EFFECTS OF INTERPERSONAL CONFLICT ON ORGANISATIONAL PERFORMANCE OF SELECTED HOTELS IN KISII TOWN

A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE SCHOOL OF TOURISM HOSPITALITY AND EVENTS MANAGEMENT, DEPARTMENT OF HOTEL AND HOSPITALITY MANAGEMENT IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF PHILOSOPHY IN HOSPITALITY MANAGEMENT OF MOI UNIVERSITY

“Whenever you're in conflict with someone, there is one factor that can make the difference

between damaging your relationship and deepening it. That factor is attitude.”

“Anybody can become angry, that is easy; but to be angry with the right person, and to the right degree, and at the right time, and for the right purpose, and in the right way, that is not within everybody's power that is not easy.”

This thesis is my original work and has never been presented for a degree award in any other university. No part of this thesis may be reproduced without prior written permission of the author and/or Moi University

This thesis has been submitted for examination with our approval as University supervisors.

Signature……………………….. Date……………………..………..

DEDICATION

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This thesis has been accomplished with the support, encouragement and inspiration of a number of people to whom I am deeply indebted. First of all, I wish to thank my supervisors Dr. Mapelu and Dr.Korir, for their professional guidance on research writing. My gratitude also goes to the hotel and hospitality department of Moi University, and to my friends and relatives for their moral and financial support.

Success in businesses and other entities, like international organizations, depends on several issues, a key one being conflict management. Yet most leaders and their senior managers seem unaware of the negative impact that interpersonal conflict in the workplace can have on their bottom line. Maintaining a good working environment devoid of interpersonal conflicts is critical for the survival of a company in a competitive environment as in the hospitality sector as it can greatly influence the performance of an organization. Further, limited literature and studies related to interpersonal conflict exist in the hotel sector in Kenya, hence the need for this study. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of interpersonal conflict on organizational performance of selected hotels in Kisii town. This was carried out by investigating the types of interpersonal conflict, outcomes of interpersonal conflict and strategies for managing interpersonal conflict. The study employed both descriptive survey design and explanatory research design. The target population was three hundred and fifty four employees while the sample size was one hundred and eighty four employees. Purposive sampling technique was used to select the hotels for the study while stratified random sampling was used to select the respondents and the criteria for stratification was according to the department worked in and the rank. Data was obtained from primary and secondary sources. Instruments for collecting primary data included self-administered questionnaires. A pilot test was conducted to test the content validity of the data collection instruments while reliability was measured using the Cronbach’s Alpha. Both descriptive and inferential analysis was performed and multiple regression used to test the hypotheses. Results showed that interpersonal conflict strategies, relationship conflict and task conflict significantly affects organisational performance respectively, while outcomes of interpersonal conflict does not significantly affect organisational performance .To improve the performance of hotels in Kisii, more emphasis should be placed on improving strategies to cope with costs, followed by alleviation of task conflicts, relationship conflicts and finally outcomes of conflicts. The recommendation from the study was that hotels should prioritize training on conflict competencies and strategies particularly for supervisors, while employees should be trained on how to select and use the appropriate styles of handling interpersonal conflict so that various situations can be effectively dealt with.

Table 2.1 Interpersonal Conflict Visibility and Measurability Matrix …………25

Table 3.1 Sampling Frame Showing the Target Population ………………........30

Table 3.2 Sampling Frame Showing the Sample Distribution …………………….32

Table 4.1: Demographic Profile of the Respondents ……………….…………….64

Table 4.2 Frequency of Interpersonal Conflict……………………………….……65

Table 4.3 Relationship Conflict……………………………………………………66

Table 4.4 Task Conflict…………………………………………………………….68

Table 4.5.Levels of interpersonal conflict…………………………………………..67

Table 4.6Common Causes of Interpersonal Conflict ……………..………………..70

Table 4.7 Outcomes Of Conflict Experienced In The Hotel………………..………74

Table 4.8 Wasted Times in Badly Managed Conflict ……………………………..76

Table 4.9 Dimensions of Organizational Performance …………………………….78

Table 4.10 Strategies For Managing Interpersonal Conflict……………………….80

Table 4.11: Reliability Results………………………………………………………81

Table 4.12: Model Summary………………………………………………………..83

Table 4.13: Regression Coefficients………………………………………………...87

Table 5.1: Summary Of Results Of Hypotheses Testing……………………………94

Figure: 2.1 Balanced Scorecard………………………………………………………15

Figure 2.2 Conceptual Framework…………………………………………………….7

OPERATIONAL DEFINITION OF TERMS

Interpersonal conflict- a condition between or among workers in the same department or in different departments whose jobs are interdependent, who feel angry, who perceive the other(s) as being at fault, and who act in ways that cause a business problem (Dana, 2001)

Organizational conflict- dispute that occurs when interests, goals or values of different individuals or groups are incompatible with each other (Sandra, 2008).

Performance - The level of attainment normally measured by pre-determined indicators (Richard et al. 2009)

Relationship conflict- refers to “interpersonal incompatibilities among group members, which typically include tension, animosity, and annoyance among members within a group ( Jehns, 1995).

Strategies - The art of, or a scheme for managing an affair cleverly (Thomas and Kilmann 2008).

Task conflict -refers to “disagreements among group members about the content of the tasks being performed, including differences in viewpoints, ideas, and opinions” Task conflict exists when individuals differ in their views regarding work-related issues, such as a goal to pursue, the ways to achieve it, and distribution of the outcome ( Jehns, 1995).

This chapter provided an insight into the study by discussing the background of the study, statement of the problem, objectives, research questions, purpose, significance, scope and conceptual framework adopted for the study.

Organizational performance comprises the actual output or results of an organization as measured against its intended outputs (or goals and objectives). According to Richard et al. (2009) organizational performance should be related to factors such as profitability, improved service delivery, customer satisfaction, market share growth, and improved productivity and sales. Organizational performance is therefore affected by a multiplicity of individuals, group, task, technological, structural, managerial and environmental factors. Individual incompatibilities between the employees and in their groups can adversely affect their work output resulting in decreased performance.

Conflict is an inevitable part of a hospitality organizational life since the environment of hospitality industry has a number of distinctive features that may add to the development of conflict situations. These include the triadic relationship that exist between management, staff, and customer; the speed of operation, causing stress and pressure for the operatives of the participants. The level of interdependence between departments in many situations is necessarily high if the customer is to receive a satisfactory service, thus increasing the tendency of occurrence of conflict (Rajinder, 2002).

Interpersonal conflict can be regarded as a dispute that occurs when interests, goals or values of different individuals or groups are incompatible with each other (Henry, 2009). This results into a situation whereby they frustrate each other in an attempt to achieve their objectives. Conflict arises in groups because of the scarcity of freedom, position, and resources. People who value independence tend to resist the need for interdependence and, to some extent, conformity within a group. People who seek power therefore struggle with others for position or status within the group. Conflict is a part of organizational life and may occur between individuals, between the individual and the group, and between groups (Weihrich, 1992).

The traditional view of interpersonal conflict within hospitality organisations was relatively straightforward: conflict was a bad thing, as the organisation was viewed as an integrated and harmonious whole. Managers were tasked with eliminating or minimising conflict, since it interfered with the smooth and normal functioning. According to Mullins (2002) interpersonal conflict was seen as a dysfunction outcome and could be explained, for example, by poor communications, personality clashes or the work of agitators.

Since the late 1970s, however, a different perspective has emerged. This perspective is, more properly, an interdisciplinary series of views which oppose the traditional one, views which are not necessarily homogenous. The pluralistic approach views interpersonal conflict as an inherent feature of organisations and induced, in part, by the very structure of the organisation, for instance, Anderson et al. (1998) view hospitality organizations as comprised of distinct groups that are actively autonomous and interdependent. They also consider conflict among these groups inevitable and impossible to resolve permanently. According to Mullins (2002), the radical perspective is associated with the ideas of writers such as Karl Marx; it challenges the traditional view of conflict and sees organisations in terms of the disparity in power and control. Conflict is seen as a feature of the unequal nature of organisational life and a means of bringing about change.

A more recent view of conflict is the interactionist perspective, which believes that conflict is a positive force and necessary for effective performance. This approach encourages a minimum level of conflict within the group in order to encourage self-criticism, change and innovation, and to help prevent apathy or too great a tolerance for harmony and the status quo. Townsend (2007) sees conflict as a sign of a healthy organisation – up to a point. Conflict, per se, is not necessarily good or bad but an inevitable feature of organisational life and should be judged in terms of its effects on performance (Mullins, 2002). According to Rajinder (2002), this is a realistic view of hospitality organizations because interdepartmental conflict is a common occurrence, particularly at the kitchen/restaurant interface. However, rather than being destructive, the conflict may actually be used to redesign more effective and efficient production and service systems. However, most evaluations suggest that negative effects are the more prevalent, and this explains why most organisations take steps to reduce internal conflict.

According to Weihrich (1992), interpersonal conflict can be seen as a ‘constructive’ force and in certain circumstances it can be welcomed or even encouraged. For example, it can be seen as an aid to incremental improvement in hospitality organisation design and functioning, and to the decision-making process. Interpersonal conflict can be an agent for evolution, and for internal and external change. Properly identified and handled, it can help to minimise the destructive influences of the win–lose situation (Helmut, 2009). Pondy (1992) also stated that the absence of interpersonal conflict may indicate autocracy, uniformity, stagnation, and mental fixity; the presence of interpersonal conflict may be indicative of democracy, diversity, growth, and self-actualization. Tjosvold (1998) complements this statement arguing that interpersonal conflict is not the opposite of cooperation but a mechanism that allows perceiving benefits of cooperative work. Furthermore, interpersonal conflict is considered psychologically and socially healthy. It is psychologically healthy because it provides a breather for frustrations and enables a feeling of participation and even of joy. And it is sociable healthy because it encourages opposition to the status quo and provides conditions for social chances and democracy stemming from pluralism and respect to diversity. Therefore, according to Butler (1973), interpersonal conflict is ubiquitous, not necessarily dysfunctional and can be required to defy people to perform and stimulate progress.

According to Hornsey (1986) the prevalence of interdepartmental conflict in hotels seems to be one of the distinctive features of their operation. Four possible reasons for the heightened interdepartmental interpersonal conflicts in the hospitality industry, either in isolation or collectively include; Interdependence, environment, rewards and Status and stigma consequently resulting into various types of interpersonal conflict such as task conflict (disagreements among group members about the content of tasks being performed, including differences in viewpoints, ideas, and opinions” (Jehn, 1995), relationship conflict ( interpersonal incompatibilities among group members and may include personality differences), horizontal conflict ( between employees working at the same hierarchical level) and vertical conflict (between employees working at different hierarchical level).

According to Helmut (2009) success in businesses and other entities, like international organizations, depends on several issues, a key one being cost control. Yet most leaders and their senior managers seem unaware of the negative impact that interpersonal conflict in the workplace can have on their bottom line. Interpersonal conflict in the workplace is a well known daily phenomenon and it is on an upward trend (Sandra, 2010). Increasingly insecure employment combined with continuous changes in the workplace to achieve efficiency gains have increased stress levels amongst employees and lowered morale. To make matters worse, the current global financial crisis is adding significantly to staff concerns over future employment and organizations’ concerns to maintain shareholder support, forcing them to step up efforts to reduce costs by using the right interpersonal conflict resolution strategies.

Thomas and Kilmann (2008) developed a model that identifies five common styles for dealing with interpersonal conflict: competitive, collaborative, accommodating, compromising or avoiding. Thomas and Kilmann believe that people are capable of using all five interpersonal conflict styles. However, certain people use some styles better than others and therefore tend to rely on those more heavily. People's interpersonal conflict behaviour in the workplace is therefore a result of both the respective personal predispositions and the requirements of a specific situation (Cloke & Goldsmith, 2005).

To understand the constructive or destructive nature of interpersonal conflict, it is important to consider social interdependence theory, which suggests that, Interpersonal conflicts are inherent in all social relationships, and are not inherently negative. Although conflicts are inherent in all social relationships, a conflict can have “destructive or constructive outcomes” depending on whether the conflict takes place within a cooperative or competitive environment (Johnson, 1989).

While it seems obvious that unmanaged or badly managed interpersonal conflict result in high direct and indirect costs for any organization, many leaders brush off incidents of low morale and unhealthy interpersonal conflict as the unavoidable result of “doing business” (Connie, 2008). The effects of interpersonal conflict in the workplace on the efficiency and performance of the organization does not seem to be a major concern in the hospitality sector, thus leaving a big gap that this study helped fill. Is it the discomfort, fear and negative associations surrounding interpersonal conflict that keep hospitality organizations from addressing costs of interpersonal conflict at work? Or are the costs just not visible enough to gain the attention they deserve? This research therefore examined the effects of interpersonal conflicts on organisational performance

Dana (2001) estimated that 65 percent of performance problems result from interpersonal conflicts between employees, representing a huge expense for organizations. In addition, he opines that unresolved interpersonal conflict represents the largest reducible cost in many businesses, yet it remains largely unrecognized. The harsh economic conditions and high inflation rates being experienced in the country have greatly affected the profitability of various organisations including hotels, resulting in cost cutting measures.

Further studies carried out by various groups have also supported the increasing importance of interpersonal conflict management in organisations. A study conducted by the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR) reveals that 80 percent of disputes have a significant impact on the smooth running of business and that British business conflict costs businesses £33 billion every year (CEDR, 2008). Productivity suffers when unhealthy interpersonal conflict persists, for instance a loss of productivity of 25 percent reduces an average working week to fewer than 20 hours (Cram, 2008). Research findings show that as much as 30 percent to 70 percent of a manager’s time is spent simply dealing with employees in interpersonal conflict (Taylor, 2008; Watson, & Hoffman, 1996).

Left unresolved, interpersonal conflicts risk simmering with great potential to escalate. Emotionally, the work environment grows more toxic and financially, the toll can be catastrophic consequently affecting the performance of the organisation. Further there exists limited literature related to interpersonal conflict in hotels and especially in the Kenyan context. This study on the effects of interpersonal conflicts on organisational performance helped fill this gap. Recommendations from this study will greatly help hotels to reduce the costs brought about by interpersonal conflicts hence improving their profitability and performance.

1.3 Purpose of the study

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of interpersonal conflict on organisational performance of selected hotels in Kisii town.

The main objective of this study was to investigate the effects of interpersonal conflict on organisational performance of selected hotels in Kisii town.

1.4.2. The Specific Objectives

1. To determine the effects of interpersonal conflict types on organisational performance.

2. To establish the effects of outcomes of interpersonal conflict on organisational performance.

3. To examine the effect of strategies adopted for managing interpersonal conflict on organisational performance.

1.5. Hypotheses

H01 The type of interpersonal conflict does not significantly affect organizational performance.

Ho2 Outcomes of interpersonal conflict do not significantly affect organizational performance

H03 Strategies adopted for managing interpersonal conflict do not significantly affect organisational performance.

1.6: Assumptions of the Study

That all employees of the selected hotels have experienced interpersonal conflicts in their respective organization.

That information provided by the hotel employees was not influenced by other external force.

1.7 Justifications for the Study

Mullins (2002) opines that, Interpersonal conflict is perceived as disruptive and unnatural, and represents a form of deviant behaviour which should be controlled and changed. Clearly, extreme cases of interpersonal conflict in hospitality organisations can have very upsetting, or even tragic, consequences for both staff and customers and have adverse effects on organisational performance. Interpersonal conflict situations can give rise to excessive emotional or physical stress. Interpersonal conflict is not necessarily a bad thing, however. Properly managed, it can arguably have potentially positive outcomes. It can be an energising and vitalising force in groups and in the organisation.

For instance, employee interpersonal conflicts can lead to frustration and low morale, which can result in missing deadlines, loss of confidence and trust levels, communication problems, withholding of information, withdrawal or absenteeism. Apart from performance-related consequences, disgruntled and aggrieved employees tend to take a more rights-based approach which can result in an increase in court cases and associated legal fees.

It is generally accepted that the right kind of friction and constructive confrontation and arguments over ideas in an atmosphere of mutual respect can help any organization and has the potential to drive greater performance and creativity and help produce major improvement in productivity. For instance when asked to comment on positive outcomes of interpersonal conflict, nine in ten HR managers in Canada have seen interpersonal conflict lead to something positive including: better understanding of others (77 percent), better solutions to problems and challenges (57 percent), improved working relationships (54 percent), higher performance in the team (40 percent), increased motivation (31 percent), major innovation/ idea was born (21 percent) (Psychometrics Canada Ltd, 2009).

The question of how well interpersonal conflict is managed and how interpersonal conflict is addressed can either add to or take away from an organization’s bottom line. According to Bobinski (2008), well managed interpersonal conflict in an enabling environment allows for issues to be tabled and discussed with objective language. Each party is empowered to state his or her position with confidence that the other party is genuinely listening, wanting to understand. Possible solutions are explored with open minds therefore improving organisational performance. In badly managed interpersonal conflict, personal attacks are common. People can get visibly angry and feelings get hurt. Words can become weapons that leave nasty scars. When co-workers do not respect the fact that approaches in addressing issues at work can differ, everyone suffers. Left unresolved, interpersonal conflicts risk simmering with great potential of escalates. Emotionally, the work environment grows more toxic and financially, the toll can be catastrophic consequently affecting the performance of the organisation. This study is therefore justified as its findings will help minimise the negative effects of conflicts by equipping hotel managers with the right strategies for managing interpersonal conflict.

1.8 Significance of the study

The significance of this study lies in the fact that its finding will enable hotel managers to have an in depth knowledge of the nature of interpersonal conflict, its type, and causes in the hospitality industry and equip themselves with the best approaches to use when resolving employee interpersonal conflict.

The managers will use the findings to control the cost of interpersonal conflict in hotels by devising organization specific and efficient interpersonal conflict management strategies and thus reduce such costs. .

Organisational learning and effectiveness can be enhanced through an appropriate diagnosis of and process and structural interventions in interpersonal conflict

The study will enable organisational members to select and use the appropriate styles of handling interpersonal conflict so that various situations can be effectively dealt with.

The study aimed at generating data that will enhance the understanding of employees on the negative effects of interpersonal conflict on organisational performance and therefore help them to solve interpersonal and interdepartmental conflicts easily and quickly.

1.9 Scope of the Study

This research was carried out at selected hotels in Kisii town. Employees in these hotels are diverse, representing populations from across the country with various racial and cultural backgrounds. The result of these diverse groups coalescing in one organization and the high turnover rate of employees made it a prime environment to study interpersonal conflict.

It entailed the nature of interpersonal conflict and in particular the sources, evolution and behavioural responses in interpersonal conflict. It also included the types of interpersonal conflict, costs of interpersonal conflict and the strategies used to manage interpersonal conflict in organisations. This research was limited to interpersonal conflicts between individual interdependent colleagues in the workplace and is therefore not addressing internal conflict within a person (intrapersonal conflict) conflict between management and staff unions, or conflict with third parties.

Purposive sampling technique was used to select the target hotels. Stratified random sampling was used to sample the required sample size, and criteria for stratification were according to the department worked in and the subject’s rank in the department in order to raise the sample size of 184 cases. The study was carried out between November 2012 and June 2013.

