Leadership Detectives
Leadership Detectives
Inviting Conflict – Jana Breuchmann interview
Inviting conflict. Almost seems like the opposite of what makes sense when you think of leadership, but today we’re joined by Jana Bruechmann who brings a fresh new take on conflict in the workplace.
Jana takes us through how her work as a Systemic Leadership Coach on ‘Future work’ or the new way of working takes her away from traditional leadership methods. We talk about how the word conflict itself has negative connotations, the difference between what it and what could potentially be and why tension is good in the work place.
But we do look at the dangers of inviting conflict when you, as a leader, are not truly prepared. Jana leaves us with some great tips on managing conflict in an inclusive way and some of the things that leaders need to think about to avoid misapplying.
To find out more about Jana you can visit: JanaBruechmann.de or e-mail mail@JanaBruechmann.de
Find Neil online at: https://neilthubron.com/
And Albert on LinkedIn at: www.linkedin.com/in/albert-e-joseph
Welcome to the Leadership Detectives with Albert Joseph and Neil Fabron. This is the go-to podcast uncovering clues about great leadership. If you are a leader today or an aspiring leader, this podcast is a must for you. Welcome to another episode of the Leadership Detectives, the home of uncovering clues of great leadership. Thank you for joining us again. This week we're joined by special guest Jana Bruchmann from Berlin in Germany. Actually, she was in Frankfurt when we interviewed her, but she's from Berlin. The topic today is a really interesting one. It's about the power of creating conflict in your teams to enable you to be more successful as a business. Now that's a really strange topic, and when Jana approached us on LinkedIn and said she'd like to do this, we thought, wow, that's really interesting. So encouraging conflict to make your teams more productive, to make them work closer together to improve your business. There's some great insight in this interview. We hope you enjoy it. Albert and I certainly got lots out of it. Please subscribe, please give us a thumbs up, please leave your comments, and remember if you want a free coaching session, just please send us a message. Look forward to hearing your feedback.
SPEAKER_01:Neil, good to see you here. How are you? You well?
SPEAKER_00:I'm fantastic, thank you, mate. Yes, loving the sunshine today. And we're delighted to be joined by Jana Brukman from Germany. So I think probably our first German guest, probably even our first international guest. I think so. I think so. So welcome, Jana. How are you today?
SPEAKER_03:I'm really fine and glad to be with you here today.
SPEAKER_00:Fabulous. No, and thank you for reaching out. So Jana reached out to us through LinkedIn, through a comment on LinkedIn, and basically asked a question which posed some conversation. So the question Jana asked was about how to deal with conflict or tension in teams. Yeah. Which was a great question to ask. So actually, we say we said, let's get Jana on to uh a telephone call to see whether it'd be a good topic for a podcast. And it certainly looked that way.
SPEAKER_01:It certainly is. And the conversation with Jana was great as well. Jana's got some other material that we'd like possibly to share at some other point. But Jana, great to see you here. Thank you very much for joining us. So let's pick you up on the challenge that you created for us and let's take the challenge on together. We've decided to headline this one as inviting conflict. So um I think that's the topic we're gonna cover. But let's let people know who Jana is, first of all, right? So, first introduction for you, Jana. Imagine you were being invited up onto a stage and you're gonna present to an audience, mixed audience, different ages, different genders, gender-free, everything. How would you like them to introduce you? What do you want them to know about you?
SPEAKER_03:Oh, that's that's interesting, yeah. So I'm a human, first of all, a female human living in Berlin, um, Germany. Um, I'm a mother of two teenagers right now. And uh yeah, I'm I'm through corporate uh business activities, yeah, and uh working as a systemic coach, leadership coach, and uh over the last uh five years I really stepped into this future of work thing. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Could you just tell us a little bit more about the mother of two? How how old and what what are they? Boys, girls?
SPEAKER_03:They they will be 15 and 12 soon.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, oh fantastic. Fantastic, a good time, a good age, um and ready to have sensible conversations with you-ish.
SPEAKER_02:They they did already uh right beginning from birth.
SPEAKER_01:So well, fantastic. So this is Jana, guys, and and it's gonna be good. You said about a coach. How do you where where does your coaching fit in?
