moment? I’m also watching them, and if I’m in the room with them, I’m also scanning their body for where I might notice what they’re doing. How they’re leaning forward, leaning back, how they lower themselves or puff themselves up. If they’re clenched or tight in certain areas, and all of that is somatic, is bodily information that I want to help them draw attention to.

Ultimately, when I’m working somatically, I’m trying to help people be somatically aware, which is, “Ooh, I notice I’m clenching my jaw as I talk about this situation, or I feel myself getting tight in the chest.” Then I want to help them to have somatic openings, which is ways to experience a little bit more of that and to think about what else is happening for them in that moment? So awareness, opening, what else is possible? What else might be possible? What would you like to be feeling in your body that you’re not feeling now? And then somatic practices, which are ways for them to work on those things. So I want to soften my jaw in those moments, I want to stay present in the moment when this happens. So those are the ways that I would bring somatics in a tangible way into the moment and into the conflict.

Shawn Hesketh: The art of listening is one of the cornerstones of coaching, and it’s interesting how really listening goes beyond just hearing words, and we can help our clients develop that same level of awareness.

Jessie Punia: I think sometimes, when we’re called in as a third party or if you are called in as a third party, as a coach, sometimes we’re so keen and eager to show value and participate, we skip that discovery step. So I would recommend you having… I have my own personal set of questions, for you to have your own set of questions that you feel like will help you understand the people in front of you. I think my way of doing this work is about building trust with folks, and the way that we do that is by being authentic, by having what the model would say is logic but credibility, and then showing empathy. So how can you ask questions and get to know folks in a way that builds trust so when you do have spicy questions or when you do have a rock that really needs some help to be overturned, folks trust you and they’ll share freely?

Shawn Hesketh: Think of a time you had to work through a conflict with a client. Did the client trust you? Did they feel really heard and understood by you? Because once you’re aware, the process of reading their cues and guiding them toward a resolution can begin.

Chris Grygo: I think that somatic awareness really serves clients because we’re beginning to make conscious and explicit things that are happening anyway. So there’s lots of ways to think about this, including if we just start with one place, there are mirror neurons. So if I’m working with somebody and we work together over time, the extent to which I can keep my own physiology, my nervous system in check and humming along, theirs is going to be able to do something similar. So there’s just something cellular that happens when people are together. That’s one good reason to be aware of what you’re doing. Another is because oftentimes, other people know what it is more than we do, and if I can begin to be aware that my body does something or I have a kind of a tell or something’s going on for me, that just helps me to align with what other people might be picking up on anyway.

And then if some of those kinds of behaviors are getting in the way of what I really want in a given situation, then it’s important to be aware so I can think, “Oh, I can see myself leaning in a little. I’m over committing to a position or I’m myself in this piece of work and that’s not going to meet my needs over time. It’s not going to be good for everybody else over time either. What does it look like right in this moment for me to pull back a little bit so other people can step in, or give space to the person I’m in conflict with so that they can express what’s important for them and we can figure that out in a way that’s a little bit more mutual?”

Shawn Hesketh: Chris points to three benefits to this practice that not only make approaching conflict more manageable, but can become new habits that can resolve a conflict before it even becomes a concern.

Chris Grygo: So my language for this is that having these kind of embodied practices, these somatic practices help us to feel and be more present, more open and more connected, and that includes to ourselves. So to the extent to which I can help a client who doesn’t already have some of these kinds of things to say, “Hey, I’m in a conflict situation. I know these things happen to me because I’m now really present to the fact that they happen for me. I want to stay connected to that and to the people who are around me to what matters, and I want to stay open to doing something other than my habit.”

And we’re always talking about the habits that are not serving us well, so there might be a good reason why I have this habit or this kind of way of being may have served me at an earlier point in my career or in another context, but it’s no longer really serving somebody where they need it to. And that’s where they have an opportunity to say, “Okay, let me get present to this. Let me stay connected and let me stay open, including to something else being possible, a part of myself, a way of being, a strategy for engaging that I just haven’t developed the same way.” So we always start by saying whatever habits we have, we’ve come by them honestly. They serve a real purpose. We will even do practices where we appreciate them, explicitly say, “Man, this thing has kept me safe,” or, “This thing has kept me in relationship.” And it’s not so much doing that now, and what else might be possible that I can explore within myself that I haven’t already?