CHAPTER TWO

This chapter discussed various aspects of literature reviewed on the nature of interpersonal conflict, cost of interpersonal conflict and approaches to resolving interpersonal conflict. Specifically it looked at the types, sources and evolution of interpersonal conflict, behavioural responses to interpersonal conflict, interpersonal conflict styles, a description of visible and hidden financial and human costs and their measurability and an analysis of how those costs are measured.

2.1 Concept of Organizational Performance

Organizational performance comprises the actual output or results of an organization as measured against its intended outputs (or goals and objectives).According to Richard et al. (2009) organizational performance should be related to factors such as profitability, improved service delivery, customer satisfaction, market share growth, and improved productivity and sales. Organization performance is therefore affected by a multiplicity of individuals, group, task, technological, structural, managerial and environmental factors.

The balanced scorecard (BSC) is a strategy performance management tool - a semi-standard structured report, supported by design methods and automation tools that can be used by managers to keep track of the execution of activities by the staff within their control and to monitor the consequences arising from these actions. It is perhaps the best known of several such frameworks (it is the most widely adopted performance management framework reported in the annual survey of management tools undertaken by Bain & Company, and has been widely adopted in English-speaking western countries and Scandinavia in the early 1990s).

Design of a balanced scorecard ultimately is about the identification of a small number of financial and non-financial measures and attaching targets to them, so that when they are reviewed it is possible to determine whether current performance 'meets expectations'. The idea behind this is that by alerting managers to areas where performance deviates from expectations, they can be encouraged to focus their attention on these areas, and hopefully as a result trigger improved performance within the part of the organization they lead.

The 1st generation design method proposed by Kaplan and Norton (1996) was based on the use of three non-financial topic areas as prompts to aid the identification of non-financial measures in addition to one looking at financial.

Four "perspectives" were proposed. Financial perspective encourages the identification of a few relevant high-level financial measures. In particular, designers were encouraged to choose measures that helped inform the answer to the question "How do we look to shareholders?”. Customer perspective encourages the identification of measures that answer the question "How do customers see us?"Internal business processes perspective encourages the identification of measures that answer the question "What must we excel at? Learning and growth perspective encourages the identification of measures that answer the question "How can we continue to improve and create value?"

This perspective includes employee training and corporate cultural attitudes related to both individual and corporate self-improvement. In a knowledge-worker organization, people - the only repository of knowledge are the main resource. In the current climate of rapid technological change, it is becoming necessary for knowledge workers to be in a continuous learning mode. Metrics can be put into place to guide managers in focusing training funds where they can help the most. In any case, learning and growth constitute the essential foundation for success of any knowledge-worker organization. Kaplan and Norton (1996), emphasize that 'learning' is more than 'training'; it also includes things like mentors and tutors within the organization, as well as that ease of communication among workers that allows them to readily get help on a problem when it is needed. It also includes technological tools; what the Baldrige criteria call "high performance work systems."

According to Kaplan and Norton (1996), this perspective refers to internal business processes. Metrics based on this perspective allow the managers to know how well their business is running, and whether its products and services conform to customer requirements (the mission). These metrics have to be carefully designed by those who know these processes most intimately; with our unique missions these are not something that can be developed by outside consultants.

Recent management philosophy has shown an increasing realization of the importance of customer focus and customer satisfaction in any business. These are leading indicators: if customers are not satisfied, they will eventually find other suppliers that will meet their needs. Poor performance from this perspective is thus a leading indicator of future decline, even though the current financial picture may look good. In developing metrics for satisfaction, customers should be analyzed in terms of kinds of customers and the kinds of processes for which we are providing a product or service to those customer groups (Kaplan &Norton 1996).

Kaplan and Norton (1996) do not disregard the traditional need for financial data. Timely and accurate funding data will always be a priority, and managers will do whatever necessary to provide it. In fact, often there is more than enough handling and processing of financial data. With the implementation of a corporate database, it is hoped that more of the processing can be centralized and automated. But the point is that the current emphasis on financials leads to the "unbalanced" situation with regard to other perspectives. There is perhaps a need to include additional financial-related data, such as risk assessment and cost-benefit data, in this category.

Adapted from Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton, “Using the Balanced Scorecard as a Strategic Management System,” Harvard Business Review (January-February 1996): 76.

According to Harbor (1997), Performance measurement is the process of measuring work accomplishments and output, as well as measuring in-process parameters that affect work output and accomplishments. He claims that there can be no interpersonal conflict without a modicum of information as to performance information in basis period and, ideally, a targeted performance in a future time period. He refers to four dimensions of evaluating performance in hotels; the customer dimension, employee dimension, internal process dimension, and the financial dimension. Different approaches used in managing interpersonal conflict will result in either a decrease or increase in the variables under each dimension. Hotels should therefore aim to ensure the effective management of conflicts so as to improve the overall organizational performance.

To determine if goals are being achieved, results should be monitored. Daily/Weekly monitoring allows all stakeholders an instant scorecard on which to assess change-driven performance. Work must be planned and measured because its productivity—output versus input—that determines the effectiveness and the ultimate value of instituting change in the first place (Harbour, 1997).

2.2 Concept of Conflict

The word “conflict” is commonly used in everyday speech to label various human experiences, ranging from indecision to disagreement to stress. “Disagreement”, “clash”, “quarrel”, “dispute”, “controversy”, “conflict” are all terms that are interchangeable in everyday speech in describing seemingly similar behavior (Sandra, 2008). The definition of conflict is therefore more difficult than initially apparent and requires a better determination of the distinctions between the different terms used. One could argue that a “disagreement” can create a problem but does not automatically result in conflict, assuming that the use of the word conflict describes already a higher level of disagreement or escalation of disagreement. Disagreement has thus the potential to result in conflict if it does not lead to a solution or a common understanding (Weinstein 2001).

A “clash”, “quarrel” or “dispute” can all be limited to an objective argument, can remain at the rational level and can be resolved without leading to a conflict. One could also argue that even if the parties get emotionally involved this must not mean that there is a conflict, as long as no party feels emotionally offended. From this brief analysis of the word “conflict” and its differentiation from other words used in every day speech to describe situations of disagreement, one can retain that the word “conflict” describes a certain level of escalation of arguments involving emotional reactions (Sandra, 2008). With this in mind, selected conflict definitions was reviewed for commonalities, before defining the specific situation of workplace conflict.

The literature on conflict does not provide a uniform conflict definition. Glasl even refers to an “inflation of the conflict definition”. Rosenstiel (1980) considers that there is already a conflict when two parties have irreconcilable positions. This definition does not require that one of the parties considers the unconceivable position as bothersome. Donohue and Kolt (1992) define conflict as: “A situation in which independent people express (manifest or latent) differences in satisfying their individual needs and interests and they experience interference from each other in accomplishing these goals”. Gilbert and Kreikebaum (1998) consider that there is already a conflict when only one party senses disagreement. Schreiber (2003) defines conflict as a situation in which at least one person in his/her action, thinking or feeling perceives an encroaching difference in the action, thinking or feeling of at least one other person. These conflict definitions refer to situations of irreconcilable positions or behavior among people. Some definitions require that one or both of the parties perceive this situation as bothersome. When combining the aforementioned definitions, a conflict definition includes the elements of irreconcilability, feelings and perceptions.

In conflict the question is often whether positions are actually irreconcilable (actual conflict) or whether positions are only perceived by the parties of being irreconcilable (pseudo conflict).2This subjective dimension of a problem – not the objective dimension – provide the best potential for conflict resolution, as opposed to problems that are actually irreconcilable and often impossible to solve. Combining the aforementioned literature and everyday speech, one could argue that the emotional dimension of behavior over an argument appears to lend itself for a meaningful distinction between conflict and other terms describing disagreement. It is thus only when differences in opinions lead to situations in which at least one party feels emotionally affected and offended that the threshold of a conflict situation is reached.

Interpersonal conflict in the workplace differs from interpersonal conflict in other areas. As an example, colleagues at work have rarely chosen to work together and will in most cases have to continue working together following a conflict. Also, in a professional setting, expressing emotions is often perceived as inappropriate. In an environment where emotions are frequently hidden, people may be unaware of their behaviour and the way their behaviour can affect other people and they lack the skills to express honest emotions, namely verbally, in appropriate ways on the job (Weinstein 2001).

Though definitions vary, conflict is consistently viewed as a sequential, dynamic process. Dictionaries and management texts offer a range of synonyms such as; to clash, disagree, a battle or struggle, antagonism or opposition, incompatibility or interference, and a mental struggle. Schreiber (2003) defines interpersonal conflict as a situation in which at least one person in his/her action, thinking or feeling perceives an encroaching difference in the action, thinking or feeling of at least one other person. Jehn and Bendersky (2003) described conflict as perceived incompatibilities or discrepant views among the parties involved. Putnam and Poole (1987) define conflict as “the interaction of interdependent people who perceive opposition of goals, aims, and values, and who see the other party as potentially interfering with the realization of these goals” (p. 552). The general characteristics of interaction, interdependence, and incompatible goals that are common to most definitions of conflict are integral to providing a comprehensive definition of conflict. Dana (2001) defines workplace interpersonal conflict as a condition between or among workers whose jobs are interdependent, who feel angry, who perceive the other(s) as being at fault, and who act in ways that cause a business problem. This analysis defines workplace interpersonal conflict as a situation in which interdependent workers, perceive positions or action as irreconcilable, with the consequence that atleast one of the parties perceive that disagreement emotionally upsetting, causing a problem at work. In addition to irreconcilability, feelings and perceptions, this definition includes the element of a workplace problem caused as a result.

Interpersonal conflict at work can relate to relationships among colleagues at different hierarchical levels (vertical interpersonal conflict), at the same hierarchical level (horizontal interpersonal conflict), relations between management and staff unions or relations between employees and third parties (such as clients). In addition to interpersonal conflict that individuals may experience with others, people can experience internal interpersonal conflict, known as intrapersonal conflict. Like other levels of conflict, intrapersonal conflicts involve two competing desires or goals, but in this case the desires or goals are competing within the same person (Sandra 2008). In this regard, this research focussed on interpersonal conflicts between individual interdependent colleagues in the workplace. Interpersonal conflict is a concern for many managers because of its frequency. These interpersonal conflicts can occur between peers or between superiors and subordinates. They can occur between individuals in the same or different departments or even different organizations (Coyne, Chong, Seigne, and Randall, 2003; Einarsen, 2000).

Interpersonal conflicts can either be constructive or destructive in nature. This distinction is important as interpersonal conflict is a reality of our daily lives and interpersonal conflict is thus inevitable in a human workplace (Townsend, 2007). Disagreement occurs even in the best working relationship and challenging another’s ideas can strengthen an outcome. Though the claim that well managed interpersonal conflict automatically results in efficiency gains is challenged by some (Beer, 2008), it is generally accepted that the right kind of friction and constructive confrontation and arguments over ideas in an atmosphere of mutual respect can help any organization and has the potential to drive greater performance and creativity and help produce major. For instance when asked to comment on positive outcomes of interpersonal conflict, nine in ten HR managers in Canada have seen interpersonal conflict lead to something positive including: better understanding of others (77 percent), better solutions to problems and challenges (57 percent), improved working relationships (54 percent), higher performance in the team (40 percent), increased motivation (31 percent), major innovation/ idea was born (21 percent) (Psychometrics Canada Ltd, 2009).

In badly managed interpersonal conflict, personal attacks are common. People can get visibly angry and feelings get hurt. Words can become weapons that leave nasty scars. When co-workers do not respect the fact that approaches in addressing issues at work can differ, everyone suffers. Left unresolved, interpersonal conflicts risk simmering with great potential of escalates. Emotionally, the work environment grows more toxic and financially, the toll can be catastrophic consequently affecting the performance of the organisation.

2.3.1 Causes of Interpersonal Conflict

The level of interdependence between departments in many situations is necessarily high if the customer is to receive a satisfactory service. A number of studies have indicated that where there are high perceived levels of interdependence between departments then interdepartmental interpersonal conflict tends to increase. Interdependence in hospitality situations is caused by the nature of work flows; the product or service that the customer receives is the outcome of close and often immediate cooperation between two or more departments. Coupled with this, the time requirements for coordination are very short compared with other industries. In fact, they can often be measured in minutes or seconds. The reason why interdependence causes interpersonal conflict between departments can be considered in a fourfold differentiation.

It has been suggested by Hornsey (1986) that there is a struggle for autonomy in the workplace, and that there is fundamental interpersonal conflict between the desires for independence and the necessity of interdependence. Where this struggle for autonomy is frustrated, then interpersonal conflict will arise between the parties who are directly concerned. This could be the situation between the kitchen and the restaurant where the waiting staff cannot feel in control of their work because they are dependent on chefs for their raw materials. Snow (2002) further develops this concept in relation to the hospitality industry by suggesting that staff have a desire to be in direct control of their own work, yet in positions of interdependence this is clearly not possible. Thus, they try to exert pressure on those with whom they are interdependent, resulting in interpersonal conflict. Perceived reciprocity may also be a cause of interpersonal conflict due to interdependence between the parties. Where it is perceived by one of the sides that the other has acted unfairly or without due concern or a favour has been done but not returned, then there appears the potential basis for an interpersonal conflict situation. Where levels of interdependence are particularly high, as between the kitchen and the restaurant, then the opportunities for this type of interpersonal conflict tend to increase. One party may often have to ask “favours” of the other in order to satisfy the guest or meet the internal requirements of the situation.

Goal differentiation between the parties is probably the most important reason cited in the literature to date for interdepartmental interpersonal conflict in hotels. Bowney, Nailon and Mars and Nicod (2002) all considered interdependence to be a determinant of interdepartmental interpersonal conflict in restaurant and hotels, as the interdependent parties placed different demands upon the situation. The chef’s concern was primarily with quality and that of service staff primarily with speed. In other situation these might be reserved, but the different objectives of the staff seem to heighten the problems of interdepartmental conflict caused by interdependence and will vary with the nature of the situation. Mars and Nicod (2002) suggested that there are likely to be higher levels of interpersonal conflict in lower classes of establishment where there is a greater differentiation between the waiter’s desire for speed and the chef’s aspirations for quality than in better classes of establishment, where both parties have a great concern for quality.

The social environment may also be a cause of interpersonal conflict (Rajinder, 2002). The environment of hospitality industry has a number of distinctive features that may add to the development of interpersonal conflict situations; these include the triadic relationship that exist between management, staff, and customer; the speed of operation, causing stress and pressure for the operatives of the participants. Many staff members face situations in which the demands placed upon them by the customer and those by the situation and their working colleague’s conflict. This type of role conflict certainly adds to the stress inherent in the task and to the existing conflict between those departments that have direct contact with the customer and those that do not. Staff who occupy positions at the interface between the organization and the customer (boundary roles) have identified their attitudes and work behavior to cope with the situation and thereby emphasizing their difference from colleagues in other departments. The external environment and the predominant features of the triadic relationship are dedicated by the nature of the task that staff undertakes.

According to Rajinder (2002) the internal environment of the group may well be dictated by the external environment in which it operates, and this provides the answer as to why, for instance, chefs and waiters may perceive themselves to be very different types of people. Studies on waiting staff have shown them to be highly individualistic in their perspective, yet kitchen staff has the reputation of stronger collectivism. Such differences in group solidarity and the different value systems that emerge may aggravate the interpersonal conflicts between the parties. Hence, the real source of the interpersonal conflict may lie in the external environment that the participants face, especially their role in interacting with the customer, rather than in any form of direct relationship between the two groups.

Rajinder (2002) further adds that, the environment in which staff conducts their activities may be one of stress and pressure. If the working relationship presents a source of stress rather than reward or satisfaction, then this could lead to the staff looking for an outlet for this pressure, the most immediate outlet being those from other departments with whom they come into contact for resources. He noted how waiters and waitress “let off steam at the hot plate due to the pressure exerted upon them by guests. Although the recipient of these outbursts were the chefs, they were not the direct cause of the problem but merely the people with whom the service staff had the most immediate contact and they were the most obvious target for the service staff frustrations. The nature of the multitude of quick decisions to cope with, the large number of unplanned and unpredictable problems that arise. Sharmir (2002) suggests that the industry is characterized by a desire for rigidity in operation at the corporate level and flexibility in the units. Whereas this would appear to call for an organic form of organization, the industry has been typified by more authoritarian leadership style and more formalized organization and communication patterns. This style of leadership and organization in a situation that appears to call for a different approach may add to interpersonal conflicts faced by the parties. Staff also develop territories for themselves and may start to perceive themselves as entities that act independently from other parts of the firm. Any intrusion directly or indirectly into their territory may be treated as an invasion and resisted as such.

The kitchen and the front desk have very clear physical barriers that divide them from other departments, and chefs have a reputation of building a strong territorial perspective about their place of work. Yet in the restaurant /kitchen relationship, waiters must come directly to the interface between the two territories, the hot plate, many times within their normal processes of work, making them resistant to the potential “intruder to their territories” and increasing interpersonal conflict between the parties. Certainly, the nature of the environment in which tasks are performed and the tasks themselves would seem a key factor in determining the reasons for interdepartmental conflict in hospitality organizations.

Rewards may cause interpersonal conflicts between departments through perceived differences in individual rewards or perceived difference in the distribution of scarce resources. Feelings of deprivation with regard to rewards tend to emerge from a basis of comparison. Whenever one party believes that it is less well off than parties in other departments, a basis for interpersonal conflict is established. One would expect rewards to be primary concern to workers in the industry, which it is often viewed as one with a low pay scale. This has not always been found to be the case, snow and Sharmir (2002) both speak of the social orientations of workers within the industry. However, resent research by Kung (2004) in Hong Kong into job satisfaction and labour turnover among food service personnel in chain hotel operations suggested that there may be a cultural element that should be considered.

The presence of tips as a feature of industry is likely to lead to distorted perceptions with regard to the earnings of other staff. In a non service organizational setting the reward system is directly responsible for linking the individual with the organization and its goals; in situations where a substantial promotion of the individuals income is not received through the organization, there is no mechanism to link the individual to the organization and its goals. If this is the case for only one set of dependent situation, then the basis for potential interpersonal conflict is formed. The most typical interpersonal conflict occurs between departments, one of which is a direct recipient of tips whereas the other is not. Waiters are recipients, chefs no recipients; chambermaids are recipients, receptionist non recipients.

The reason for this could be that tip recipients develop different attitudes from no recipient. For, instance, recent research by Sharmir (2002) found that tip recipients had a more favourable attitude towards the customers and the management than non recipients. Although he does not indicate their relative perceptions of their jobs by tip recipients and no recipients differ. Snow (2002) also noted that perks such as tips had the effect of dividing staff within the organization, with the result that common interest were not realized. Differences in perceived rewards may be further distorted by the perceived opportunity for fiddles between various departments.

According to Rajinder (2002) scarce resources are quoted by a numbers of authors as a reason for interdepartmental conflict. Where there is a struggle for scarce resources between departments and where it is perceived by one of the parties that the distribution of resources has not been equitable, then the likelihood of interdepartmental interpersonal conflict increases. If workers do perceive themselves as being employed in a low pay industry, then perceived difference in reward may be strongly felt and add to interpersonal conflict that occurs between departments. Rewards may well be seen as a major source of interpersonal conflict between staff in the hospitality industry (Rajinder, 2002).