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, so typically it's it's uh more about leadership coaching or coaching into the direction of future of work in the agile world, for example, or new work, it's called. Uh there's several names around, uh, which means basically their traditional methods and techniques and and leadership skills are not enough. Okay, and it turns out they need uh probably some impulses or some you know strange things to try out to achieve uh further goals, uh basically in in startup grown-up IT software development area, but it's more and more getting into other businesses as well.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, so you you use the term future work.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:What does that mean?
SPEAKER_03:It's away from traditional, you know, a hierarchy management systems, um, like uh based on Taylor, Frederick Taylor and Henry Ford is a very famous name in this area, where we say, okay, it's this is alpha. Um the the way how to uh organize, the way how to uh design your organization. And uh we say, okay, probably might be more beta. Beta is you know, in in software development, it's never final, it's not finished yet. So you invite um change and new things and try things out, okay, stuff like that.
SPEAKER_00:So so in the in the terms of the topic around conflict, which is how kind of how we got here, and and you reached out and said, you know, how would you deal with tension or conflict as a leader? How would you define conflict?
SPEAKER_03:So typically the term conflict is is uh judged, so there's a judgment behind that, it's it's uh meant to be negative, uh so it's uh better to go with another term which is not more neutral, um, so like tension.
SPEAKER_00:Okay.
SPEAKER_03:It's like you you can say, okay, there's something, there's a difference between what is and what could be, potentially be, which might be more successful, interesting to go, whatever. Um, and and so there's a difference and it's coming up in a person.
SPEAKER_00:When you put the question out to us about conflict intention, how would we manage it? What was behind your thinking when you asked that question?
SPEAKER_03:So, first of all, I'm in in that area right now. I'm not an expert yet, um, but I'm I'm reading a lot of books and try to find out what is behind that. Because uh when when we go into transitions or change or transformation activities, however you call it, it's in a lot of situations, I feel that people don't try to get into conflicts or these tensions. It's like so the the old way would be okay, there's uh the goal, shut up, go. But actually, it might be relevant that the person speaks up and says, No, I don't think it's it's the right way. I don't think we we have seen everything. I think there are other options or other ways to to go there, or other people, or whatever it is.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, so you think it's good. So you're what you're saying is it's good.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, yeah, it's it's good. And then of course, there need to be some some principles or rules around that, how to handle that. Uh, so it's uh better to be prepared to work with tensions, right? Um, and they need to be, you know, a place where and how you do it. Um, however, it's it's good, it's because then organizations can evolve, and this is necessary nowadays, I think, because we can't stick companies that do um probably might not be that successful any longer.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. What what I think you've talked about here, Jana, is an amount of theory. Have you seen it in practice? What's your experience of it in practice?
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, actually, I practice it in my private life and in situations which are coming up, yeah, and it's so fruitful if you're going there, like uh, for example, using nonviolent communication for that, yeah, you're getting much closer to the other person and to get a deeper understanding of the perspective, and it opens the picture for other options, yeah. You might decide, okay, it's not really relevant, it's one possible result out of that, but it it of course it opens the window to other things.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, so I'm fascinated uh by this idea of uh um of inviting conflict in a team. So, as a leader, how do you then so what what's the strategies you would recommend you use for managing that?
SPEAKER_03:So um the there are some ideas around how to do this. So, one is to have a like a parking place for tensions where people can you know bring it up and put it there, and there's a certain meeting handling those tensions, it's a governmental meeting, right? You you work not on your job, you work on the system, you work on the organization itself, then yeah, and uh then people can can bring it up, and so um in some frameworks, it's the person who is bringing up the tension has to bring up a proposal, how to deal with that, and then there are several possibilities so to to get in deeper understanding what is behind that, um, you know, share that with other people, invite their view on whatever is going on, and then uh there there might be a proposal which is shaped and integrating other other perspectives and point of view views, and and then you might come to a conclusion to change things, like change a process, change a role, change a way you go, you know, out to the client, whatever it is.
SPEAKER_01:It's a really interesting thought, and it and it it turns everything on its head from the way that most leaders would operate. And I hope this doesn't come across racist. Do you think it's do you think it's a German thing? Do you think it's a worldwide thing? What where do you because because for Neil, for you and me, this was quite new, right? To actually invite conflict into the conversation rather than prevent it, right? But but I can see all the merits of the way that you talk about it. Yeah, has it started its life in Germany, or what's your understanding of it?
