Human Resource: Workplace Conflict - Essay Example

Veteran employees tend to be lazy, not motivated, and sometimes tend to believe that they should receive the same treatment as their coworkers (Montgomery, 2005).
The Laziness of veteran employees can affect the performance of a team in a specific department in the workplace. This is evident when employees slack off and do not attend to their pile of work. Walter and Jesse are team members at ABC Company. Walter and Jesse have worked for the company for about thirty years; their experience at work has made them veteran employees. Lately, the performance of the team has been noticed to slack off due to their attitude toward Jesse toward his duties.

He believes he has been a veteran employee, hence, should have privileges over other workmates. His negligence and laziness at the workplace have built up a conflict, due to personality differences. Walter is an employee with a type ‘A’ personality that is efficient and always determined to succeed in any chore. Walter believes Jesse is of the different personality of employees who are not concerned with propelling in their duties. Walter being a close friend to Jesse, tries to cope with him by trying to work long hours doing Jesse’s work. He even covers for him in situations where he is absent.

Jesse is an employee who prefers to lie back and let his fellow workmates work for him. This is a personal challenge and frustrating to other workmates. His lack of interest in work lowers the company’s productivity, making the company fail in achieving its goals and objectives. The conflict between Jesse and their fellow employees is a result of his negative impact on work which has made the management disappointed with the whole team. Walter and his fellow employees favor Jesse since they have worked with him for many years and would not report his slack off at work, and extra-long breaks during work hours (Montgomery, 2005).

The cause of Jesse’s poor performance at the workplace is believed to be team interdependence. This is where team members depend on each other to fulfill their chores and achieve their goals set by the management. All duties are group-oriented, and it is difficult for his workmates to neglect Jesse’s pile of work. This made it unfair for the employees and caused stress to them. Jesse’s negligence, laziness, and uncooperativeness at the workplace dragged back the team's efforts but this did not lower their motivation to meet their annual target (Johnson, 2010).

ABC Company held an annual reward day for the employees as a way to motivate and encourage them to work hard. Jesse’s fellow veteran employees were to be rewarded for their continued efforts for many years toward the success of the company. Walter is one of the employees deserving a reward for his tremendous efforts and support towards the achievement of goals set.

Jesse believes he has been a veteran employee, just like Walter, and is entitled to receive the same rewards, such as Walter, but that was not the case. He decides to confront the management claiming that he was also entitled to the same rewards since they have been in the same company with Walter for the same number of years. The management response to Jesse was for him to achieve the rewards his efforts at work had to be recognized as being a team player and an asset to the company.
Jesse was disappointed and accused Walter and other fellow employees of having reported him to the management. This brought about other types of conflicts that were not in favor of the company’s success. The administration was forced to dismiss Jesse for his incompetence, negligence, and being liability to the company.

Conflicts at the workplace can either have a positive or negative impact on the company. Some tend to be beneficial to a company and can be used by management to determine the best strategies for running a company. Conflicts have various resolution techniques that can be used to solve problems in the workplace. In Jesse’s case, the resolution between him and his fellow workmates would have been open dialogue and trying to enlighten him on how to be a responsible worker (Johnson, 2010). Read More