The rigid organizational hierarchies of the hospitality industry and the traditions under which they have grown have led to very highly differentiated and established status system. This status system develops around the job title that the individual carries. Some position carries a particular status within the organization, whereas others such as that of the kitchen porter carry a distinct stigma. This is clearly an issue of perception; how members of staff perceive themselves and others within the work situation. If they perceive their positions as being of low status or others of high status or others of high status, then this may be a cause of interpersonal conflict between the parties (Rajinder, 2002).

As Dann and Hornsey (1986) points out, people behave in the workplace according to their perceptions of reality, and in industrial interpersonal conflicts a crucial factor is the reality, and in industries interpersonal conflicts a crucial factor is the reality of opposed interests as perceived by the parties. The status system is established through tradition and myth and reinforced through group pressure. Where staffs are grouped together around a similar task they tend to develop ideologies that emphasize their distinctive contribution to the organization and that differentiate them from other groups with whom they have contract. Hence, each group may develop its own subculture and values, which may involve negative or indifferent attitudes towards other organizational groups.

Certainly, interpersonal conflict occurs in hospitality situations when there are differences in belief between the parties. Although the occupation hierarchies that develop may differ somewhat between establishments, there does seem to be some uniformity in the way in which waiters/chefs and housekeeping staff/receptionist perceives each other. These perceptions appear to be based upon traditionally negative preconceptions and may form a basis for interpersonal conflict between the departments (Rajinder, 2002).

Members of these groups find their range of occupational choice limited to the lowest paid, least skilled work, which would not be considered acceptable to those people who are able to work elsewhere. In many cases these workers may be reluctant entrants, who are forced into the industry through a lack of opportunity elsewhere in the labour market. They will probably enter the industry with a perceived sense of stigma, which may then be reinforced by colleagues, management and customers. They was particularly receptive to the opportunity for interpersonal conflict with other departments, as their involvement with the organization is likely to be low (Rajinder, 2002).

Other sources of workplace interpersonal conflict can be multiple and include personality clashes, stress, heavy workloads, poor leadership, and lack of openness, lack of role clarity or poor performance management. An international work environment with a great diversity of staff adds a multitude of cultural, linguistic and socio-economic differences. Slaikeu and Hasson (1998) opine that one or more of the following is present in every interpersonal conflict: denial, skill deficits, lack of information, interpersonal conflicting interests or values, psychopathology, personality style, scarce resources, organizational deficiencies, selfishness or evil intent ( Slaikeu and Hasson 1998). Other authors refer to categories such as operational interpersonal conflicts, task interpersonal conflicts or identity interpersonal conflicts (Pel 2008). Such categorization helps understanding that interpersonal conflicts are not necessarily the result of colleagues’ behavior also known as relationship interpersonal conflict which is defined as the occurrence of interpersonal tensions, friction, animosity, annoyance, and resentment among colleagues. An operational interpersonal conflict can simply be based on unclear job-descriptions leading to differences on roles and responsibilities.

A number of recent studies of interpersonal conflict in the workplace in the United Kingdom and Canada found that personality clashes, stress and poor leadership were considered the main causes of interpersonal conflict. For instance according to CPP Global Human Cappital Report, July 2008, When asked to state the main causes of interpersonal conflict, half of 5000 employees in nine countries around Europe and the Americas mentioned “Personality clashes”; other sources of interpersonal conflict mentioned in the same survey included: stress (34 percent), heavy workloads (33 percent), poor leadership (29 per cent), lack of honesty and openness (26 percent), poor line management (23 percent), lack of roles clarity (21 percent).

In another survey conducted with 357 HR professionals in Canada, when asked about the main causes of interpersonal conflict, almost nine in 10 respondents mentioned “Personality clashes”, other sources of interpersonal conflict mentioned included: poor leadership (73 percent), lack of honesty (67 percent) or stress (64 percent) (Psychometrics Canada Ltd. 2009).

As described above, interpersonal conflict exists when personal and emotional aspects are involved alongside disagreement on substance. Most interpersonal conflicts have a dominant interpersonal conflict issue. Often there can be multiple layers of underlying interpersonal conflict dimensions hidden under a seemingly open and dominant interpersonal conflict issue. This can also be defined as “open interpersonal conflict” and “hidden interpersonal conflict” “Hidden interpersonal conflicts” are not immediately recognizable but do show in the form of tense atmosphere, a closed communication culture versus open communication.

2.3.2 Evolution of Workplace Interpersonal Conflict

According to Putman (1992), it’s important to understand how interpersonal conflicts emerge and how they develop, not every difference in views develops into an interpersonal conflict. However, if differences of views are not dealt with satisfactorily in a timely manner, they may gradually shift from factual business or workplace differences to personal blame and eventually escalate. Glasl (2004) analyzed this natural tendency to escalation and developed the concept of interpersonal conflict escalation ladder describing phases of escalation with specific characteristics which impact on the appropriate interpersonal conflict management tool to use. In that logic, there is an initial phase of each interpersonal conflict in which the parties are still ready to cooperate called grievance, which is the pre-interpersonal conflict stage.

In the second phase known as conflict, the parties start to threaten each other and in a last phase, disputing, the parties enter into full confrontation. Glasl argues that it is generally only until the end of the second phase and the very beginning of the third phase that classic mediation is productive and the only point at which the parties still have some regard for each other’s interests, but not later in the third phase when the parties aim at destroying each other.

Glasl’s model underscores the importance of addressing interpersonal conflict situations early. In addition, it shows that the degree of escalation is an important indicator of the applicability and potential effectiveness of interpersonal conflict resolution tools, including mediation.

2.3.3 Behavioural Responses to Interpersonal Conflict in Organizations

According to Sandra (2008), Interpersonal conflicts in organizations can lead to a variety of behavioural responses, many of which are counterproductive for the workplace. The most frequent response to interpersonal conflict at work is verbalization. People involved in workplace interpersonal conflict like to talk about it. While they sometimes choose to speak directly to the other party in the dispute about the issue, they very often choose to speak to co-workers outside the interpersonal conflict, and even to people outside the organization.

Behavioural responses to interpersonal conflict can be classified as direct, indirect, or uncontrollable. Discussing the issue with the other party in the interpersonal conflict would be a direct response, secretly sabotaging the other party’s work would be indirect, and crying would be uncontrollable (unless tears were produced strategically). Behaviours can also be classified by intensity of response. Avoiding the other party would be at the low end of intensity and striking the person would be at the high end (Sandra, 2008).

In workplace interpersonal conflicts that continue over a period of time, people engage in numerous behavioural responses as patterns of behaviour emerge. Interpersonal conflicting parties may try one strategy for dealing with the interpersonal conflict but switch to another if their initial response is ineffective. A common pattern of responding includes switching from some sort of verbalization (e.g., discussing the issue, shouting at the other party) to helplessness (e.g., crying, not talking to the other party, or ignoring the interpersonal conflict), and back to verbalization. An example of this pattern might be an employee who initially responds to interpersonal conflict by complaining to co-workers (verbalization) and avoiding the other party in the interpersonal conflict (helplessness) but eventually raises the issue with the other party directly (verbalization).

According to Sandra and James (2008), Coping with rude behaviours at work can have an impact on worker performance. In one study, 53 percent of targets of rude behavior responded by losing time at work worrying, 28 percent lost time at work avoiding the rude person, and 22 percent decreased their effort at work. Organizations can pay the price for their employees’ rudeness in other ways, as well. The poor work environment may lead to chronic physical illness in some employees, high levels of turnover, diminished loyalty, and, in some cases, litigation. Workplace violence is now estimated to cost employers from $6.4 billion to $36 billion annually in lost productivity, reputation damage, insurance costs, and increased security.

Employees who feel they are not being treated fairly in an organization may resort to a variety of tactics to relieve their frustration, including at times denigrating their manager. They may tell unflattering stories and jokes about the manager or the organization behind the manager’s back. (Sandra and James, 2008).Dissatisfied employees may engage in more overt behaviours as well, including pressure tactics. Employees working together, in both unionized and nonunionized organizations, can apply pressure to management by orchestrating slowdowns, absences, and lower product quality. Therefore, interpersonal conflict in the workplace that is not managed well is detrimental and costly to an organization and consequently affects organisational performance.

2.4 Types of Interpersonal Conflict

There is consensus among conflict researchers that conflict perceptions have multiple dimensions. Jehns (1995) typology of interpersonal conflict includes task and relationship conflict. This view of interpersonal conflict proposes that both types of interpersonal conflict are distinct, based on the differing conceptual relationships that each is expected to have with outcomes. However, the two types of conflict perceptions may be interrelated, such that a group with many relationship conflicts may also have a high number of task conflicts and vice versa.

Task conflict is focused on the substantive issues associated with the group’s task and can involve differences in viewpoints, ideas, or opinions. Task conflict may also involve the discussion or awareness of different preferences or approaches to a task. More formally, task conflict is defined as “disagreements among group members about the content of tasks being performed, including differences in viewpoints, ideas, and opinions” (Jehn, 1995, p.284). Conceptually, it is suggested that task conflict is positively related to performance. This view is consistent with a more contemporary position in the literature that has emerged within the last ten years or so. In the presence of task related conflict, these recent conflict researchers believe that task conflicts have the potential to create value by stimulating creative thinking and divergent thought processes. Task conflict may help employees confront task-related issues, learn to take different perspectives, and address task-related inefficiencies. Other conflict researchers, who conform to the more traditional view of task conflict, contend that task conflict may be detrimental to performance. This is based on the rationale that the tension and antagonism that can result from task conflict, may further distract from the task.

The second type of conflict, relationship conflict, on the other hand, is focused on interpersonal incompatibilities among group members and may include personality differences as well as differences of opinion and preferences regarding non-task issues. Relationship conflict can also be thought of as an awareness of personality clashes, interpersonal tension, or conflict characterized by anger, frustration, and uneasiness. As such, relationship conflict is defined as “interpersonal incompatibilities among group members which typically includes tension, animosity, and annoyance among members within a group” (Jehn, 1995, p. 284). Conceptually, relationship conflict is uniformly considered to negatively relate to performance, and has a more adverse effect than task conflict. This is based on the rationale that in the presence of relationship conflict, arousal and cognitive load increases, which in turn affects cognitive flexibility and creative thinking and decreases performance. Further, researchers believe that employees who experience relationship conflict often spend most of their time and effort resolving interpersonal problems.

As such, they mobilize less energy and fewer resources to deal with task-related issues, which lead to process losses. Additionally, employees who are involved in relationship conflict are thought to also suffer from increased levels of anxiety and frustration resulting in cognitive interference and poorer cognitive functioning for problem solving. Task and relationship conflict can also share some conceptual overlap, as each type of conflict may affect the other. Task conflict may turn into relationship conflict if perceived as a personal disagreement. Misattributions about viewpoints or opinions could lead an individual to assume that his or her competence is being challenged and relationship conflict might result. Similarly, unresolved relationship conflict could also result in unproductive task conflict. Underlying personal issues can become enmeshed in communication and disturb task-related processes.

2.5 Nature of Outcomes of Conflict

Unresolved interpersonal conflict can create serious and quite varied consequences involving high financial and human outcomes. By way of example a study conducted by the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR) reveals that 80 percent of disputes have a significant impact on the smooth running of business and that British business conflict costs business £33 billion every year (CEDR, 2008). For instance, employee interpersonal conflicts can lead to frustration and low morale, which can result in missing deadlines, loss of confidence and trust levels, communication problems, withholding of information, withdrawal or absenteeism. Apart from performance-related consequences, disgruntled and aggrieved employees tend to take a more rights-based approach which can result in an increase in court cases and associated legal fees.

Cram and Williams distinguish between First-Order Effects (quantifiable), such as lost revenue or employee replacement outcomes, Second-Order Effects (harder to quantify), such as missed opportunities or increased supervision and management, and Third-Order Effects (impossible to truly quantify), such as passive-aggressive behaviours exhibited by disgruntled employees or the poor image of the company within the industry (Cram,2008).

For Levine(Mediate,2008) outcomes of interpersonal conflict is composed of (a) direct outcomes, such as legal fees, (b) opportunity outcomes, such as the value of what could have otherwise been produced, (c) continuity outcomes, such as loss of ongoing relationships and (d) emotional outcomes, such as the pain of being held prisoner by emotions.

As many managers do not consider outcomes of interpersonal conflict worth measuring it is assumed that this is partly due to their hidden nature, the difficulty to establish a casual link between certain outcomes and interpersonal conflict that may be at the origin of those outcomes and the difficulty to quantify the outcomes. For this research it is therefore suggested, as a first step, to identify negative consequences of interpersonal conflict and place them in a graph according to their visibility and “measurability” of the resulting outcomes. Once those categories have been identified, the analysis was oriented to the question of outcomes measuring. To highlight the immense human outcomes of interpersonal conflict the study will also examine the visibility of negative consequences of interpersonal conflict and the quantifyablity of the resulting outcomes in terms of (a) outcomes to the organization, (b) outcomes to the employees and (c) outcomes to the clients(s). In doing so it is recognized that outcomes can often be imputed to all of those categories at the same time. Dana,(2008) identifies the following eight “hidden outcomes” of interpersonal conflict that many employers overlook: (1) wasted time, (2) reduced quality of decisions, (3) loss of skilled employees, (4) restructuring inefficiencies, (5) lowered job motivation, (6) sabotage and theft, (7) absenteeism and (8) health outcomes.

2.5.1 Visibility of Negative Consequences of Interpersonal Conflict

Visibility is defined in this research as how easily negative consequences can be spotted or recognized as a result of interpersonal conflict in the workplace. The most visible negative consequences of interpersonal conflict include as the most easily noticeable outcomes, legal fees or increased health costs.

For many people the experience of badly managed interpersonal conflict is alienating and disempowering. They feel themselves to be “not ok”, and experience a downward spiral into negative thinking and feeling. Physically people become ill, suffering from a range of stress-related illnesses. Resulting visible consequences include absenteeism, reduced motivation, and increase of wasted time in dealing with unmanaged or badly managed interpersonal conflict and departure of employees (conflict at work, 2008). Considerably reduced motivation can result in ‘presenteeism’. This term refers to employees who “retire on the job”, do not do the work expected from them and cause additional workload problems for others in their area (Duxbury & Higgins, 2008). While it is acknowledged that it may be difficult to establish precisely to what extent a health problem can be attributed to a specific interpersonal conflict situation, research data show that employees working in conditions with high levels of interpersonal conflict are facing higher stress levels and are more likely to have injuries ( Hart,2008).

There are other less-visible consequences which tend to be the cumulative result of unmanaged interpersonal conflict in the workplace, such as sabotage, damage to the company’s brand, the diminished ability of a company with a questionable reputation for treating its employees fairly to attract top talent, the drain of the company’s intellectual capital as a result of turnover, missed opportunities or the loss of key business with damaging and long-term adverse impact on the company’s productivity (see table 1 below). Many of these outcomes are typically overlooked because they are not immediately associated with interpersonal conflict and are accounted for as part of the normal outcomes of doing business.

The interpersonal conflict visibility and measurability matrix provides an easy overview of some of the more important negative consequences of interpersonal conflict developed above while relating them also to the measurability of outcomes implications, The matrix clearly illustrates that easy visibility of negative consequences of interpersonal conflict cannot automatically be equated to easy measurability of the resulting outcomes (e.g. loss of motivation) and more “hidden” negative consequences of interpersonal conflict can be easily measurable (e.g. accidents at work).

Accidents

•Sabotage/ stealing

•Absenteeism

•Image

•Branding

•Missed opportunities

•Loss of commitment

•Loss of trust

Loss of sleep

•Departure of staff

•Sickness

•Compensation claims

•Legal fees

•Harassment cases

•Aggressive behaviour

•Productivity loss

•Stress

•Underperformance

•Waste of time

•Difficulty to attract

talent

•Avoidance culture

•Miscommunication

•Presenteeism

•Loss of motivation

•Unpleasant work

environment

2.5.3 Outcomes Measurability

It is striking that most interpersonal conflict theory literature only states that unresolved interpersonal conflict leads to very high costs, without however providing methods to measure those costs. While their exist well developed analytical tools to monitor and analyze organizations’ income, expenditure and other financial data, most organizations lack systems monitoring outcomes of interpersonal conflict. There is however an increasing amount of research based on empirical data from surveys among different groups of employees in different industries which attempt to quantify outcomes of interpersonal conflict (Di Martino V., Hoel H. and Cooper, Cary L., 2008). Morale, productivity, stress, emotions, absenteeism and complaints are the attributes that are typically measured to determine the health of an interpersonal conflict management system.

2.5.3 Outcomes to the Organization

Productivity suffers when unhealthy interpersonal conflict persists, for instance a loss of productivity of 25 percent reduces an average working week to fewer than 20 hours (Cram, 2008). Research findings show that as much as 30 percent to 70 percent of a manager’s time is spent simply dealing with employees in interpersonal conflict (Taylor, 2008; Watson, & Hoffman, 1996; Thomas and Schmid, 1976). Those percentages are possibly inflated when compared to a survey conducted with 5,000 employees in various countries in Europe and the Americas by OPP, an international business psychology consultancy, jointly with the UK-based Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD). The survey found that employees spend, depending on the country in which the survey was conducted, between 0.9 hours and 3.3 hours a week dealing with badly managed interpersonal conflict, amounting to respectively 2.3 percent and 8.3 percent of the weekly working hours (CIPD and OPP, 2008).

Mediator P. Derfler (2008) found that employees waste 25 percent in dealing with interpersonal conflict. Time spent in dealing with badly managed interpersonal conflict is time which is not valued and does not contribute to achieving operational targets. Productivity also suffers when a company redesigns workflow only to avoid people having to interact with each other (Dana, 2001). The resulting changed procedures or structures are rarely more efficient.

“Absenteeism” is an outcome which stands for the number of unscheduled personal days taken off work by individuals affected by badly managed interpersonal conflict. Research has shown that a high correlation exists between absenteeism, stress and needing a break from fighting with co-workers (Giebels and Janssen, 2005). It appears however that few organizations engage in pro-active health-productivity management to allow for early detection of workplace-related health problems (Pwc, 2008). Among the reasons for such lack of attention are; a silo mentality in managing health care of staff, the lack of insight into the link between workplace interpersonal conflict and health problems, or the absence of integrated data on staff health problems (Kessler and Stang, 2006). While absenteeism is the failure to report to work, “presenteeism” consists of showing up at work while ill or otherwise not completely fit for work and the productivity decline that can result from this condition. While the outcomes of absenteeism to employers is well researched, it is only recently that research in occupational medicine has begun to suggest that work lost due to absenteeism is only the visible tip of an iceberg and that the hidden outcomes of presenteeism may be much greater (John, 2009).

Researchers studying exit interview data on voluntary departures state that chronic unresolved interpersonal conflict is a decisive factor in at least 50 percent of all such departures ( Duxbury Higgins, 2003). A work-life interpersonal conflict study conducted in Canada found that it outcomes about 150 percent of one trained employee’s salary to replace him or her (Philips, 1990; Duxbury&Higgins, 2003). Interpersonal conflict accounts for up to 90 percent of involuntary departures, with the possible exception of staff reductions due to downsizing and restructuring (Dana, 2001). In the United Nations, however, unresolved interpersonal conflict seems to have less relevance in voluntary departure decisions (ICSC, 2009).The amount of theft and damage in a company has a direct correlation to the level of employee interpersonal conflict. Dana assessed the outcomes to be 2 percent of staff outcomes (Dana, 2001).