SPEAKER_03:I I think um so reflecting on my business history, right? So in corporate life, you have uh the organizational design. If you are silo-oriented, there might be the different silos um might have different goals, right? So uh, like um we we talked about sales is signing oriented and delivery might be revenue oriented. And so they when there's a certain situation and customer side which is not standard, um then you need to figure out how to deal with this situation from both both anchors, right? And so it's dealt with, but there might not be a structure to do that because people just work together and and you know find out a way to go for this client in this situation. So they it's already done. This is what I mean, but it's not done necessarily in a very conscious way.
SPEAKER_00:Okay. So it sounds to me like there's probably quite a lot of groundwork around the system that needs to be put in place before you can invite conflict. Because if you invite conflict without the system, you get you're gonna create chaos.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, and it's it's it's not good to have chaos, right?
SPEAKER_00:Sometimes, sometimes it is, but probably not in this situation, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, might be fruitful, but uh in seldom situations, I think. Yeah, so it's yeah, you you um and and there are a lot of programs in in organizations existing to you know come up with new ideas, not not necessarily uh technology driven, but might be like, okay, if we do it this way, it might be better, easier, less time consuming, you know, with lower prices or costs involved, whatever it is. So there are already ways where organizations invite, you know, proposals. So uh but it's done on on you know, not on a monthly basis or on a biweekly basis or so, how this type of organizations I'm talking about would do that.
SPEAKER_01:I'm thinking about it from our leadership audience, right? Who hopefully have got some level of skill and understanding of models, and one of the models that comes to mind would be the situational leadership model, right? So the question is does the team or members of the team need to be in a certain place on that situational leadership model for this to work, right? They need a certain level of maturity, or am I am I overthinking it?
SPEAKER_03:This is following a certain mindset, yeah, right? Yeah, so if you if you're looking at employees, uh you know lazy, they have no clue, they are not knowledgeable enough, whatever, about they their work, right? I mean, this is on topics where they are the experts, where they are working actually. And if you say, okay, I'm the boss, I know everything better than you, and you're not mature enough, or you don't have, you know, you don't know enough. So then it's difficult to invite things like that.
SPEAKER_00:I don't know if you've come across uh the work Ray Dalio did on his uh system. So Ray Dalio, you're one of the largest um fund managers in the world. Um, and his method was uh whenever he had meetings, he invited conflict, and people had an iPad, it's quite famous, it's worth looking up on YouTube. In fact, anyone who's listening to this, have a look at the way Ray Dalio manages his meetings. So he he has an iPad which on any topic everyone in the room can vote on. So, and and what direction they go in. But the more experience you've got, the more votes you get, or the more weighting your vote has. So if you're a junior just come into the company and you've just left come out of university or whatever, and on this topic it's not your area of experience, you get a lower vote than someone who's been doing the same job 30 years and might, you know, especially when you're talking about investing people's money. So have you come across that method?
SPEAKER_03:No, not exactly, no.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, and do you think that would be a sensible way of managing conflict is that uh or helping enable it, is that you give weighting to seniority or to experience or skill levels.
SPEAKER_03:You could try that. I mean, try it if it's safe enough to try and to fail. And and you can, you know, afterwards reflect with people on how did that work. Probably you missed a point because someone, you know, coming from extern, external, um, having a total fresh and neutral view might have a really good idea and it's not rated or weighted very high, and you probably miss the point. On the other hand, I I like the idea of you know, I'm I'm not 20 years old any longer. So I like and appreciate if experiences, you know, are also weighted in a way. However, it might be in the content of what people say.
SPEAKER_00:I mean, there's a there's a company I work with, well, actually, in a number of situations, encouraging tension and conflict between departments creates higher levels of performance because they want to outdo each other, you know, especially in sales organizations. They want to they want to do better than their other so their other colleagues. So is that is that old thinking, or is that uh just in some situations it's good to have comfort? I understand in the software world where you've got product developers and code writers and stuff, you you might not want to create that division, even. But um are there some areas where some leadership where that should it does work and add value?
SPEAKER_03:So uh to to my view, it's um finite leadership you're talking about. And if you're following Simon Sinek, I I love his work very much. Yeah, uh, so it's like infinite leadership, so there's enough for everyone. Okay, we don't need to fight each other um to you know bring the other down for you to step up uh to have more profit, higher you know, status, whatever. So actually, I I don't like that. It might be a male-female thing as well. So um, because we tend to be more embracing things, um might be a gender thing as well, but actually, I I don't think it's so valuable. A little bit like gamification, like you know, um having some, you know, it's I I like to be better, but against myself. Yeah, this is more this, you know, level up you by yourself and your personal development rather than on cost of others.