Shawn Hesketh: And once you feel ready, it’s time to face the conflict. Jessie’s been at this point many times, and it’s fascinating to hear how resolving the conflict doesn’t always follow the path you might expect.

Jessie Punia: I was recently coaching a team who were working on re-imagining the way one of their processes work, and we had a meeting at the end of the week with their sponsor, with the very senior person who most of these people on the team typically wouldn’t ever share, or they were enough levels senior for the rest of the team that it felt like a high stakes moment. And so lots of back and forth and debate, and I think sometimes this happens in corporate speak. It doesn’t read of conflict and people aren’t raising voices, people aren’t scrunching their faces, but there’s a lot of passive-aggressive comments and ping pong or tennis back and forth with ideas because essentially, the idea that is out on the table isn’t right.

And so that’s where I step in as a coach and I ask folks and try and move the team along by asking things like, “Is this safe to try? Not, “Is this the best thing that we can put in front of that senior leader?” But, “Is this safe to try? Will this cause harm?” And that helps the team move forward through the conflict, resolve the conflict, but still also have something that they can show that leader at the end of the week.

Shawn Hesketh: Have you ever driven through a dense fog or a heavy storm when it’s really hard to see? That’s how it can feel when you’re trying to navigate conflict. But that confusion clears when you look at it through the lens of basic human needs, and somatic practices are a powerful tool in clearing the fog.

Chris Grygo: The kind of embodied practice, somatic practice I do, we are often orienting toward three primary needs, and there’s lots of hierarchies of needs out there but just that we’re talking about most people are trying day to day to take care of their needs for dignity, for just inherent worth and a sense of dignity as a person. Safety, of course, and belonging. That just as humans, we want to be safe, we want to belong, we want to have a sense of dignity versus shame or some other kind of experience. And so if a client is engaging out of habit or in an automatic way, I get to think, “Oh, this person, I wonder what it’s trying to take care of.” Dignity, safety, and/or belonging, it could be a combination of them. And then I can get curious about, “Oh, I wonder if this tendency of theirs to give up a little bit of their dignity in this moment is because it helps them feel or take care of safety needs, or they can stay in the relationship and be safe even if they have to compromise on that.”

And so when you come at it from that point of view, and I share this with clients, that I’m trying to help them have safety, dignity, and belonging, that means also that when it’s an ugly process, quote-unquote, or it’s not as easy for them as they want, we dignify that. We say, “Yeah, but look at where we are,” or, “Good on you for trying to take care of something, and let’s stay with it.” And that makes a big difference for people. It’s a lot more supportive of a process, and if you’re managing shame or guilt or regret or a sense of self-judgment, that’s energy bleeding out that you could be directing toward this thing that you really want and making some kind of incremental, even transformational shifts over time. So that’s, again, what I love about this approach, is that it helps me think, oh yeah, this person wants to be safe, they want to belong, they want to have dignity.

I want those kinds of things too. I get it, and so how do I bring my best self to supporting them in getting all three of those things more of the time? The phrase then my somatic teachers often say is we’re trying to help people take new action under the same old stress, so how do I help this person take new action with the same stress? So it’s not that their workplace is going to change or that their spouse is going to change or whatever it is going to change necessarily, but they might have some different ways of being and engaging within that, and that’s what we’re trying to unlock.

Shawn Hesketh: It’s this human element of coaching that makes it different from any other industry. You connect to your client’s needs and that allows you to build solutions that protect their vulnerabilities. But in order to build, we have to have the right tools, and Jessie has found some in rather interesting industries.

Jessie Punia: So the first tool that I recommend to teams and often find myself using is the tool of retrospectives or retros. This borrowed from Agile software, people have these scheduled on their calendars every either four to six weeks, and they have them scheduled as far out as possible. And that is because people can trust and rely and know that they have a team, a shared moment where we’re going to get together and revisit everything. Everything is on the table. Just by having that on the calendar can help people really focus on their work and know that they have a moment to share and consider the team. And then when you get people in that moment, I really recommend you ask three questions. What worked? Where did you get stuck? And what might we do differently next time?