2.5.4. Outcomes to the Employee

Unmanaged or badly managed interpersonal conflict is stressful, reduces confidence levels, produces anxieties and frustration and leads to lowered job motivation, humiliation, and stress-induced psychological and physical illness, with often dramatic consequences for the employee, family and friends and long term career damage (McClure, 2000). People involved in interpersonal conflict experience a break in their interpersonal connections, and often feel alienated from each other and self focused. They may avoid or attack each other in a number of different ways: withdrawing from each other, interrupting, not listening, or finding unnecessary fault with each other. This is detrimental not only to the working relationship, but also to those with whom they work, as energy is used in fuelling the interpersonal conflict rather than in furthering the performance of the individuals or of the team. Aggravating interpersonal conflict leads parties to avoid contact, relations are limited to the minimum, communication is not open, information withheld or wrong information provided. Studies have shown that health care expenditures are nearly 50 percent higher for workers who report high levels of stress. While differences in individual characteristics such as personality or coping style need to be taken into account, there are working conditions that are stressful to most people, a work environment characterized by unresolved interpersonal conflict being one of those conditions (Hart, 2004). Presenteeism is impacting negatively on employees in that it might worsen existing medical conditions, damage the quality of working life, and give impressions of ineffectiveness at work (John, 2009).

2.5.5. Outcomes to the Client

Clients are rarely referred to in the literature describing outcomes implications of workplace interpersonal conflict, which is surprising as the implications of workplace interpersonal conflict on the quality of products or services seems to be evident. Particularly in highly competitive industries, the negative implications on client satisfaction and a company’s reputation can be substantial and become a question of survival (Helmut, 2009). Most of these outcomes are hidden and difficult to qualify. However, there can be very visible consequences in cases of reduced motivation of staff leading to lower quality products or services or mistakes that can even threaten clients’ lives.

2.5.6 Tools for measuring outcomes

This part of the study examines tools which would allow organizations to improve their capacity to measure outcomes of interpersonal conflict in the workplace. A number of online tools offer tools to assist in measuring outcomes. Dana has developed a formula for organizations to calculate the soft financial outcomes of interpersonal conflict (Dana, 2001). Dana’s formula builds on data such as the number of individuals involved in a particular interpersonal conflict, average number of hours per week each individual spends involved in unproductive participation in interpersonal conflict, including time distracted from productive work by thinking about or worrying about interpersonal conflict, average annual salary of the employee involved in the interpersonal conflict and duration of the interpersonal conflict in weeks per year. Without assessing the use and precision of such assessment tools, they require data which is rarely readily available as companies are seldom tracking this kind of data. Allocating exactly the contribution of badly managed interpersonal conflict to those outcomes is not possible. However, starting to collect and analyze a selected set of data on consequences of unmanaged interpersonal conflict and using initially a conservative approach in calculating the outcomes will assist the organization to obtain more precise data on interpersonal conflict-related outcomes and allow taking targeted action to reduce those outcomes.

Building on the above described nature of the outcomes and their potential relevance for interpersonal conflict prevention or identification of efficiency gains, data which should be systematically collected and analyzed include (a) outcomes of employment-related legal proceedings and judgments against the organization, (b) sick leave records including analysis to which extent unmanaged interpersonal conflict has contributed to the sickness or absence from work and related trends in specific sectors of an organization, (c) outcomes of bringing in temporary staff to cover for absentee staff, (d) systematic interviews with employees applying for relocation in the organization or leaving the organization to establish to which extent the action could have been the result of unmanaged interpersonal conflict, (e) outcomes of recruitment and training of staff replacing colleagues who have left the organization as a result of badly managed interpersonal conflict, (f) monitoring of theft, sabotage, fraud cases including the monetary value involved and possible linkage with unmanaged interpersonal conflict and (g) monitoring of productivity in interpersonal conflict prone work environments, (h) periodic surveys on interpersonal conflict culture, sources of interpersonal conflict and assessment of impact of unmanaged interpersonal conflict on decision-making.

While some of the data collection can consist of using archival work measures such as counting the number of reported complaints of workplace harassment or days of absence from work due to interpersonal conflict situations, other data can be collected by surveys using self-reporting including the impact of interpersonal conflict on work productivity. Though it is impossible to calculate the exact outcomes of interpersonal conflict, some of the related outcomes are measurable or can be estimated, and the exercise of calculating an organization’s outcomes of interpersonal conflict is still an instructive way to think about the outcomes of putting up with badly managed interpersonal conflict. Another reason for trying to “outcomes the interpersonal conflict” in a seemingly rational and number-driven business world is that no matter how compelling a case on outcomes of interpersonal conflict might be, people from accounting, finance and other quantitative backgrounds prefer to make decisions on the basis of financial estimates. According to Sutton (2007) awareness of outcomes and a better ability to measure outcomes does, however, not provide an answer to the question how to reduce outcomes of interpersonal conflict.

2.6 Strategies for Managing Interpersonal conflict.

To resolve a dispute means to turn opposed positions into a single outcome (Davis, 1986). The most common means to reconcile interpersonal conflicts are negotiation and mediation (Fisher and Ury, 1991). The decision which approach to take will impact on the costs of interpersonal conflict resolution, the outcome, the relationship and the possible recurrence of disputes. The way in which individuals behave during interpersonal conflict depends on personality, experience, training, and the particular circumstance of the situation. Recognizing those styles helps to identify the way individuals react to interpersonal conflict, even though it is generally recognized that often people adopt a combination of styles depending on the respective context. Before developing the most appropriate and outcomes efficient method of interpersonal conflict resolution it is important to understand the different interpersonal conflict styles and their most salient characteristics.

Thomas and Kilmann (2008) developed a model that identifies the following five common styles for dealing with interpersonal conflict: competitive, collaborative, accommodating, compromising or avoiding. Thomas and Kilmann believe that people are capable of using all five interpersonal conflict styles. However, certain people use some styles better than others and therefore tend to rely on those more heavily. People's interpersonal conflict behavior in the workplace is therefore a result of both the respective personal predispositions and the requirements of a specific situation (Cloke & Goldsmith, 2005).

The competitive style is about achieving one’s goal. Weinstein (2001) argues that while a competitive style is indeed about winning and losing, competitive people are not necessarily aggressive or adversarial, often view competition as a sport and does not necessarily have the intention to harm others. However, for others who do not share this perception, competitive people can be quite threatening. A competitive style can be a valid strategy when what is under discussion is too important to risk or where relationships involved appear to be not important. An adversarial position is different from a competitive approach in that adversaries take absolute positions based on an interpretation of the problem. “Justice” and reference to the legal system, not emotions, is often the rationale for engaging in adversarial tactics.

The collaborative style employs and requires teamwork and cooperation to attain a mutually acceptable goal. Various perspectives are examined and the parties come together with a patchwork solution. While this style may be the most efficient one in achieving win-win solutions, it takes longer and requires that people put their individual needs aside for a common good, which is very difficult to achieve when parties are emotionally engrained in a interpersonal conflict situation.

Accommodating consists of capitulating in order to gain or maintain something else of value such as relationships. While accommodation can be a necessary step in resolving interpersonal conflicts, there is a risk that accommodation masks the problematic issues with a short-lived feel-good agreement.

Compromising is very similar to accommodation but suggests that both parties make accommodations to reach mutual agreement. Compromise is an inherent part of any interpersonal conflict resolution. While compromise often reflects personal perceptions it can also be objective, such as dividing money in half. This style is often chosen by those who wish to avoid the emotional aspects of interpersonal conflict management. Relying on this approach risks however that both parties’ needs are not fully met.

Avoidance is a natural response of many people to interpersonal conflict. The prospect of dealing with the complexity of interpersonal conflict is often overwhelming and leads to the natural response to do nothing. While doing nothing or at least initially delaying a reaction can be helpful, avoidance, though often built on legitimate feelings such as fear, intimidation or anger carries great potential to aggravate the interpersonal conflict. It risks upsetting the other party that feels trapped in its thoughts that remain unaddressed. As a result, those who deny interpersonal conflict and its reasons risk indirectly contributing to interpersonal conflict escalation (Kellner, 2000). In environments of avoidance, rather than acknowledging interpersonal conflicts as what they are, people talk about “open questions”, “misunderstandings” or the “need for clarification”.

Glasl (2004) describes two broad reactions of people to interpersonal conflict: those that are interpersonal conflict averse and try to avoid interpersonal conflict thinking that interpersonal conflict is destructive and aggravating problems; and those that are combative and see interpersonal conflict as an energizing process leading to solutions and change. Comesantino and Merchant (1996), use the categories of “fight” or “flight” responses. Both reactions are built on anxiety images. Interpersonal conflict-averse people are afraid their aggressive behavior would be considered inhuman and cold and could hurt other people’s feelings. The combative people are afraid that giving in would mean not being honest to oneself and being perceived as unconfident and cowardly or weak.

While some styles are particularly risky e.g. avoidance, each style has unique advantages and disadvantages depending on the circumstances. Each method has predictable costs: with collaborative resolution such as negotiation or mediation being the lowest-outcomes resolution, involving fewer people and fewer hours; and higher authority resolutions, namely litigation, involving the most people and the most hours. Costs being not the only variable, organizations prefer one method over the other, depending on their respective culture.

2.7 Theoretical Framework

To understand how people react to interpersonal conflict situations and why they employ certain interpersonal conflict styles it is useful to review some of the theories underlying human behavior in dealing with interpersonal conflict situations. A variety of theoretical perspectives have emerged to explain people’s behavior in interpersonal conflict situations.

The Face Negotiation Theory by Ting-Tommey (1985) refers to the potentially “face-threatening” character of interpersonal conflict. The theory explains that the various facets of individual and cultural identities are described as faces. Interpersonal conflict occurs when people perceive their face threatened. The Attribution Theory, by Lindner, (2006), builds on studies revealing that it is in people’s nature to attribute their own negative behavior to external factors while attributing others’ negative behavior to internal factors. The Reciprocity Theory by Thompson, (2006), builds on research finding that individuals are likely to reciprocate what is done to them.

The transformational theory, interpersonal conflict is viewed as an important part of the development of relationships, organizations, and societies. Interpersonal conflict occurs when there is a perceived discrepancy between how things actually are and how we think things should be, and, through interpersonal conflict progress is made toward how things should be. Interpersonal conflict can initiate desired change and growth. A transformational approach to dealing with interpersonal conflict doesn’t focus on simply finding a solution to the immediate problem, but rather on examining underlying factors and relationships and determining how they are creating and being affected by interpersonal conflict. The focus is on transforming relationships for long-term benefit.

While the aforementioned theories focus on specific aspects of human behavior, according to Boyd, (2009), the Social Exchange Theory is broader and based on the idea that human beings in interpersonal conflict are guided by self-interest and outcomes benefit considerations in achieving a specific goal. The possible relational or social goals can be relationship, power, identity (e.g. saving face and maintaining self -esteem) or justice, namely fairness. “Justice” and “fairness” are considered by some authors to be critical benchmarks in evaluation of human behavior. They argue that there is only justice if fair procedures are provided for, Deutsch (2006). A corner stone of fair procedures is the right to be heard. According to Hampshire (2000), “only the principle of fairness in settling interpersonal conflict can claim universal ground as being a principle of shared rationality, indispensable in all decision making and in all intentional action”. It is further argued that whatever the subject matter on which there can be considerable disagreement, interpersonal conflict is less likely when there is a perception of procedural justice, including respect of the principle of “hearing the other side”. The notions of “justice” and “fairness” seem to play an important role in determining people’s reactions to interpersonal conflict.

Social Interdependence Theory by Johnson and Johnson (1989) posits that interpersonal conflict is of little interest when individuals are independent because their actions are unlikely to affect the goal pursuit of others. When individuals are interdependent, however, perceptions of cooperation and competition become relevant to how parties interact (see Deutsch, 1849; Tjosvold, 1985). More specifically, cooperative interpersonal conflict management is an approach to interpersonal conflict that occurs when individuals see their goals as being positively related (i.e., a positive interdependency), such that goal attainment of one individual enhances the perceived probability that goal attainment will occur for other individuals. Cooperative interpersonal conflict has been associated with effective communication, friendliness and helpfulness, coordination of effort and division of labour, treatment of interpersonal conflicting interests as a mutual problem to be solved through collaboration, and mediation (Deutsch, 2006) Conversely, interpersonal conflict occurring in a competitive environment that is characterized by a perceived negative association between individuals’ goal attainment (i.e., a negative interdependency) is theorized to hinder the effective processes and behaviours just described. The basic premise of social interdependence theory is that how participants’ goals are structured determines the ways they interact and the interaction pattern determines the outcomes of the situation. In cooperative situations, interpersonal conflicts occur over how best to achieve mutual goals. In competitive situations, interpersonal conflicts occur over who will win and who will lose.

To understand the nature of interpersonal conflict, this study will consider social interdependence theory, which suggests that, although interpersonal conflicts are inherent in all social relationships, interpersonal conflict can have destructive or constructive outcomes depending on whether the interpersonal conflict takes place within a cooperative or competitive environment. The hotel environment is both competitive and cooperative due to the high level of interdependence between departments. Interdependence in hospitality situations is caused by the nature of work flows; the product or service that the customer receives is the outcome of close and often immediate cooperation between two or more departments. Coupled with this, the time requirements for coordination are very short compared with other industries. In fact, they can often be measured in minutes or seconds, hence making the hotel environment cooperative.

Goal differentiation between the departments makes the environment competitive as each department has its own goals to achieve, for instance the chef’s concern is primarily with quality and that of service staff primarily with speed. For each department to achieve its own goals and at the same time cooperate with other departments in achieving the overall goal of the hotel while competing for scarce resources shared with other departments results in both interdepartmental and interpersonal conflict. The use of social interdependency theory through cooperative interpersonal conflict management as an approach for resolving interpersonal conflicts in the hotels will ensure that management work towards managing interpersonal conflict in the organisation which will result in achieving a cooperative relationship in all their staff and maintain constructive interpersonal conflict only.

A cooperative relationship will help the hotel reduce the outcomes of interpersonal conflict and enjoy the benefits of constructive interpersonal conflict such that staff was able to discuss diverse views open-mindedly, create innovative solutions, learn from their experience, better understanding of others, better solutions to problems and challenges, improved working relationships, higher performance in the departments, and increased motivation. The interpersonal conflict may actually be used to redesign more effective and efficient production and service systems. Cooperative interpersonal conflict has been associated with effective communication, friendliness and helpfulness, coordination of effort and division of labour, treatment of interpersonal conflicting interests as a mutual problem to be solved through collaboration, and mediation.

2.6 Conceptual framework.

This study will adopt a conceptual framework where types of interpersonal conflict, outcomes of interpersonal conflict and strategies for managing interpersonal conflicts was itemized as independent variables and organizational performance which was measured using the balanced score card is itemized as dependent variable. This is shown in figure 2.2.

It implies from the figure that if interpersonal conflict is well managed by using the right strategies and reducing the outcomes of interpersonal conflict, it would affect the performance of the organization.

CHAPTER THREE

STUDY AREA AND RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.0 Overview

This chapter discussed the study area and research methodology that was used in carrying out this study. Research methods were discussed and the test results presented.

3.1 Study Area

Kisii is a cosmopolitan town situated in the south western Kenya. It is the main urban and commercial centre in the Gusii Highlands. Kisii town was originally known by the Gusii people as 'Bosongo'. It is believed to have originated from 'Abasongo' (to mean the White people or Whites) who lived in the town during the colonial times. The town was originally established by British soldiers who were being forced to retreat from Lake Victoria by heavy gunfire from German soldiers' gunboats during the Great War in the early 20th Century. A vibrant town, the Kisii municipality has a population of about 83,000, according to 2008 estimates. However, it has a large dependent metropolitan population of over 100,000 residents, as per the latest national population and housing census of 2009. Kisii town is the capital of the Kisii County. Today, it is a bustling town and a home to several businesses, organizations, educational institutions and government agencies. Kisii municipality sits right at the centre of the Western Kenya tourist circuit that includes the Tabaka Soapstone Carvings, Maasai Mara Game Reserve, Lambwe Valley Game Reserve and the entire Lake Victoria basin. The town continues to serve these former districts, the larger South Nyanza County and the Trans Mara area of western Narok County in terms of commerce. This town has several hotels which offer good standards of accommodation including swimming pools, comfortable rooms and other facilities. Employees in these hotels are also diverse, representing populations from across the countries with various racial and cultural backgrounds. The result of these diverse groups coalescing in one organization and the high turnover rate of employees makes it a prime environment to study interpersonal conflict.

3.2 Research design

Research design is the arrangement of conditions for collection and analysis of data in a manner that aims to combine relevance to the research purpose with economy as procedure (Kothari, 2008). According to Mugenda (1999), research design is the plan, structure and strategy of investigation conceived so as to obtain answers to research questions. Based on the research problem and the research questions formulated for the study, the research design used was the descriptive survey design and explanatory research design. Descriptive survey design sought to collect data without manipulating the research variables or the respondents in an attempt to uncover the existing status of interpersonal conflicts in hotels and to find out its effects on the performance of hotels. The respondents were also required to provide information on their perceptions of interpersonal conflict in hotels. The researcher chose descriptive survey research design since it enabled finding out the ‘real’ situation of the effects of interpersonal conflict as it is through investigation that does not allow manipulation of the study variables (Patton, 2000). Descriptive studies generally take raw data and summarize it in a useable form. Specifically, questionnaires were the tools utilized in data collection. ` Further, the researcher chose an explanatory research design. This enabled the establishment of the relationship between interpersonal conflict and organisational performance. The design also allowed in depth acquisition of knowledge and insight into the study population and the variables under study. Additionally, the design allows use of inferential statistics to establish the significant relationships between the dependent and the independent variables (Hair et al., 2007).

3.3 Target population

According to Mugenda (1999), target population is a population to which a researcher would like to generalize the results of a study. The main target units for analysis of the study was 354 employees of the selected hotels in Kisii as shown in table 3.1 below

3.4 Sampling Design

According to Mugenda (1999), the term sample design refers to the procedures or processes used to obtain the sample size for the study. The sample size on the other hand, is the number of cases involved in the study from which the researcher collects data.

3.4.1. Sample size

The sample size was statistically obtained by calculating the sample size from the five purposively selected hotels in Kisii. A sample size of 184 hotel employees was statistically obtained, by calculating the sample size for each stratum while adjusting to round off decimals to one person. Mugenda and Mugenda (1999) formula for calculating the sample size was applied.

Where:

Nf = the desired sample size (when the population is less than 10,000).

n=the desired sample size (when the population is more than 10,000).

N=the estimate of the population size.

Therefore, if the desired sample size is 384 when the population is more than 10,000, on a precision of 5% and a confidence level of 95% (Mugenda and Mugenda, 1999), the sample size for this study was attained a follows;

Nf = less than 10,000 =

= 184

Table3.2 Sample size determination/distribution

Hotels	Sample size	Managers	Supervisors	Staff
MWALIMU INTERNATIONAL	31	1	4	26
DALLAS	41	2	5	34
UFANISI	42	1	4	37
FOUNTAIN	38	1	4	33
MASH PARK	32	1	2	29
TOTAL	184	6	19	159

Source: Author's own compilation (2013)

3.4.2 Sampling Procedure

Sampling procedure is the process of deriving a sample from a given population according to certain rules. It is normally done with the keen understanding of the characteristics of a population including size, distribution and other features that distinguish the elements in the population to ensure all aspects of a population are captured in the selected sample.