SPEAKER_01:That's interesting, actually. For all the golfers on here, that's a good example, right? Because you're playing against your handicap, you're not get playing against each other, but people can't help but compare themselves to other people, right? I heard a great analogy the other day, by the way, and I'm sure this is not new to you, is that if you're a candle and you're burning and somebody lights another candle next to you, do you get any darker? So so why would you have a problem with having another candle, right?
SPEAKER_03:If the room gets brighter, yeah, and and and if my purpose is you know to give light, so then it's you know, I would invite others to okay, candle after your job was to provide light.
SPEAKER_00:Sorry, it might not get any darker, but your ego would be here.
SPEAKER_01:That's the problem. Somebody else is now sharing, creating the light, and and that's partly what you're bringing here, I think. Jana, you're bringing some different thinking that breaks the mold of some of the leadership things we may have talked about before that lots of people believe in. And it doesn't make it right or wrong, it makes it different and it makes it worth trying. But in that trying, I guess there's also some risk. What damage do you think it could do in a team for people to apply this? Whether they apply it well or they don't apply it well, because it also matters about the team's capability. What damage do you think could come from it?
SPEAKER_03:So the first uh thing that comes to my mind is that uh people really need a certain, you know, maturity, as you mentioned, or a certain um you mean the team or the leader? The the the whoever is involved probably need some support at the beginning if you uh start trying that out. And uh so sometimes it's good to to um really. I mean, you could follow the idea of Marshall Rosenberg uh with the non-violent communication, which there are certain steps, how to verbalize what you're talking about, right? It's like my observation, my feeling, my beliefs, and this is my wish. So it's it's like so if if I come up and and say you failed, you did it wrong, blah blah blah. So probably it's not the best way to speak about this. And uh also inviting other perspectives sometimes is not very easy. So there you need uh um uh of course a level of psychological um safety. Yeah, yeah. I mean you would need if you're the boss in the room, you would need to be open to whatever is coming up, and you need to be able to hold that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:And that's not probably not easy, right?
SPEAKER_00:So I just want to ask some practical tips now. Okay, so okay, we've got some uh good outline of the theory anyway, but it what I'd like to leave uh the leaders who are listening to this with. Okay, so if I want to manage conflict in a an inclusive way, yeah, I want to encourage it, I want it to enhance my business, not damage my business, enhance my team, not damage my team. So one of the tips was you you said you you need to have a safe space for conflict, uh and that's a time and a place uh where you say you you agree that you're gonna get together, and the person who has an issue brings a proposal, or if if if it maybe they don't admit that there is an issue and someone has to bring a proposal to them to say, you know, you're the issue here. Um so so what what what other tips uh could you give people on if they get their team together and they're managing this, they're trying to make this work in a positive way, what other things could they do?
SPEAKER_03:So basically that that's it, right? It's you you need to be open, I mean, really interested in that. If you fake that, it will fail, right? First of all, second, you need some, you know, principles or rules around that. So uh where do we, you know, having a parking place, something like that. So where do we put those issues? Yeah, and you know, don't do it like this person is a problem, it's more probably the behavior of a person. Yeah, so their system theory comes in, people are probably not the problem, but you know what the the role in in the system might be, yeah. Um the reason for their behavior in this uh area. Then you need an agreement on when you will handle that, and you need some rules around how you will do that. So there's a lot of stuff in the internet available about that, yeah. However, if you think uh it's better to have someone neutral moderating such a meeting, it would be probably a good idea, especially on the way how people name whatever comes up, yeah. Because it might be something in a relationship to another person or a role or whatever, an outcome might be.
SPEAKER_01:Just a quick thought, actually. If there are people that want to look into this a bit more, what resources would you advise them to go look at?