Those questions sound very simple, but they are pretty powerful and sophisticated. Those first two questions really get a good lay of the land. They make sure everyone speaks from the I, we avoid blame, and we start with what worked because we have a negativity bias as humans. I think we’re like four times more likely to remember bad things that happen to us so we have to work extra hard on the positive. And then as a team, we surfaced all that wisdom. We then asked that last question, what might we do next time? That’s where we put our big ideas hats on and incremental change hats on, and really think about what can we do differently going forward? And that is just an hour-long meeting, sometimes half an hour, that teams can do every six weeks that has a huge impact on the way that they do their work.

So the benefits of the tool rounds, there are loads of benefits. The one that I usually start or lead with is the fact that it allows teams to get all the information out of people’s heads and into the room. Typically, when we’re doing a piece of work, we have a bunch of people around the table and there’s a reason we’ve chosen those five to six people. They maybe represent a particular business unit or they have a particular skillset, and so we want to make sure we hear from everyone so that we have all the data that’s available to us. Some people are more introverted thinkers, some people are more extroverted processes, and so when we use a tool like rounds where each person speaks in turn without interruption, we are giving everyone equal opportunity to participate in the conversation.

And sometimes when I’m doing rounds, some things that I have to think about is where is the leader going in that round? We don’t want always the leader to go first and anchor the room. Sometimes, we want the leader to go last so they have to hear from everyone and then pull that thinking together into some kind of decision or call maybe. Rounds are really great because psychological safety is the key, the biggest driver of team performance, and rounds is a really great tool to help people know that their voice is welcome in this conversation, and it’s so welcome that we’re actually going to structure our conversation in such a way so that we can hear from everyone. So it is a really great tool to increase psychological safety within teams.

Shawn Hesketh: Jessie’s comments about feeling safe remind us of Chris’s idea of a person in conflict protecting their core needs, and feeling secure while you’re being vulnerable is one of those needs. It’s also a core practice in any coaching business. Creating an environment where your clients feel comfortable learning with you and voicing their conflicts is central to your success in supporting them toward their goals.

Jessie Punia: Psychological safety is a concept that was coined by a Harvard professor, Amy Edmondson, and then later on, Google have done a lot of research around psychological safety. And what that research showed was that psychological safety is the biggest indicator of high team performance. So a team with high levels of psychological safety will outperform a team of your most talented folks if they have a lower level of psychological safety. So psychological safety can be built in three ways. One, by creating a learning frame, making sure that we’re making it clear to folks that we’re experimenting, we’re learning together. That we might even fail, and by making sure that we are including all voices or soliciting all voices, people know that their voice [inaudible 00:25:41]. And then finally, by responding productively, so when people finally do speak up, they aren’t necessarily chastised or made to feel bad about that.

So psychological safety is the idea that people can speak up without fear, and it is one of the biggest, most helpful tools when it comes to conflict resolution because we want people to be able to speak up. We want people to be able to speak freely when it comes to the conflict that they’re experiencing.

Chris Grygo: What I love about this approach, and it’s not unique to somatics but it’s part of it, is that there’s an appreciation for any way that anybody is engaging comes from an honest place. So other people around them might not love it, but the truth is however people are behaving, it’s trying to take care of something. So when you start to think, “Gosh, this person’s trying to take care of something,” it’s a much more generous place to be and it’s a much more open place to be as a coach.

Shawn Hesketh: Thank you so much to Chris Grygo and Jessie Punia for sharing their advice and practical steps to help clients work through and resolve conflict, and thank you for joining me on this episode of the Coach Factory Podcast. If you’ve got questions about this topic or just want to let us know you’ve found it helpful, go to CoachFactory.chat and let’s start a conversation, or send me an email at shawn@coachfactory.co

This episode of The Coach Factory Podcast was produced with the support of Come Alive Creative. To hear more episodes, get the show notes, and learn how to start, run, and grow your coaching practice, visit CoachFactory.co.

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