Purposive sampling was used to select the hotels with relevant information for the study. Stratified random sampling was used to sample the required sample size, and criteria for stratification were according to the department worked in and the subject’s rank in the department. The target population was first divided into departments and staff from these departments were further divided into strata’s of managers, supervisors, and employees. From each stratum simple random sampling was used to select the cases so as to raise the sample size of 184 cases.

This technique is appropriate since it divides the target population into departmental managers, supervisors, and employees, thus achieving a desired representation from various subgroups in the population.

3.5 Data Collection

This subsection discusses the data types and sources to be used in the study, the data collection instruments and validity of the instruments.

3.5.1 Data types and sources

3.5.1.1Primary data

This is raw data that was collected from the field, using questionnaires. These data was collected from employees of the selected hotels in Kisii.

3.5.1.2 Secondary data

A major advantage of using secondary data is that it is more economical in terms of data collection compared to primary data.

This data focussed on what other researchers and writers have written concerning interpersonal conflict and interpersonal conflict management practices in organizations and was collected from both published and unpublished materials such as books, journals, research papers and internet.

3.5.2 Data collection instruments

The data was collected using questionnaires which generated the primary data needed for the study.

3.5.2.1 Questionnaires

Questionnaires are a collection of items to which a respondent is expected to react to usually in writing (Kothari, 2004). Questionnaires were designed based on the research problem to be administered to the employees of the selected hotels. The questionnaires will constitute close-ended questions, likert scale and matrix questions as they are easier to code and analyse. The likert scale was used to show the strength of one respondents view in relation to that of another. They were taken to the respective hotels by the researcher and five research assistants to avoid missing data and misunderstanding of the questions by the respondents. Advantages of using questionnaires include gathering information in a standardized way, it’s outcomes effective, and they permit anonymity. .

Section A of the questionnaire contained demographic information including, gender, age, education level, job title, department worked in and duration of employment. Section B consisted of measures of the types of interpersonal conflict experienced in the hotels. Section C included measures of outcomes of interpersonal conflict. Section D consisted of measures of the strategies used to manage interpersonal conflict and finally, section E consisted of aspects used to measure organisational performance in the selected hotels.

3.5.3 Validity and Reliability of Research instruments.

Validity is the extent to which differences found with a measuring tool reflect true differences among the respondents being tested (Kothari, 2004). A pilot test was conducted to test the content validity of the data collection instruments. Bell (1999) and Mugenda and Mugenda (1999) allude that pilot testing of questionnaires assists in identifying deviance, finding out how long the questionnaire takes to complete, clarity of the instruction, questions that are unclear and attractive; suitable data analysis methods for the study and other comments.

Reliability, which entails the accuracy and precision of the measurement procedure, was measured using the Cronbach’s Alpha at a level of 0.7%. Cronbach's alpha generally increases as the inter-correlations among test items increase, and is thus known as an internal consistency estimate of reliability of test scores. Because inter-correlations among test items are maximized when all items measure the same construct, that is, the higher the coefficients, the better the measuring instrument (Zinbarg et al., 2005).

3.6 Data Analysis Procedures

After data collection, the data was cleaned, coded and entered into the computer and analyzed with the aid of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) version 17.0. Descriptive and inferential statistics was performed. Descriptive statistics makes use of measures of central tendency such as means, median and mode and measures of dispersion such as range deviation and variance to describe a group of subjects. Multiple regressions was conducted to check multiple independent variables (type of interpersonal conflict, outcomes of interpersonal conflict and strategies for managing interpersonal conflict) against the dependent variable (perceived organisational performance). A multiple regression was used to explain the relationship between interpersonal conflict and organisational performance determinants. The regression model was given as:

Yi= β0+ β1X1+ β2X2+ β3X3+µ

Where,

Yi = organisational performance

X1 = Type of interpersonal conflict

X2 = Outcomes of interpersonal conflict

X3 = Strategies for managing interpersonal conflict

β0 = Constant term

β1, β2, β3 = Regression coefficients

µ = Error term

3.7 Ethical issues

The study was undertaken with special considerations of all ethical concerns and will attempt to uphold them. The major ethical issues to be addressed by the study included informed consent, privacy and confidentiality, anonymity and researchers’ responsibility (Yuko and Onen 2005; Mugenda and Mugenda 2003).

Informed consent was upheld by providing the respondents with adequate information about the study. This included the purpose of the study, the procedures to be followed; the benefits of the study to them and the industry as a whole and the extent of privacy and confidentiality to be maintained. This information was the basis upon which the selected respondents made an informed decision on whether or not to participate in the study.

The study respected privacy of the respondents and maintained confidentiality of all data to be collected to the extent that was agreed between the two parties. All collected data was used for the purpose for which the study was undertaken and was not divulged to unauthorized persons.

CHAPTER FOUR

DATA ANALYSIS, PRESENTATION AND INTERPRETATION

4.0 Introduction

This chapter presents an analysis of the data collected from the field on the effects of interpersonal conflict on organisational performance of selected hotels in Kisii. The research aimed at fulfilling the following objectives: to determine the effects of interpersonal conflict types on organisational performance, to establish the effects of outcomes of interpersonal conflict on organisational performance and to examine the effect of strategies adopted for managing interpersonal conflict on organisational performance. It is subdivided into two sections; the first section presents results of descriptive analysis and the second section presents results on inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics were used to present distribution of scores using indices while inferential statistics were used to make inferences about the population based on the results obtained from the sample. The results and discussions are based on the questionnaire responses of employees and managers of the selected hotels in Kisii. Of the 184 questionnaires issued, only 160 that were appropriately filled were analysed. The response rate yielded was 84% which is good.

4.1 Descriptive Statistics

Descriptive statistics are used to describe the basic features of data in a study. They provide simple summaries about the sample and the measures together with simple graphics analysis. They form the basis of virtually every quantitative analysis of data. The primary use of descriptive statistics is to describe information or data through the use of numbers and to give a clear view of raw data by presenting quantitative descriptions in a manageable form (Kumar, 2005).

4.1.1 Demographic Profile of the Respondents

The demographic profile of the respondents was generated from the bio data collected through the questionnaires which specifically focused on their age, gender, academic qualification, job title, duration of employment and department worked. The results in table 4.1 indicate that 55.6% of the respondents were male while a sizeable percentage of 44.4% were female. Majority (78.7%) of the respondents were below 40 years while only 21.3% were above 40 years, which could mean that majority of the employees in the hotel industry are young which could be attributed to the heavy physical workload in hotels requiring young and energetic people. With regard to level of education, majority (60%) of the respondents had attained college level education, followed by secondary level education (19.4%), 15.6 % had university level education while only 5% had primary level education. This could mean that most of them have the ability to undergo training on issues pertaining to interpersonal conflict management.

With regard to the duration of employment, 93.8% of the respondents had worked in the establishment for a period of less than 5 years which implies that there could be a high rate of employee turnover in hotels maybe due to ineffective interpersonal conflict management leading to their destructive effects on employees, thus forcing employees to look for better work conditions elsewhere. 40% of the respondents worked in the Food and Beverage department, followed by 31.9 % in the Front office while the least (28.1%) worked in the Housekeeping department. A summary of the demographic profile of respondents is as shown on table 4.1.

Table 4.1: Demographic Profile of the Respondents

VARIABLE	PERCENT
Gender	Male	55.6
	Female	44.4
	TOTAL	100
Age	18-25 years	21.9
	26 - 40 years	56.9
	Above 40 years	21.3
	TOTAL	100
Academic qualification	Primary	5
	Secondary	19.4
	College	60
	University	15.6
	TOTAL	100
Job title	Junior staff	80
	Supervisor	14.4
	Manager	5.6
	TOTAL	100
Duration of employment	Below 5 years	93.8
	6-10 years	3.1
	Above 10 years	3.1
	TOTAL	100
Department worked in	Housekeeping	28.1
	Front office	31.9
	Food and Beverage	40
	TOTAL	100

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

4.1.2: Conflict Frequency

According to Dana (2001) most people consider conflict as negative. If asked about conflict, they may simply consciously or unconsciously repress facing such situations. An organizational culture of conflict avoidance can add to such a reaction. In reference to the question on how frequently employees face interpersonal conflict at work, 12.5 % pointed out that they face interpersonal conflict 1-2 times a year, 15.6% indicated that they face interpersonal conflict every 2-3 months, while 17.5% face interpersonal conflict once a month. In addition, 6.3% of the respondents were in agreement that they face interpersonal conflict every week while 3.1% of the respondents, were of the opinion that they face interpersonal conflict several times a week. Summary of the responses are as shown on table.

Table 4.2 Frequency of Interpersonal Conflict

Frequency of conflict situation	NO	YES
	FQ	%	FQ	%
1-2 times a year	25	15.6	20	12.5
Every 2-3 months	15	9.4	25	15.6
Once a month	10	6.3	28	17.5
Every week	17	10.6	10	6.3
Several times a week	5	3.1	5	3.1
TOTAL	72		88

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

4.2 Types of Interpersonal Conflict

The Respondents were asked to indicate the extent to which they agreed that certain types of interpersonal conflict were experienced in their organisations. The attributes were analysed on a 5-point Likert scale to establish the level of agreement, where strongly agree was assigned 1 while strongly disagree was assigned 5. The interpersonal conflicts under study were relationship conflict and task conflict.

4.2.1 Relationship Conflict

A majority (75%) of the respondents were in agreement that there is friction among members in their department, while 25% were in disagreement. In addition, 59% of the respondents were also in agreement that there are personality clashes (conflicts) among members of their department, while 41% were in disagreement.

In reference to whether there are grudges (emotional conflict) among members in their department, 28.8% of the respondents indicated that they strongly agreed, 29.4% agreed while 30% disagreed and 11.9 strongly disagreed. 21.3% of the respondents strongly agreed that there is tension among members in their department, 32.5% agreed, 36.3% disagreed and only 10% strongly disagreed.

Table 4.3 shows that all the measures of relationship conflict attained a mean statistic of between 2.3 and 2.9 with standard deviations of between 1.1 and 1.6. This low standard deviation indicates that the values are close to the mean thus falling within the range of expected values. According to Ulrich (2005) the means of a group of items can be related to the anchor on the Likert scale, this could therefore imply that relationship conflict is experienced in the hotel and could affect organisational performance as majority of the responses were skewed towards anchor 2 (agreed) based on the means.

Table 4.3 Relationship Conflict

MEASUREMENTS	STATISTICS
relationship conflict	Strongly disagree 5	Disagree 4	Neutral 3	Agree 2	Strongly Agree 1
	F	%	f	%	f	%	f	%	f	%	M	SD
There is friction among members in my department	16	10	24	15	-	-	80	50	40	25	2.906	1.2876
There are personality clashes(conflicts) among members in my department	18	11.25	24	15	-	-	48	30	46	28.75	2.531	1.5169
There are grudges (emotional conflict) among members in my department	19	11.88	48	30	-	-	47	29	46	28.75	2.919	1.1326
There is tension among members in my department	16	10	58	36.25	-	-	52	33	34	21.25	2.369	1.6199

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

4.2.2 Task Conflict

Of the measures of task conflict rated, 53.8% of the respondents were in agreement that there are conflicts about ideas in their department, while 46.3% were in disagreement. In response to whether people in their department disagree about opinions, 56.9% of the respondents were in agreement while 43.1% disagreed on the same. 60% of the respondents agreed that members of their department disagree about who should do what while 40% disagreed.

In relation to whether members of their department disagree about the way to complete a group task, 49.4% strongly agreed, 10% agreed, 25.6% disagreed while 15% strongly disagreed. 63.8% of the respondents were in agreement that there is conflict about delegation of tasks within their department while 36.2% were in disagreement on the same, as shown in table 4.3 below.

Overall, table 4.4 shows that all the measures of task conflict attained a mean statistic of between 2.5 and 2.9 with standard deviations of between 1.0 and 1.6. This could also imply that task conflict is experienced in the hotel and it affects organisational performance as majority of the responses were skewed towards anchor 2 (agreed) based on the means.

Table 4.4 Task Conflict

MEASUREMENTS	STATISTICS
Task conflict	SD 5	D 4	N 3	A 2	SA 1
	F	%	F	%	f	%	f	%	f	%	M	SD
There are conflicts about ideas in my department	16	10	58	36.25	0	0	68	42.5	18	11.25	2.912	1.281
People in my department disagree about opinions	16	10	48	30	5	3.1	25	15.6	66	41.3	2.518	1.513
Members of my department disagree about who should do what	16	10	48	30	0	0	96	60	0	0	2.9000	1.139
Members of my department disagree about the way to complete a group task	24	15	41	25.6	0	0	16	10	79	49.4	2.468	1.633
There is conflict about delegation of tasks within my department	0	0	58	36.3	0	0	96	60	6	3.8	2.687	1.011

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

The results above (table 4.3 and table 4.4) show that both task and relationship conflicts occur in the hotels. This could be attributed to the interdependent nature of hotels and interpersonal incompatibilities among hotel staff, including personality differences as well as differences of opinion and preferences regarding non-task and task issues. Task and relationship conflict can also share some conceptual overlap, as each type of conflict may affect the other. Task conflict may turn into relationship conflict if perceived as a personal disagreement.

4.2.3 Levels of Interpersonal Conflict

Interpersonal conflict at work can relate to relationships among colleagues at different hierarchical levels (vertical interpersonal conflict) and at the same hierarchical level (horizontal interpersonal conflict). In reference to the question on whom employees have ever had interpersonal conflict(s) at work with, 17% indicated that they are always in conflict with their managers, 30% with their supervisors, 43% with their co-workers, 64% with workers from other departments, and 35% were always in conflict with workmates from a lower hierarchical level as shown in the table 4.5 below.

Table 4.5 Levels of Interpersonal Conflict

Variables of conflict parties	Always 5	Often 4	Sometimes 3	Rarely 2	Never 1	M	SD
	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%
My manager	27	17	1	1	29	18	50	31	53	33	3.631	1.3901
My supervisor	48	30	25	16	18	11	20	13	49	31	2.981	1.6501
Co-workers	68	43	50	31	0	0	7	4	35	22	2.319	1.5757
Workmates from a lower hierarchical level.	56	35	5	3	28	18	46	29	25	16	2.869	1.5301
Worker from other department	103	64	16	10	20	13	0	0	21	13	2.931	1.4280
AVERAGE		37.8%		12.2%		12%		15.4%		23%

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

4.2.4 Causes of Interpersonal Conflict

The prevalence of interdepartmental conflict in hotels seems to be one of the distinctive features of their operation (Rajinder, 2002). In reference to the question on the common causes of interpersonal conflict in their organisations, a total of 31.3% of the respondents responded as strongly

agree and agree that there is poor leadership by their managers, while 50% responded as disagree and strongly disagree. These indicated that poor leadership is not a very strong cause of interpersonal conflict in their organisations. 68.8% of the respondents pointed out that unfair treatment was practiced in their hotels, while 62.5% were in agreement that individual differences exist with their workmates. 75% of the respondents indicated that there is poor Communication in their hotels while a cumulative percentage of 50.1% strongly agreed and agreed that disagreements arise from tips and other rewards. In reference to lack of honesty, openness and trust as a cause of conflict in the hotels, 25% strongly agreed, 12.5% agreed, 6.3 % were neutral, 28.1% disagreed while 28.1% strongly disagreed. A total of 52.5% of the respondents strongly agreed and agreed that there is no clarity of roles and responsibilities in the hotels while 62.5 % of the respondents pointed out that there is heavy workloads in their organisations.

In reference to long shifts at work as a common cause of conflict, 68.7% of the respondents were in agreement while 31.2% were in disagreement. A majority of the respondents 73.1% and 63.2% strongly agreed that there is job stress in their organisations and competition between colleagues at work respectively. In relation to interdependence with other departments as a common cause of conflict, 63.2% of the employees were in agreement while 36.9% were in disagreement. 60% of the respondents pointed out that lack of cooperation was evident among employees in the hotel while 65.7% of them indicated that lack of resources creates pressure in the hotels which could be attributed to the fact that interpersonal conflicts increase when there is a struggle for scarce resources between departments and where it is perceived by one of the parties that the distribution of resources has not been equitable. Lastly 56.2% of the respondents were of the opinion that there is no recognition for good work or effort in their organisations. Table 4.6 shows the causes of interpersonal conflicts experienced in the hotels with the mean statistics of between 2.0 and 3.3 and standard deviation of between 1.1 and 1.6. Majority of the responses were skewed towards anchor 2 (agreed) based on the means.

Table 4.6.Common causes of interpersonal conflict

MEASUREMENTS	STATISTICS
Statements (Common causes of IC)	Strongly disagree 5	Disagree 4	Neutral 3	Agree 2	Strongly Agree 1	M	SD
	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%
There is poor leadership by my manager	60	37.5	20	12.5	30	18.8	10	6.3	40	25	3.313	1.614
Unfair treatment is practiced in the hotel	10	6.3	30	18.8	10	6.3	40	25	70	43.8	2.188	1.337
Individual differences exist with my workmates	10	6.3	40	25	10	6.3	20	12.5	80	50	2.250	1.441
There is poor Communication.	3	1.9	27	16.9	10	6.3	52	32.5	68	42.5	2.031	1.157
Disagreements arise from tips and other rewards	25	15.6	35	21.9	20	12.5	30	18.8	50	31.3	2.719	1.489
There is lack of honesty, openness and trust	45	28.1	45	28.1	10	6.3	20	12.5	40	25	3.219	1.581
There is no clarity of roles and responsibilities	23	14.4	47	29.4	6	3.8	24	15	60	37.5	2.681	1.560
There is heavy workloads	24	15	13	8.1	23	14.4	60	37.5	40	25	2.506	1.351
The shifts are long	9	5.6	41	25.6	0	0	29	18.1	81	50.6	2.175	1.421
There is job stress	23	14.4	20	12.5	0	0	8	5	109	68.1	2.000	1.578
There is competition btn colleagues	0	0	41	25.6	36	22.5	30	18.8	53	33.1	2.406	1.184
There is Interdependence with other departments	24	15	35	21.9	0	0	11	6.9	90	56.3	2.325	1.648
Lack of cooperation is evident among employees	38	23.8	8	5	18	11.3	20	12.5	76	47.5	2.450	1.655
Lack of resources creates pressure.	11	6.9	31	19.4	13	8.1	15	9.4	90	56.3	2.113	1.427
There is no recognition for good work	40	25	13	8.1	17	10.6	29	18.1	61	38.1	2.638	1.635

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

4.3 OUTCOMES OF CONFLICT.

The study sought to establish the effect of interpersonal conflict outcomes on organisational performance. The Respondents were asked to indicate the extent to which they agreed that certain outcomes of interpersonal conflict were experienced in their organisations. The attributes were analysed on a 5-point Likert scale to establish the level of agreement, where

Strongly agree was assigned 5 while strongly disagree was assigned 1. The responses were as shown in table 4.7.