SPEAKER_03:So actually, uh something I I just read, and it's here it's in German, but it's available in the English language as well. This is uh the loop approach, it's uh um a summary, actually. So this is how people can run a transformation, yeah. This is the whole thing, and there it's in uh included, and they use ideas based on holocracy, um, where it's already tension-based activities, but there's a lot of other stuff out there as well. We have a lot of um management leadership books like this also German magic of conflict or a Swiss guy with the potential and wisdom uh in the collective, uh, and stuff like that. And and what is really a good base, or might be a good base, is Marshall Rosenberg's work on nonviolent communication.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, okay. Um it's interesting actually. This is a fascinating topic, and it's I'm just thinking of there are people I'm coaching and working with, and they've got all sorts of different conflicts in their team. You know, you've got um there's one company I can think of where two of their best people are in conflict because one thinks they do more work than the other, and and and the this other person, and the other person thinks they do more than they do, and they have this there's this conflict going on about who does the most work, who does the best work, and uh and they're professionals, you know, they're not this isn't salespeople. Um and in in another, yeah, and and in another yeah, it it it's weird the different conflicts that happen. So no, this is and actually a leader taking that on and and adding acting as a mediator in that type of situation is quite a big challenge for most leaders to do, yeah, yeah. Um I mean, we could go on forever on this topic, yeah. I guess but we'll move on to a couple of quickfire questions in a minute. But just if you were gonna leave leaders that are listening to this one thought on all of this um topic around managing conflict, managing tension, what would be one thought you'd like to leave people with?
SPEAKER_03:The first uh thought coming to my mind is I I love Brene Brown. Have you heard about her? Oh, I know Brene Brown well vulnerability, yeah. So it really, I mean, allow yourself to be vulnerable.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, that's great. That's a great message. That's a great message, okay.
SPEAKER_02:And it's so difficult, you know. It's so difficult, and it stays difficult, so you never get Neil said it earlier, Gianni, right?
SPEAKER_01:It's also to do with ego, right? Yeah, you can't have a really good ego and be vulnerable. The two don't fit together that well. So it's an interesting point.
SPEAKER_00:That's it's interesting. Well, I look at the quickfire questions we were going to ask. We're gonna ask you about favourite books, you've already done that. We're gonna ask you about quotes, and you've already done that. Allow yourself to be vulnerable, which I think is a brilliant quote. That's uh and we've also asked you what would be one one message you'd leave as well. So I don't know, Albert, what do you think? Should we miss out on the quickfire questions?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think I think I think we've covered it. I think you've done some really you've really done justice to the to the session, actually, here, Jana, right? But I think you've left people with as many questions as you have as answers, which is a great place to be, by the way. Um so that's really useful. Um and we we I think we'd like to have you back for things that we talked of in the prep a week ago, right? You you've opened our thinking to some other areas that we think would be really good for our audience, and we'd love to be able to invite you back for that.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, especially the word hylocracy came up. You mentioned it in the uh discussion there. Now, I didn't know what that word meant when we first met, so I'm gonna leave that pending for people. People to look up and see what it means. Absolutely. We'll have an episode on Holocracy, I think.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. Go look at it yourself, guys. Jana's got a view on it, and and probably a much better view than Neil and I have got. But uh go and look at it yourself, see what you think, and get ready to come back for that episode. We may even want to consider doing that one in a webinar where we could have some QA as well.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, good idea. And and Jana, you're if people wanted to get hold of you, find out more. Uh you got a website they can go to?
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, it's uh it's in German, uh Jana Bruchmann.de.
SPEAKER_00:Okay.
SPEAKER_03:Um, but you can just send me an email also in English, of course. Yeah mail at janabruchmann.de.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, I'll make sure that goes in the uh show notes of the uh the episode. Yeah. So I I'll I'll I'll just say thank you. Thank thank you, Jana, for joining us. Thanks for that insight into a completely different area and different approach than uh we would normally look at. And it's great. That's what we want to undo is is uncover the clues of great leadership. And this is another clue on that path. So thank you ever so much for joining.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely. So so, guys, to our audience, thank you very much for tuning in and listening. Um, please leave us your comments, please leave us your feedback. Let's have some more um subscriptions as well. So, thank you for that. Um, and then I'd like to say thank you as well, Yana. Fantastic session, really good to spend that time with you. 30 minutes has disappeared, um, but but it's certainly got the uh the brain cells going. So, thank you very much for joining us, and we hope we see you again.
SPEAKER_03:And very welcome, and I'm open for anything you're coming up with. It's it's really fun talking with you.
SPEAKER_01:And great stuff. Thank you. Thanks for watching. Take care. Take care. Bye-bye. Thank you for listening to the Leadership Detectives with Neil Thabron and Albert Joseph. Please remember to subscribe, give us your comments and your feedback. Please also visit leadershipdetectives.com for all the episodes and more resources and support.