Is it Time to Consider Conflict Management Training?

After more than a year of lockdowns, social distancing, working from home (if at all), wearing a mask and hypervigilance about contagion, you’d think getting “back to normal” would make everyone happy.  

But not always. In fact, agency employees have a growing number of stories about angry patrons pushing back on wearing face coverings , social distancing, new policies and procedures. Even more odd is what seems to be a trend of patrons becoming belligerent about requirements that were nonissues before the pandemic. You need to handle this strange behavior — which stems from the sustained stress of the past year — with care and sensitively. It’s important to minimize the risk of a situation spiraling out of control for both employees and patrons by learning how to defuse negative conflict when tensions rise.

Residual Stress Is What’s Really Behind This

For more than a year, we have faced disruption in every aspect of our lives — we’ve curtailed work, social, school and family activities and even limited medical care. We’re beginning to return to a new “normal,” but the cumulative impact of these stressors lingers long after the pandemic lifts. People also are stressed about the future: vaccinations, catching COVID, personal space, masking, children’s schooling and what going back to work looks like.   

Experts use the term Post Pandemic Stress Disorder (PPSD) for the anxiety, stress, fear and other emotions generated by the end of the pandemic and restarting of public life. This potent emotional cocktail can affect employees as well as patrons. That’s where conflict resolution training can help. Your employees can learn the skills and listening techniques to lower the heat when tempers flare. And it also helps staff recognize and respond to each other’s stress as we define our new normal. 

Resources to Help

With the onset of warmer weather, your agency is busier than ever, so take advantage of our available resources to help your employees cope with the crowds’ and their own anxieties.

• Crisis Prevention Institute (CPI) — Verbal Conflict Intervention Program (Online).
  Self-directed training your agency’s Safety Coordinator can assign. We will send additional information to Safety Coordinators by the end of June.
• CPI — Verbal Conflict Intervention Program (On-site).
  CPI also offers on-site classes for your staff and/or a train-the trainer program to train an employee who can then train agency staff. Visit www.crisisprevention.com for more information.
• Handle with Care Behavioral Management Training (Classroom).
  This consultancy offers classes in how to create a calm environment using verbal and other skills. You can send an employee to a train-the-trainer session, and that person can then train your agency staff. Learn more at https://handlewithcare.com/.
• Workplace Solutions EAP (Online and On-site).
  Choose web-based or on-site conflict resolution training at a negotiated PDRMA-member rate of $300 per hour.

What You Can Do

• Acknowledge there are still many unknowns and stressors your employees are facing, and the possibility of pandemic-related tensions and potential conflict between staff and patrons is still high.
• Actively communicate agency policy, procedures, EAP services and practices, especially since they change in this fast-moving environment.
• Perform short check-in meetings with staff, listen to their needs and provide coaching as needed.
• Check in at programs and customer service areas to listen to the comments and needs of your patrons. Remember their needs may also be changing in relation to our current environment.
• Look for ways to minimize stress for both staff and patrons to help minimize potential conflicts arising.

Rest assured change will continue as Illinois and the nation reopen and determine pandemic-related needs. Employee and patron acceptance of COVID transitioning will not change overnight. Be patient, practice active listening, communicate your agency’s expectations respectfully to everyone and focus on safety — so you can make this transition as smooth as possible.