A majority, 70% of the respondents were of the opinion that conflicts reduce understanding of others at work, a minority 20.7% were of a different opinion while 9.4% remained neutral. 54.4 % of the respondents were in agreement that poor solutions to problems and challenges are derived due to conflicts while 28.8% were in disagreement. In reference to whether poor working relationships are experienced as a result of interpersonal conflicts, a total of 65.7% of the respondents strongly agreed and agreed, 15% were neutral while 19.4% of the respondents strongly disagreed and disagreed. A cumulative percentage of 75.1% strongly agreed and agreed that there is low performance in teams, 14.4% strongly disagreed and disagreed while 10% took a neutral position.

74.4% of the respondents were of the opinion that bad ideas are produced as an outcome of interpersonal conflict, 3.8 % neither agreed nor disagreed while 21.9% disagreed. In reference to an increase in employee turnover, 46.3% strongly agreed, 31.3% agreed, 4.4% were neutral, 15% disagreed while 3.1% strongly disagreed. In addition, a cumulative percentage of 48.8% of the respondents were in agreement that Low efficiency at work was experienced as an outcome of interpersonal conflict while 51.3% were in disagreement.

Table 4.7 shows that all the outcomes of conflict experienced in the hotel attained a mean statistic of between 1.9 and 3.0 with standard deviations of between 1.1 and 1.6 This could also imply that outcomes of interpersonal conflicts experienced in the hotel could affect organisational performance as majority of the responses were skewed towards anchor 2 (agreed) based on the means.

Table 4.7 Outcomes of Conflict Experienced In The Hotel.

Outcomes	Strongly disagree 5	Disagree 4	Neutral 3	Agree 2	Strongly Agree 1	M	SD
Reduces understanding of others at work	10	6.3	23	14.4	15	9.4	55	34.4	57	35.6	2.213	1.246
Poor solutions to problems and challenges are derived	36	22.5	10	6.3	27	16.9	64	40.0	23	14.4	2.825	1.385
Poor working relationships are experienced	14	8.8	17	10.6	24	15.0	30	18.8	75	46.9	2.156	1.348
There is low performance in teams	8	5.0	15	9.4	16	10.0	39	24.4	82	51.3	1.925	1.200
Bad ideas are produced	27	16.9	8	5.0	6	3.8	31	19.4	88	55.	2.09	1.521
Employee turnover is common	5	3.1	24	15.0	7	4.4	50	31.3	74	46.3	1.9750	1.181
Low efficiency at work	46	28.8	36	22.5	0	0	35	21.9	43	26.9	3.0438	1.638

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

4.4 Cost of Interpersonal Conflict

One objective of the survey was to obtain data which can assist to establish the effects of costs of interpersonal conflict on organisational performance. Due to the risk of subjectivity respondents were not requested to provide answers on hours or percentage of work time spent in dealing with conflict. However, building on the answers on frequency of conflict, some qualitative analysis assisted in interpreting the data on time spent in dealing with conflict in hours per week, which in turn allowed for determining costs of conflict as a percentage of staff salary costs (Dana, 2001).

As illustrated in table 4.8 below, the qualitative analysis is built on the assumption that work efficiency is seriously reduced for respondents who state that they face conflict several times per week. All of those respondents spend considerable time in dealing with the conflict situation and are distracted from assigned work. As a result, it is assumed that individuals in that group spend at least eight hours per week in dealing with conflict. This is a conservative assessment. The number of hours per week spent in dealing with conflict for that group is probably considerably higher, as persons in that group often risk becoming unable to focus on work and thus become quasi-dysfunctional.

Using Dana’s instrument for measuring costs of conflict, work time spent on conflict has been set in hours per week ranging from eight hours for those who face conflict several times a week to half an hour (30 minutes) for those who stated that they either never or rarely face conflict situations. For the latter group the assumption is made that everyone spends some time in managing conflict, if not directly then at least indirectly in assisting the concerned colleagues in conflict situations.

The total number of hours per week is 282 divided by 88 respondents, resulting in 3.20 hours (or192.3 minutes) per person per week, which amounts to 6.7% of weekly working hours and 1.67% monthly working hours.

(Hotel staff work for 8hours a day, 6days in a week, resulting in 48 hours a week and 192 hours a month. 3.2/48x100=6.7% 3.2/192x 100=1.67%)

Building on the above analysis, it is possible that annual efficiency losses for hotels could amount to some kshs.1, 336,000. (1.67% x 800,000=1,336,000). This calculation is based on the assumption that the time wasted in conflict would have otherwise been used productively and that the amount of money spent on staff salaries per month is between kshs. 800,000 to kshs. 1 million. When compared with the results of similar surveys referred to in the theoretic part of this thesis, the total of 3.2 hours per week per person spent in dealing with badly managed conflict fall within the range assessed elsewhere.

Table 4.8 Wasted Times in Badly Managed Conflict

Frequency of conflict situation	Response count (YES)	Hours/ Week/ per person	Hours/ week (total)	Hours/ month (4weeks)
	%	FQ
1-2 times a year	22.7	20	1	20	20
Every 2-3 months	28.4	25	2	50	100
Once a month	31.8	28	4	112	448
Every week	11.4	10	6	60	360
Several times a week	5.7	5	8	40	160
TOTALS	100%	88		282	1088

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

4.5 STRATEGIES FOR MANAGING INTERPERSONAL CONFLICT.

To resolve a dispute means to turn opposed positions into a single outcome. The decision on which approach to take will impact on the costs of interpersonal conflict resolution, the outcome, the relationship and the possible recurrence of disputes. The survey requested respondents to explain their personal reaction when faced with conflict situations. The results indicated that, a majority 88.8% of the respondents were in agreement that they try to find a compromise when faced with a conflict, a minority 9.4% were in disagreement, while those in a neutral position were only 1.9%. 93.8% of the respondents were in agreement that they try to avoid conflict.3.1% were in disagreement while 3.1% were in a neutral position. In addition, 85% of the respondents were also in agreement that they prefer a competitive strategy when handling an interpersonal conflict, 9.4% disagreed, while 5.6% were in a neutral position. Only 12.5% of the respondents were in agreement that they collaborate with the party they are in interpersonal conflict with, and 23.1% of the respondents agreed that they use an accommodating strategy when faced with interpersonal conflict.

Table 4.9 shows that the strategies for managing interpersonal conflict were found to affect organisational performance, with the mean statistics of between 2.0 and 4.3 and standard deviation of between 0.7 and 1.3. Compromising, avoidance and competitive strategies had a mean statistics of between 4.1 and 4.3 which could imply that they are the strategies mostly used by the respondents when faced with an interpersonal conflict situation as the responses were skewed towards anchor 4 (agreed) based on the means. This could be attributed to the fact that goal differentiation between the departments makes the environment competitive as each department has its own goals to achieve, for instance the chef’s concern is primarily with quality of food prepared and that of service staff primarily with speed.

Collaborative and accommodating strategies had a mean statistics of between 2.0 and 2.1 which could imply that they are the strategies rarely used by the respondents when faced with an interpersonal conflict situation as the responses were skewed towards anchor 2 (disagreed) based on the means. The collaborative strategy employs and requires teamwork and cooperation to attain a mutually acceptable goal. While this style may be the most efficient one in achieving win-win solutions, it takes longer and requires that people put their individual needs aside for a common good, which is very difficult to achieve when parties are emotionally engrained in an interpersonal conflict situation.

TABLE 4.9 Strategies For Managing Interpersonal Conflict.

MEASUREMENTS	STATISTICS
STRATEGIES	Strongly agree 5	Agree 4	Neutral 3	Disagree 2	Strongly disagree 1	M	SD
	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%
Compromising	58	36.3	84	52.5	3	1.9	9	3.8	6	5.6	4.100	1.017
Avoidance	78	48.8	72	45.	5	3.1	4	2.5	1	0.6	4.388	0.727
Competitive	73	45.6	63	39.4	9	5.6	0	0	15	9.4	4.119	1.162
Collaborative	9	5.6	11	6.9	12	7.5	71	44.4	57	35.6	2.025	1.104
Accommodating	9	5.6	28	17.5	9	5.6	39	24.4	75	46.9	2.106	1.316

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

4.6 ORGANISATIONAL PERFORMANCE.

Organizational performance comprised the actual output or results of an organization as measured against its intended outputs. The study sought to establish the effect of managing interpersonal conflict on organisational performance. The Respondents were asked to indicate the extent to which they agreed that certain dimensions of performance were experienced in their organisations as a result of effectively managing interpersonal conflict. The attributes were analysed on a 5-point Likert scale to establish the level of agreement, where strongly agree was assigned 5 while strongly disagree was assigned 1. Table 4.9 displays a summary of the dimensions of organizational performance experienced in hotels as a result of effectively managing interpersonal conflict.

Majority of the respondents 85.7% were in agreement that increased profitability was experienced in the hotel, 8.8% were neutral, while only 5.7% were in disagreement on the same. 31.9% of the respondents strongly agreed that good company reputation was experienced, 45% also agreed, while 18.8% were neutral, 4.4% disagreed and none of the respondents strongly disagreed. In regard to increased guest satisfaction, 41.3% indicated that they strongly agreed, 45.6% agreed, only 5.6% remained neutral while 7.5% disagreed. This could be attributed to the fact that most of the respondents 81.9 % also pointed out that the hotel had repeat guests while only 16.3% were in disagreement. Therefore managing interpersonal conflict will not result in cases of reduced motivation of staff leading to lower quality products or services or mistakes that can even threaten clients’ lives. Instead Customers will not complain when they are satisfied with the services given thus leading to their satisfaction with the hotel. Satisfied customers will spread positive word of mouth about the hotel to others, thus increasing the hotel’s market share, and will definitely become repeat and loyal guests to the hotel. This will consequently increase the hotel’s profitability.

In relation to reduced absenteeism, a majority of the respondents 81.9% were in agreement, 4.4% were neutral while a minority 13.8 % were in disagreement. 25.6% of the respondents strongly agreed that Food and Beverage Outcomes efficiency was experienced, 49.4% also agreed, while 10% were neutral, 7.5 % disagreed and only 7.5% of the respondents strongly disagreed. In reference to whether there was improved productivity in the hotel, 53.8% of the respondents were in agreement, 37.6% of the respondents differed with them and another 8.8 % had a neutral position. 65% of the respondents were of the opinion that controlled variable outcomes was experienced in the hotel, however 20.7% of the respondents differed with them and another 14.4 % had a neutral position. This is attributed to the fact that effectively managing interpersonal conflict can result in constructive task conflict, which results in improved productivity and controlled variable outcomes by the staff. In addition, task conflicts have the potential to create value by stimulating creative thinking and divergent thought processes. Task conflict may help employees confront task-related issues, learn to take different perspectives, and address task-related inefficiencies.

Findings from the study deduce that well managed interpersonal conflict in an enabling environment allows for issues to be tabled and discussed with objective language. Each

party is empowered to state his or her position with confidence that the other party is genuinely listening, wanting to understand. Possible solutions are explored with open minds therefore improving organisational performance.

Table 4.10 shows that all the dimensions of organisational performance attained a mean statistic of between 3.2 and 4.3 with standard deviations of between 0.8 and 1.3. This could imply that the dimensions of organisational performance were significant as majority of the responses were skewed towards anchor 4 (agreed) based on the means.

Table 4.10 Dimensions of Organizational Performance

MEASUREMENTS	STATISTICS
Dimensions of performance	Strongly agree 5	Agree 4	Neutral 3	Disagree 2	Strongly disagree 1	M	SD
	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%	FQ	%
Increased profitability	90	56.3	47	29.4	14	8.8	2	1.3	7	4.4	4.319	0.999
Good company reputation	51	31.9	72	45	30	18.8	7	4.4	0	0	4.144	0.827
Increased guest satisfaction	66	41.3	73	45.6	9	5.6	12	7.5	0	0	4.206	0.855
Repeat guests	74	46.3	57	35.6	3	1.9	15	9.4	11	6.9	4.050	1.217
Reduced absenteeism	74	46.3	57	35.6	7	4.4	18	11.3	4	2.5	4.119	1.084
Food and Beverage Outcomes efficiency	41	25.6	79	49.4	16	10.0	12	7.5	12	7.5	3.781	1.136
Improved productivity	27	16.9	59	36.9	14	8.8	42	26.3	18	11.3	3.219	1.311
Controlled variable outcomes	43	26.9	61	38.1	23	14.4	18	11.3	15	9.4	3.619	1.253

Source: Survey Data, (2013)

4.7 Reliability Tests

Cronbach‘s alpha was used to test the reliability of the data collected. The highest value stood at 0.924 while the lowest value stood at 0.798. These results showed that the indicators used to measure the variables were reliable in explaining each of the variables under study because they were all above the 0.7 threshold. The independent variables for the study were relationship conflict, task conflict, outcomes of conflict and strategies to cope with conflict. Relationship conflict which was denoted as X1 had five indicators with a Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.879. Task conflict denoted as X2 with five indicators had a Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.880. Outcomes of conflict denoted as X3 with ten indicators had a Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.798. Strategies to cope with conflicts denoted as X4 with fourteen indicators had a Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.817 while the

dependent variable organizational performance (Y) with eight indicators had a Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.924. A summary of the results are illustrated in table 4.11 below.

Table 4.11: Reliability Results

Reliability Statistics

	N of items	Cronbach’s Alpha
Relationship conflict (X1)	5	0.879
Task conflict (X2)	5	0.880
Outcomes of conflict (X3)	10	0.798
Strategies to cope with conflicts (X4)	13	0.817
Organizational performance (Y)	8	0.924
All Variables (X1,X2,X3,X4,Y)	41	0.865

Source: Data Analysis, (2013)

4.8 Inferential Statistics

Inferential statistics deal with inferences about population based on results obtained from samples. This study employed multiple regression analysis to analyze the data obtained from sampled employees of various hotels in Kisii town.

4.8.1 Index Construction

Organizational performance which was the dependent variable was denoted as Y. Organizational performance was made up of eight indicators namely; the organization achieves profitability, has minimal staff turnover, controlled variable costs, has a good reputation, achieves food and beverage cost efficiency, has increase in guest satisfaction, reduced absenteeism and realizes improved productivity. These eight indicators were summed up and averaged to obtain organizational performance.

The independent variables were relationship conflict (X1), task conflict (X2), outcomes of conflict (X3) and strategies to cope with conflicts (X4). Each of these independent variables was made up of sub variables which were averaged to derive the main independent variables. The sub independent variables averaged to derive relationship conflict included: - there is friction among members of a department, there are personality clashes (conflicts) among members of a department, there are grudges (emotional conflict) among members in a department, and there is tension among members in a department.

Task conflict was made up by the average of the following indicators: - there are conflicts about ideas in a department, people in a department disagree about opinions, members of a department disagree about who should do what, members of a department disagree about the way to complete a group task, and there is conflict about delegation of tasks within a department.

The sub independent variables that constituted outcomes of conflict included: - reduced understanding of others at work, poor solutions to problems and challenges, poor working relationships are experienced, low performance in teams, bad ideas are produced, increase in employee turnover, people are forced to search for new approaches to managing conflicts, distance between people increases, there is no clarification of individual views, long-standing problems are not brought to the surface to be resolved.

Strategies to cope with the conflicts were derived from the average of the following sub independent variables including; avoiding the person in conflict with, conflicts are a waste of time, feeling angry and aggressive when faced with conflicts, discussing with co-workers in times of conflicts, listening and discussing with the person in interpersonal conflict with, going to the supervisor of the person in conflict with, discussing conflicts with people outside the organization, making jokes about the conflicts at the person’s expense, talking behind the person’s back, trying to find a compromise in times of conflicts, considering it to be necessary in order to make clear who really is in charge, defending myself and insisting on my rights, changing my mood and making me less friendly and less balanced, feeling burned-out because of interpersonal conflicts.

4.8.2 Model Summary

Table 4.12: Model Summary

Model	R	R Square	Adjusted R Square	Std. Error of the Estimate	Change Statistics	Durbin-Watson
					R Square Change	F Change	df1	df2	Sig. F Change
1	.734a	.539	.480	.606441	.539	18.641	4	155	.000	1.812
Predictors: (Constant), Relationship Conflict, Task Conflict, Outcomes of Conflict, Strategies. Dependent variable: Organisational performance Source: Survey data, 2013.

4.8.2.1 R square (R2)

The coefficient of multiple determination (R2) is by definition the proportion of total variation in the dependent variable (Y) explained by the multiple regression of say Y on X1 and X2 (Koutsoyiannis, 1993).

R2 was found to be 0.539. From this figure, it can be deduced that the multiple regression of Y on X1, X2, X3 and X4 explains 53.9% of the variations in the dependent variable. R2 of 53.9% implies the model is significant in studying organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town and that the model has captured the important variables. The rest of the variations (100 – 53.9) % can be attributed to factors included in the error term.

4.8.2.2 Adjusted R2

The adjusted R2 adjusts for the number of explanatory terms in a model. It increases only if the new term improves the model more than would be expected by chance. The adjusted R2 can be negative, and will always be less than or equal to R2.

The sample R2 tends to optimistically estimate how well the model fits the population. The model usually does not fit the population as well as it fits the sample from which it is derived. Adjusted R2 corrects R2 to more closely reflect the goodness of fit of the model in the population. R2 takes care of the fact that inclusion of more independent variables is likely to increase Regression Sum of Squares (RSS) for the same total sum of squares (TSS) and thus R2 is made to increase. To take into account the reduction in degrees of freedom as additional explanatory variables are added, Adjusted R2 is computed (Koutsoyiannis, 1993).

Adjusted R2 = 0.480. From this figure, it can be inferred that the multiple regression of organizational performance on X1, X2, X3 and X4 explains 48 % of total variations in Y.

4.8.3 Multiple Regression Analysis

Multiple regression analysis is used for testing hypothesis about the relationship between a dependent variable (Y) and two or more independent variables (Xs) (Koutsoyiannis, 1993)

The OLS method was chosen because according to Koutsoyiannis, (1993), the parameter estimates obtained from ordinary least squares (OLS) are unbiased, exhibit least variance, are efficient, Best Linear Unbiased (BLU), least mean square error (MSE) and sufficient.

Secondly, the computational procedure of OLS is fairly simple as compared with other statistical techniques and the data requirements are not excessive. Thirdly, the least squares method has been used in a wide range of relationships with fairly satisfactory results. Fourthly, the mechanics of least squares are simple to understand.

A regression analysis of Y (organizational performance) against X1 (relationship conflict), X2 (task conflict), X3 (outcomes of conflict) and X4 (strategies) was done and the results are summarized in tables 4.10 and 4.11 below.

The regression function adopted for the purposes of this study was given as;

Y = βo + β1X1 + β2X2 + β3X3 + β4X4 + εi

Where Y – Organizational performance

X1 – Relationship conflict

X2 – Task conflict

X3 – Outcomes of Conflict

X4 – Strategies to cope with conflict

βo – Constant term

βis– Regression Coefficients

εi – Stochastic error term

The assumptions of this model includes;-

εi is normally distributed with mean zero and variance δ2-, denoted as

εi ~ N (0, δ2)

(Assumption of homoscedacity or constant variance)

Xi is measured without error. (X is fixed)

The error terms are uncorrelated such that cov (εi, εi) = 0 for i≠j (Koutsoyiannis, 1993).

Table 4.13: Regression Coefficients

Model	Unstandardized Coefficients	Standardized Coefficients	t	Sig.	95% Confidence Interval for B	Correlations	Collinearity Statistics
	B	Std. Error	Beta			Lower Bound	Upper Bound	Zero-order	Partial	Part	Tolerance	VIF
1	(Constant)	.574	.397		1.445	.151	-.213	1.361
	Relationship Conflict	-.185	.085	.195	2.176	.032	.017	.353	-.143	-.202	-.160	.671	1.490
	Task Conflict Outcomes of Conflict	-.058 -.002	.025 .101	.071 .002	2.320 .018	.000 .986	-.031 -.198	.257 .202	-.201 -.053	-.251 -.002	-.179 -.001	.573 .675	1.500 1.482
	Strategies	.239	.075	.325	3.203	.002	.091	.387	.534	.291	.235	.524	1.907

a. Dependent Variable: Organizational Performance

Source: Survey Data, 2013.

The regression equation

Yi = βo + β1X1 + β2X2 + β3X3 + β4X4 + εi

Yi= 0.574 – 0.185X1 – 0.058X2 – 0.002X3 + 0.239X4 + εi

From the above model, it is clear that there exist a negative relationship between organizational performance (Y) and relationship conflict (X1), task conflict (X2) and outcomes of conflict (X3) and positive relationship between the Organisational Performance (Y) and strategies to cope with conflicts (X4).

was the sample parameter estimate of the population parameter

. It shows that when relationship conflict goes up by one unit percentage, organizational performance declines by 18.5%. It follows then that a unit increase in relationship conflicts in terms of there being friction among members of a department, personality clashes (conflicts) among members of a department, grudges (emotional conflict) among members in a department, and tension among members in a department would decrease organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town by 18.5%.

Was the sample parameter estimate of the population parameter β2. It shows that when task conflict goes up by one unit percentage, organizational performance declines by 5.8 %. It follows then that a unit increase in task conflicts in terms of there being conflicts about ideas in a department, people in a department disagree about opinions, members of a department disagree about who should do what, members of a department disagree about the way to complete a group task, and conflict about delegation of tasks within a department would decrease organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town by 5.8%.

The estimate

tells us that when outcomes of conflict go up by a unit percentage, organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town declines by 0.2%. Thus a one percent upsurge in the level of outcomes of conflict in hotels in Kisii town which includes aspects such as reduced understanding of others at work, poor solutions to problems and challenges, poor working relationships are experienced, low performance in teams, bad ideas are produced, increase in employee turnover, people are forced to search for new approaches to managing conflicts, distance between people increases, there is no clarification of individual views, long-standing problems are not brought to the surface to be resolved will generate 0.2% decline in organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town.

was the sample parameter estimate of the true parameter β4. From the figure, it can be deduced that a one percentage improvement in strategies to deal with internal conflicts arising in hotels in Kisii town would bring about a 23.9% improvement in organizational performance of the hotels in the town. Indeed, a unit improvement in strategies would encompass all the sub variables that made it up including avoiding the person in conflict with, conflicts are a waste of time, feeling angry and aggressive when faced with conflicts, discussing with co-workers in times of conflicts, listening and discussing with the person in interpersonal conflict with, going to the supervisor of the person in conflict with, discussing conflicts with people outside the organization, making jokes about the conflicts at the person’s expense, talking behind the person’s back, trying to find a compromise in times of conflicts, considering it to be necessary in order to make clear who really is in charge, defending myself and insisting on my rights, changing my mood and making me less friendly and less balanced, feeling burned-out because of interpersonal conflicts. The deductions above about the signs of the parameter estimates are further supported by the results of the partial correlation coefficients.

4.2.2.1 Correlation

Partial correlation coefficient is by definition; “The measure of strength of the relationship between the criterion or dependent variable and a single predictor variable when the effects of the other predictor variables in the model are held constant” (Johnson and Bhattacharyya, 1973). Partial correlation coefficient is used to identify the independent variable with the greatest incremental predictive power beyond the predictor variables already in the regression model. The results of the partial correlation coefficient for this study are summarized as below;

rYX1.X2X3X4 = -.202

rYX2.X1X3X4 = -.251

rYX3.X1X2X4 = -.002

rYX4.X1X2X3 = .291

The figures reveal that strategy to deal with conflict is the most important determinant of organizational performance among the studied employees of hotels in Kisii town. This is evident by the large partial correlation coefficient between the two variables; rYX4.X2X1X3= 0.291. Strategies are closely followed in importance by task conflict, though in the inverse direction, in the determination of organizational performance of selected hotels in Kisii town, with partial correlation coefficient of rYX2.X1X3X4 = -0.251. The third most important factor in the determination of organizational performance was relationship conflict with a partial correlation coefficient of rYX1.X2X3X4 = -0.202. Of the four independent variables, outcomes of conflict ranked lowest in determination of organizational performance among the sampled employees of hotels in Kisii town with a partial correlation coefficient of rYX3.X1X2X4 = -0.002. To improve the organizational performance of hotels in Kisii, more emphasis should be put improving strategies to cope with costs, followed by alleviation of task conflicts, relationship conflicts and finally outcomes of conflicts.

4.8.4 Tests of Research Hypotheses

In order to test the four stated hypotheses, statistical significance of parameter estimates were established and thus enabling the researcher to establish the significance of the variables in the model and therefore their relative importance in determining the dependent variable.

The 95% confidence interval for the estimation of

ranged between 0.017 and 0.353 for the lower and upper bound respectively with

. The true population parameter would lie in this range on 95 occasions out of one hundred occasions this parameter is estimated. The standard error of the estimate stood at 0.085. This is a small value in relation to the regression coefficient which implies a reliable prediction of

. The standard error is the estimate of how much the regression coefficient will vary between samples of the same size taken from the same population; that is, if one was to take multiple samples of the same size from the same population and use them to calculate the regression equation, this would be an estimate of how much the regression coefficient would vary from sample to sample. (Koutsoyiannis, 1993).

H01 The type of interpersonal conflict does not significantly affect organizational performance.

The sample estimate

was found to be statistically significant at 5 % level with 155 degrees of freedom with t

= 2.176. Clearly therefore, relationship conflict is a significant determinant of performance of hotels in Kisii town. With this result, the hypothesis is rejected that relationship conflict has no effect on organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town. This is because the calculated value of t

=2.176 was greater than the critical value of tα = 1.445.

which is the coefficient that relates performance to task conflict stood at

. The 95% confidence interval for the estimation of the parameter ranged between -0.031 to 0.257 for the lower and upper bounds respectively. The standard error of the estimate, S

= 0.025, was small with regards to the size of the parameter estimate and thus pointing to reliable estimation of

.Task conflict (X2) was found to be statistically significant at 5% level of significance with 155 degrees of freedom with t2= 2.320. With this result, the hypothesis is rejected that task conflict has no effect on organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town. This is because the calculated value of t2 =2.320 was greater than the critical value of tα = 1.445.

was the coefficient that linked organizational performance to outcomes of conflict among the sampled employees of hotels in Kisii town. The 95% confidence interval for the estimation of this coefficient lied between -0.198 for the lower bound and 0.202 for the upper bound. The standard error for the estimate was S

= 0.101. This figure of the standard error was big in relation to the parameter estimator implying unreliable estimation of the coefficient. Outcomes of conflict was found to be statistically insignificant at 5% level of significance with 155 degrees of freedom with t

= 0.018. With this result, the hypothesis is accepted that outcomes of conflict have no effect on organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town. This is because the calculated value of t

= 0.018 was less than the critical value of tα = 1.445.

H02 Strategies adopted for managing interpersonal conflict do not significantly affect organisational performance.

The 95% confidence interval for the estimation of β4 ranged between 0.091 and 0.387 for the lower and upper bound respectively with

. The true population parameter would lie in this range on 95 occasions out of one hundred occasions this parameter is estimated. The standard error of the estimate stood at 0.075. This is a small value in relation to the regression coefficient which implies a more reliable prediction of β4. The sample estimate

was found to be statistically significant at 1 % level with 155 degrees of freedom with t4= 3.203. Therefore, strategies to cope with conflicts were a significant determinant of organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town. With this result, the hypothesis is rejected that strategies to cope with conflicts have no effect on performance of hotels in Kisii town. This is because the calculated value of t4= 3.203 was greater than the critical value of tα = 1.445.

According to Koutsoyiannis (1993), the greater the value of t, the stronger is the evidence that

is significant. He goes on to note that for a number of degrees of freedom greater than 8 the critical value of t at 5% level of significance for the rejection of the null hypothesis is two (2). The inference that can be made in light of the statements above with regards to this study is that strategy to cope with conflict is the most important factor in the determination of organizational performance of hotel establishments, followed albeit in the negative direction by task conflict, relationship outcomes and finally outcomes of conflict respectively.

CHAPTER FIVE

SUMMARY OF FINDINGS, DISCUSSION, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS

5.0 Overview

The chapter presents discussions, conclusions, recommendations and Areas for further research for the study.

5.1 Discussions

5.1.1 Types of Interpersonal Conflict and Organizational Performance.

According to the research findings, there exist friction, personality clashes, grudges (emotional conflict) and tension among members in their department. This finding concur with the literature’s definition of relationship conflict as a conflict that is focused on interpersonal incompatibilities among group members and may include personality differences as well as differences of opinion and preferences regarding non-task issues (Jehn, 1995). In addition, relationship conflict could also be thought of as an awareness of personality clashes, interpersonal tension, or conflict characterized by anger, frustration, and uneasiness. As such, relationship conflict is defined as “interpersonal incompatibilities among group members which typically includes tension, animosity, and annoyance among members within a group” (Jehn & Mannix, 2001).

All the indicators of relationship conflict attained a low standard deviation indicating that the values were close to the mean thus falling within the range of expected values. According to Ulrich (2005) the means of a group of items can be related to the anchor on the Likert scale, this could therefore imply that relationship conflict is experienced in the hotel and could affect organizational performance. Additionally, Results from the regression model shows that there exist a negative relationship between organizational performance and relationship conflict. These study findings are consistent with propositions by Jehn, (1995) who opined that relationship conflict is uniformly considered to negatively relate to performance, and has a more adverse effect than task conflict. This was based on the rationale that in the presence of relationship conflict, arousal and cognitive load increases, which in turn affects cognitive flexibility and creative thinking and decreases performance. Further, De Dreu & Weingart, (2003) believe that employees who experience relationship conflict often spend most of their time and effort resolving interpersonal problems. As such, they mobilize less energy and fewer resources to deal with task-related issues, which lead to process losses. Additionally, there is a rare unanimity about the consequences of relationship conflict. In virtually every instance examined empirically, the emergence of relationship conflict has been shown to be detrimental to performance (De Dreu & Weingart, 2003). The harm induced by relationship conflict appears at both the individual and group level (Jehn & Bendersky, 2003) and includes reduced productivity (Wall & Nolan, 1986), reduced creativity (Amabile, Conti, Coon, Lazenby, & Herron, 1996), and reduced satisfaction within the members of a group or a department (Jehn et al., 1999). Together, these studies show that the presence of relationship conflict should provide highly diagnostic information about its ability to perform well and its effect on organizational performance.

In the study relationship conflict was found to be a significant determinant of organizational performance hence the rejection of the hypothesis: relationship conflict has no effect on organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town.

Based on the study findings, it can be deduced that there are conflicts about ideas in the departments, people in their department disagree about opinions and on who should do what. Members of the department disagreed about the way to complete a group task and that there is conflict about delegation of tasks within the department.These findings are in conformity to Jehn and Bendersky (2003) definition of task conflict, which states that task conflict is focused on the substantive issues associated with the group’s task and can involve differences in viewpoints, ideas, or opinions. Task conflict may also involve the discussion or awareness of different preferences or approaches to a task. More formally, task conflict is defined as “disagreements among group members about the content of tasks being performed, including differences in viewpoints, ideas, and opinions” (Jehn, 1995). These findings on task conflict are further supported by the research findings on the causes of interpersonal conflict, which showed that that there is no clarity of roles and responsibilities in the hotels and that there is heavy workloads in the organizations.

Moreover, results from the regression model show that there exist a negative relationship between organizational performance and task conflict. This implies that task conflict is experienced in the hotels and it affects organizational performance. These findings are consistent with researchers (Amason, 1996; Nemeth, 1986; Tjosvold, 1991; Triandis, Marin, Lisansky, & Betancourt, 1984) who conform to the more traditional view of task conflict, who contend that task conflict may be detrimental to performance. This is based on the rationale that the tension and antagonism that can result from task conflict, may further distract from the task. However, it differs with the more contemporary position in the interpersonal conflict literature that has emerged within the last ten years or so. These recent conflict researchers (Jehn, Northcraft, &Neale, 1999) believe that task conflicts have the potential to create value by stimulating creative thinking and divergent thought processes. Task conflict may help employees confront task-related issues, learn to take different perspectives, and address task-related inefficiencies. Conceptually, they suggested that task conflict is positively related to performance.

In the study task conflict was found to be a significant determinant of organizational performance hence the rejection of the hypothesis: task conflict has no effect on organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town.

It can thus be deduced from the study findings that both task and relationship conflicts occur in the hotels. This could be attributed to the interdependent nature of hotels and interpersonal incompatibilities among hotel staff, including personality differences as well as differences of opinion and preferences regarding non-task and task issues. Task and relationship conflict can also share some conceptual overlap, as each type of conflict may affect the other. Task conflict may turn into relationship conflict if perceived as a personal disagreement.

On the levels of interpersonal conflict experienced in the hotels, the study findings indicated that horizontal interpersonal conflict is experienced more in the hotels as compared to vertical interpersonal conflict. These findings on levels of interpersonal conflict are further supported by the study findings on the causes of interpersonal conflict, which showed that the main cause of interpersonal conflict in the organizations was due to interdependence with other departments, this is consistent with Hornsey (1986) who suggested that the prevalence of interdepartmental conflict in hotels seems to be one of the distinctive features of their operation. The level of interdependence between departments in many situations is necessarily high if the customer is to receive a satisfactory service. A number of studies by Slaikeu and Hasson (1998) have indicated that where there are high perceived levels of interdependence between departments then interdepartmental interpersonal conflict tends to increase and it affects organizational performance. Interdependence in hospitality situations is caused by the nature of work flows; the product or service that the customer receives is the outcome of close and often immediate cooperation between two or more departments. Coupled with this, the time requirements for coordination are very short compared with other industries. In fact, they can often be measured in minutes or seconds.

Furthermore, the study findings indicated that interpersonal conflict between co-workers was experienced; this could be because of scarce resources that were also cited as another cause of interpersonal conflict. This reiterates earlier findings of Henry (2009), which stated that employees compete in organization because of limited resources. This competition can take the form of financial, promotion, manpower equipment, etc. According to Rajinder (2002) goal differentiation between the parties, environment, rewards and Status and stigma are other cause of interpersonal conflict in hotels.

It can be inferred from the research findings that there is low vertical interpersonal conflict being experienced in the hotels. This could be due to the fact that poor leadership by their managers was not cited as a major cause of interpersonal conflict. This point is further illustrated by Brewer N, Mitchell P, and Weber N, (2002), who posit that in vertical conflict; apparently individuals in lower organizational level seek to avoid conflicts with higher hierarchical levels.

Pondy (1992) observed that it is expected that the top management peers perceive more conflict internally between their groups than those of lower position. This happens because of various reasons: Firstly people in higher hierarchical level, rather than the lower ones, are engaged in non-routine activities and development of politics, where orientation for the actions are less clear and chances for disagreement, bigger and; secondly, people in higher hierarchical level, rather than the lower ones, are probably less flexible in their points of view. Hence conflict resolution is more difficult, as a result negatively affecting organizational performance

5.1.2 Outcomes of Interpersonal Conflict and Organizational Performance.

On the objective of investigating how outcomes of conflict affects organizational performance of hotels, the findings from the study indicated that all the listed outcomes of Interpersonal conflict such as reduced understanding of others at work, poor solutions to problems and challenges, poor working relationships are experienced, low performance in teams, bad ideas are produced, increase in employee turnover, people are forced to search for new approaches to managing conflicts, distance between people increases, there is no clarification of individual views and long-standing problems are not brought to the surface to be resolved, negatively affected organizational performance .These findings also conform to the arguments of McClure, (2000) who opined that unmanaged or badly managed interpersonal conflict is detrimental not only to the working relationship, but also to those with whom they work, as energy is used in fuelling the interpersonal conflict rather than in furthering the performance of the individuals or of the team. Moreover, reduced motivation of staff can lead to lower quality products or services or mistakes that can threaten clients’ lives.

However findings from the regression analysis indicated that outcomes of interpersonal conflict negatively affect organizational performance of hotels but by only a small decline. Consequently the hypothesis was accepted that outcomes of conflict have no effect on organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town. These findings are consistence with Taylor, 2008; Watson, & Hoffman, (1996) who suggested that interpersonal conflicts can either be constructive or destructive in nature. Disagreement occurs even in the best working relationship and challenging another’s ideas can strengthen an outcome. The right kind of friction and constructive confrontation and arguments over ideas in an atmosphere of mutual respect can help any organization and has the potential to drive greater performance and creativity and help produce major improvement in productivity.

5.1.3 Strategies for Managing Interpersonal Conflict and Organizational Performance.

On the objective of establishing the effects of the strategies used to manage interpersonal conflict on organizational performance, the research findings pointed out that one strategy is not sufficient for managing interpersonal conflict as different interpersonal conflict cases need to be managed differently for positive improvement in performance to be seen. Accordingly, based on the research findings, avoidance was the most frequently used strategy to manage interpersonal conflict and improve the hotels performance. This could be because avoidance is a natural response of many people to interpersonal conflict. The prospect of dealing with the complexity of interpersonal conflict is often overwhelming and leads to the natural response to do nothing. While doing nothing or at least initially delaying a reaction can be helpful, avoidance, though often built on legitimate feelings such as fear, intimidation or anger carries great potential to aggravate the interpersonal conflict (Kellner, 2000). As a result, those who deny interpersonal conflict and its reasons risk indirectly contributing to interpersonal conflict escalation which consequently affects the hotels performance negatively. These findings also conform to the arguments of McClure, (2000) who opined that conflict should not be avoided, hoping it will go away. The participants should be asked to describe specific actions they would like the other party to take. It would also be beneficial to have a third party (meaning a non-direct superior with access to the situation) involved. This could be an individual member or a board dedicated to resolving and preventing issues.

Compromising as a strategy is an inherent part of any interpersonal conflict resolution if the organizational performance is to be improved. While compromise often reflects personal perceptions it can also be objective, such as dividing money in half. This style is often chosen by those who wish to avoid the emotional aspects of interpersonal conflict management. Relying on this approach however results in both parties’ needs not being fully met, thus affecting the performance of the organization. According to Rahim (2002) compromising involves give-and-take whereby both parties give up something to make a mutually acceptable decision. However this strategy is only appropriate when both parties involved in the conflict are powerful and when the problem is not complex. This point is further illustrated by Brewer N, Mitchell P, and Weber N, (2002), who suggested that an Integration strategy be used in complex situations and when one party is weak as it involves openness, exchanging information, looking for alternatives, and examining differences so as to solve the problem in a manner that is acceptable to both parties.

Competitive strategy was ranked third. This could be attributed to the fact that goal differentiation between the departments makes the environment competitive as each department has its own goals to achieve, for instance the chef’s concern is primarily with quality of food prepared and that of service staff primarily with speed. These finding are illustrated by Weinstein (2001) who contends that competitive strategy is about achieving one’s goal. He argues that while a competitive style is indeed about winning and losing, competitive people are not necessarily aggressive or adversarial, often view competition as a sport and does not necessarily have the intention to harm others. However, for others who do not share this perception, competitive people can be quite threatening. A competitive style can be a valid strategy when what is under discussion is too important to risk such as customer satisfaction which subsequently can affect organizational performance. However this findings did not conform to the arguments of Renner (2007) who opined that in a hospitality establishment a competitive strategy should not be encouraged as both parties have to work together for the satisfaction of the guest and when personal conflict leads to frustration and loss of efficiency, counselling may prove to be a helpful antidote.

Accommodating and Collaborative strategies were ranked last as the least favourite strategies used. This could be because collaborative strategy employs and requires teamwork and cooperation to attain a mutually acceptable goal. While this style may be the most efficient one in achieving win-win solutions, it takes longer and requires that people put their individual needs aside for a common good, which is very difficult to achieve when parties are emotionally engrained in an interpersonal conflict situation. In the same vein, Accommodating strategy consists of capitulating in order to gain or maintain something else of value such as relationships. According to Thomas and Kilmann (2008) while accommodation can be a necessary step in resolving interpersonal conflicts, there is a risk that accommodation masks the problematic issues with a short-lived feel-good agreement. Consequently, most of the respondents do not prefer using these strategies as it negatively affects organizational performance.

The findings of this study signify a positive relationship between Strategies adopted for managing interpersonal conflict and organizational performance, hence a rejection of the hypothesis: Strategies adopted for managing interpersonal conflict do not significantly affect organizational performance.

5.2 Summary of Findings

A regression analysis of organizational performance against relationship conflict, task conflict, outcomes of conflict and strategies to deal with conflicts was done and the results indicated that there existed a negative relationship between organizational performance and relationship conflict, task conflict and outcomes of conflict and positive relationship between the Organizational Performance and strategies to manage conflicts. The deductions above about the signs of the parameter estimates were further supported by the results of the partial correlation coefficients.

Partial correlation coefficient was used to identify the independent variable with the greatest incremental predictive power beyond the predictor variables already in the regression model. The figures revealed that strategy to deal with conflict was the most important determinant of organizational performance among the studied employees of hotels in Kisii town. The strategies to deal with conflicts were closely followed in importance by task conflict, though in the inverse direction, in the determination of organizational performance of selected hotels in Kisii town. The third most important factor in the determination of organizational performance was relationship conflict and of the four independent variables, outcomes of conflict ranked lowest in determination of organizational performance among the sampled employees of hotels in Kisii town.

The partial correlation coefficients of the variables in the study were both positive and negative which was in agreement with the conceptual framework that such aspects as types of interpersonal conflict and outcomes of interpersonal conflict contribute negatively to organizational performance while strategies for managing conflict contribute positively to organizational performance. It was therefore concluded that to improve the organizational performance of hotels in Kisii, more emphasis should be put on improving strategies to cope with costs, followed by alleviation of task conflicts, relationship conflicts and finally outcomes of conflicts.

Four null hypotheses were tested using the T- test; three were rejected while one was accepted.

Table 5.1: Summary of results of hypotheses testing

HYPOTHESES

	STATEMENT	RESULTS
H01:	Relationship conflict has no effect on organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town.	REJECTED
H02:	Task conflict has no effect on organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town.	REJECTED
H03:	Outcomes of conflict have no effect on organizational performance of hotels in Kisii town.	ACCEPTED
H04:	Strategies adopted for managing interpersonal conflict do not significantly affect organizational performance.	REJECTED

Source: Regression analysis, 2013

5.3 Conclusion.

From the research findings, conclusions can be drawn based on the independent variables; types of interpersonal conflict, outcomes of conflict and strategies used to manage interpersonal conflict and their effects on the dependent variable organizational performance. An improvement in the management of interpersonal conflict through the use of the right strategies would likely result into improved organizational performance.

First, types of interpersonal conflict affect organizational performance. This conclusion is drawn from the fact that the findings from the study pointed out that relationship and task conflict negatively affected the performance of the hotels. It was noted that relationship conflict has a more adverse effect on performance than task conflict. Further, the research findings indicated that horizontal interpersonal conflict is frequently experienced in the hotels when compared to vertical interpersonal conflict.

Secondly, outcomes of interpersonal conflict do not affect organizational performance. This conclusion is drawn from the fact that although the research findings showed that outcomes from unmanaged or badly managed interpersonal conflict were detrimental to the performance of the hotels, the extent to which the organizational performance was affected was insignificant. In addition, the regression results indicated that outcomes of interpersonal conflict negatively affect organizational performance of hotels but by only a small decline.

Finally, strategies for managing interpersonal conflict effect organizational performance. This conclusion is drawn from the fact that the research findings pointed out that one strategy is not sufficient for managing interpersonal conflict as different interpersonal conflict cases need to be managed differently for positive improvement in performance to be seen. Furthermore, the regression results indicated a positive relationship between Strategies adopted for managing interpersonal conflict and organizational performance.

5.4 Recommendations

Based on the findings from this study, the researcher recommends the following:

Efforts should be made by the managers to occasionally stimulate constructive task conflict by encouraging divergent views and rewarding staff and department for outstanding performance while relationship conflict should be completely prevented.

Outcomes of interpersonal conflict should not be overlooked by managers and accounted for as part of the normal outcomes of doing business but should be minimized by clarifying to staff at large where to go for advice in case of conflict and build peer-support structure of conflict advisors.

Managers should develop diverse but appropriate strategies to resolve and manage conflicts as they arise before escalating to unmanageable level.

Proper communication procedures should be put in place to resolve conflict. For instance, when any disagreements arise among the employees, it should be reported to the management and then management should get statements from the parties involved, brainstorm the issue and make recommendation on how to resolve the conflict.

Efforts should be made by the management to organize in house training/ seminars/workshops on organizational conflict management from time to time for the employees .This will enable employees learn about conflict and how it can be effectively managed for individual and organization effectiveness.

Lastly managers should review existing rules and procedures for their impact on the hotel’s conflict culture, i.e. do they sanction and suppress conflict or do they invite dealing with conflict in a constructive way.

5.5 Areas for further research

1. Using the DUTCH as a measurement instrument to assess an individual’s conflict management strategies.

2. Investigate work–family conflict in females working in the hospitality industry.

3. Assess the effect of other types of conflict on organizational performance.

4. Examine the effects of relationship and task conflict on team performance.

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APPENDICES

Appendix I: Cover Letter

Dear respondent,

I am a student undertaking a Master of Philosophy degree in Hospitality Management, Moi University. As part of my studies, I am carrying out a research on “ Effects of interpersonal conflict on organisational performance . A survey of selected hotels in Kisii” You have been chosen to participate in the named research as a respondent.

The research is being carried out using questionnaire with the sole objective of identifying the effects of interpersonal conflicts on organisational performance. It will also examine how hotel staff approach interpersonal conflict management in the workplace, sources and outcomes of interpersonal conflict and to propose measures which would assist in improving interpersonal conflict management in hotels in order to improve performance.

The data provided through this research will allow hotels to review their current interpersonal conflict management system and inform their future reform. It will also enable organisational members to select and use the appropriate styles of handling interpersonal conflict so that various situations can be effectively dealt with.

Any information you give is purely intended for academic purposes and was handled with utmost confidentiality. Your contribution, participation and co-operation was highly appreciated. Thank you.

Yours Faithfully,

EUNICE MUKOLWE

Appendix II: STAFF’S QUESTIONNAIRE.

Questionnaire Number

SECTION A: Personal information of the respondent.

Please tick where appropriate:

Gender

Male [ ]

Female [ ]

Age in years

18-25 [ ]

26-40 [ ]

Above 40 [ ]

Academic qualifications

Primary [ ]

Secondary [ ]

College [ ]

University [ ]

Job title

Junior staff [ ]

Supervisor [ ]

Manager [ ]

Duration of employment

below 5 year [ ]

6-10 years [ ]

above 10 [ ]

years

Department

Housekeeping [ ]

Front office [ ]

Food & Bev [ ]

Specify any other:

SECTION B: TYPES OF INTERPERSONAL CONFLICT IN HOTELS.

1 How frequently do you face interpersonal conflict situations at work?

Frequency of conflict situation

YES

NO

1-2 times a year

Every 2-3 months

Once a month

Every week

Several times a week

Others specify....................................

2. Please tick on the below table people that you have had interpersonal conflict with in the hotel.

With whom have you ever had interpersonal conflict(s) at work with?

Always

5

Often

4

Sometimes

3

Rarely

2

Never

1

A

My manager

B

My supervisor

C

My co-workers

D

A workmate of a lower hierarchical level

E

Workers from other departments

Others specify....................................

4. Using the scale provided, tick to what extent do you agree that the following statements pertaining to your department in the hotel?

a)

Statements(relationship conflict)

Strongly disagree

5

Disagree

4

Neutral

3

Agree

2

Strongly

Agree

1

A

There is friction among members in my department

B

There are personality clashes(conflicts) among members in my department

C

There are grudges (emotional conflict) among members in my department

D

There is tension among members in my department

b)

Statements (task conflict)

Strongly disagree

5

Disagree

4

Neutral

3

Agree

2

Strongly

Agree

1

A

There are conflicts about ideas in my department

B

People in my department disagree about opinions

C

Members of my department disagree about who should do what

D

Members of my department disagree about the way to complete a group task

E

There is conflict about delegation of tasks within my department

4. using the scale provided, tick the extent to which you agree that the following statements occur in your hotel?

Statements (Common causes of IC)

Strongly disagree

5

Disagree

4

Neutral

3

Agree

2

Strongly

Agree

1

A

There is poor leadership by my manager

B

Unfair treatment is practiced in the hotel

C

Individual differences exist with my workmates

D

There is poor Communication.

E

Disagreements arise from tips and other rewards

F

There is lack of honesty, openness and trust

G

There is no clarity of roles and responsibilities

H

There is heavy workloads

I

The shifts are long

J

There is job stress

K

There is competition between colleagues

L

There is Interdependence with other departments

M

Lack of cooperation is evident among employees

N

Lack of resources creates pressure

O

There is no recognition,

Others specify....................................

SECTION C: OUTCOMES OF INTERPERSONAL CONFLICT IN THE ORGANISATION.

4. Using the scale provided, tick the extent to which you agree that the following outcomes are experienced as a result of interpersonal conflict in your organisation.

Outcomes

Strongly disagree

1

Disagree

2

Neutral

3

Agree

4

Strongly

Agree

5

Reduces understanding of others at work

Poor solutions to problems and challenges are derived

Poor working relationships are experienced

There is low performance in teams

Bad ideas are produced

An increase in employee turnover.

People are forced to search for new approaches to managing conflicts

The distance between people increases

There is no clarification of individual views

Long-standing problems are not brought to the surface to be resolved

Others specify....................................

SECTION D: STRATEGIES FOR MANAGING INTERPERSONAL CONFLICT IN THE ORGANISATION

Using the scale provided, tick to indicate the extent to which you agree on the following reactions to interpersonal conflict in your organisation.

How do you react to interpersonal conflict at work?

Strongly disagree

5

Disagree

4

Neutral

3

Agree

2

Strongly

Agree

1

I avoid the person I am in conflict with.

Conflicts are a waste of time

I feel angry and aggressive when faced with conflicts

I discuss with co-workers in times of conflicts

I listen and discuss with the person I had interpersonal conflict with.

I go to the supervisor of the person I am in conflict with.

I discuss conflicts with people outside the organization.

I make jokes about the conflicts at the person’s expense.

I talk behind the person’s back.

I try to find a compromise in times of conflicts

I consider it to be necessary order to make clear who really is in charge

I defend myself and insist on my rights

It changes my mood and makes me less friendly and less balanced.

I feel burned-out because of interpersonal conflicts

6 a) Using the scale provided, tick to indicate the extent to which you agree that you have discussed conflict with the following people.

With whom did you discuss the interpersonal conflict situation?

Strongly disagree

1

Disagree

2

Neutral

3

Agree

4

Strongly

agree

5

I discuss with co-workers.

I discuss with the person I had interpersonal conflict with.

My human resource manager

My spouse, partner,

Family members at home

A professional outside the hotel

The supervisor of the person I had the interpersonal conflict with

Staff Welfare leader

A mediator

A lawyer

My manager

Head of department

Others, specify…………………………………………………………………………………

b) When discussing the interpersonal conflict, did you ever ask directly for help in finding a solution?

1. Yes ( ) 2. No ( )

c) In your opinion how frequently did you get the assistance you asked for?

Always ( ) 2. Yes, sometimes ( ) 3. No, Never ( )

Using the scale provided, tick to indicate how true each statement is of your reaction to interpersonal conflict in the organization.

When interpersonal conflict occurs in our hotel, I tend to . . .

Strongly disagree

5

Disagree

4

Neutral

3

Agree

2

Strongly

agree

1

I disagree with colleagues without becoming angry.

I openly share relevant information with colleagues, rather than secretively withhold it.

I go directly to the person with whom I am in interpersonal conflict to resolve it.

I get together with my colleagues to resolve the interpersonal conflict cooperatively.

I avoid dealing with interpersonal conflict directly by complaining to others.

I take personal responsibility for resolving interpersonal conflicts to the mutual satisfaction of all parties.

I work together with my colleagues to find an agreeable solution.

I Withhold information that may be needed by others.

I get someone else to take care of solving the interpersonal conflict for me.

I approach interpersonal conflict as a competition to be won.

I engage in gossip and feed the rumour mill.

SECTION E: Organizational performance.

Using the scale provided, indicate the extent to which you agree that the following dimensions of performance are experienced in the hotel as a result of managing interpersonal conflict.

Dimensions of performance

Strongly disagree

1

Disagree

2

Neutral

3

Agree

4

Strongly

Agree

5

We achieve profitability

We have reduced staff turnover

We controlled variable outcomes

Our company has good reputation

We achieve food and beverage outcomes efficiency

There is increase in guest satisfaction

Reduced absenteeism is characteristic of our organization

There realize improved productivity

Others, specify ………………………………………………………………

Type of conflict

Task conflict

Relationship conflict

Vertical interpersonal conflict

Horizontal interpersonal conflict

vertical interpersonal conflict

vertical interpersonal conflict

Outcomes of conflict

Outcomes to the client

Outcomes to the employee

Outcomes to the organisation

Organisational performance

Customer dimension

Employee dimension

Internal process dimension

Financial dimension

Strategies for managing conflict

Competitive

Collaboration

Accommodation

Avoiding

Compromising

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Gender	Male [ ]	Female [ ]
Age in years	18-25 [ ]	26-40 [ ]	Above 40 [ ]
Academic qualifications	Primary [ ]	Secondary [ ]	College [ ]	University [ ]
Job title	Junior staff [ ]	Supervisor [ ]	Manager [ ]
Duration of employment	below 5 year [ ]	6-10 years [ ]	above 10 [ ] years
Department	Housekeeping [ ]	Front office [ ]	Food & Bev [ ]	Specify any other:

	With whom have you ever had interpersonal conflict(s) at work with?	Always 5	Often 4	Sometimes 3	Rarely 2	Never 1
A	My manager
B	My supervisor
C	My co-workers
D	A workmate of a lower hierarchical level
E	Workers from other departments

a)	Statements(relationship conflict)	Strongly disagree 5	Disagree 4	Neutral 3	Agree 2	Strongly Agree 1
A	There is friction among members in my department
B	There are personality clashes(conflicts) among members in my department
C	There are grudges (emotional conflict) among members in my department
D	There is tension among members in my department

b)	Statements (task conflict)	Strongly disagree 5	Disagree 4	Neutral 3	Agree 2	Strongly Agree 1
A	There are conflicts about ideas in my department
B	People in my department disagree about opinions
C	Members of my department disagree about who should do what
D	Members of my department disagree about the way to complete a group task
E	There is conflict about delegation of tasks within my department

	Statements (Common causes of IC)	Strongly disagree 5	Disagree 4	Neutral 3	Agree 2	Strongly Agree 1
A	There is poor leadership by my manager
B	Unfair treatment is practiced in the hotel
C	Individual differences exist with my workmates
D	There is poor Communication.
E	Disagreements arise from tips and other rewards
F	There is lack of honesty, openness and trust
G	There is no clarity of roles and responsibilities
H	There is heavy workloads
I	The shifts are long
J	There is job stress
K	There is competition between colleagues
L	There is Interdependence with other departments
M	Lack of cooperation is evident among employees
N	Lack of resources creates pressure
O	There is no recognition,

Outcomes	Strongly disagree 1	Disagree 2	Neutral 3	Agree 4	Strongly Agree 5
Reduces understanding of others at work
Poor solutions to problems and challenges are derived
Poor working relationships are experienced
There is low performance in teams
Bad ideas are produced
An increase in employee turnover.
People are forced to search for new approaches to managing conflicts
The distance between people increases
There is no clarification of individual views
Long-standing problems are not brought to the surface to be resolved

How do you react to interpersonal conflict at work?	Strongly disagree 5	Disagree 4	Neutral 3	Agree 2	Strongly Agree 1
I avoid the person I am in conflict with.
Conflicts are a waste of time
I feel angry and aggressive when faced with conflicts
I discuss with co-workers in times of conflicts
I listen and discuss with the person I had interpersonal conflict with.
I go to the supervisor of the person I am in conflict with.
I discuss conflicts with people outside the organization.
I make jokes about the conflicts at the person’s expense.
I talk behind the person’s back.
I try to find a compromise in times of conflicts
I consider it to be necessary order to make clear who really is in charge
I defend myself and insist on my rights
It changes my mood and makes me less friendly and less balanced.
I feel burned-out because of interpersonal conflicts

With whom did you discuss the interpersonal conflict situation?	Strongly disagree 1	Disagree 2	Neutral 3	Agree 4	Strongly agree 5
I discuss with co-workers.
I discuss with the person I had interpersonal conflict with.
My human resource manager
My spouse, partner, Family members at home
A professional outside the hotel
The supervisor of the person I had the interpersonal conflict with
Staff Welfare leader
A mediator
A lawyer
My manager
Head of department

When interpersonal conflict occurs in our hotel, I tend to . . .	Strongly disagree 5	Disagree 4	Neutral 3	Agree 2	Strongly agree 1
I disagree with colleagues without becoming angry.
I openly share relevant information with colleagues, rather than secretively withhold it.
I go directly to the person with whom I am in interpersonal conflict to resolve it.
I get together with my colleagues to resolve the interpersonal conflict cooperatively.
I avoid dealing with interpersonal conflict directly by complaining to others.
I take personal responsibility for resolving interpersonal conflicts to the mutual satisfaction of all parties.
I work together with my colleagues to find an agreeable solution.
I Withhold information that may be needed by others.
I get someone else to take care of solving the interpersonal conflict for me.
I approach interpersonal conflict as a competition to be won.
I engage in gossip and feed the rumour mill.