The impact of interdepartmental psychological safety on interdepartmental conflict management styles

Conflict is an inevitable part of life, and organizations spend a sizable amount of time addressing it. Literature has shown a connection between conflict management styles and psychological safety, but little research has been afforded to these interactions applied across departments. Data were collected from various companies across the United States using an anonymous survey to quantify respondents’ perceived level of general psychological safety, interdepartmental psychological safety, and preferred styles of conflict management. The results of this study indicated that a significant difference between interdepartmental and general psychological safety exists and is positively correlated with each other. Furthermore, certain styles of conflict management showed correlations to the raising and lowering of interdepartmental psychological safety. The results of this study will be helpful to managers and employees by illuminating how the interdepartmental psychological safety level of a company influences an individual’s propensity toward certain conflict management styles when addressing interdepartmental conflict.

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Tennessee at Chattanooga

Author dc:creator

• Limpus, Ryan

Contributors dc:contributor

• Kim, Seong Dae
• Goodrich, Jennifer; Sozer, Sevin; Varol, Serkan
• College of Engineering and Computer Science

• Organizational behavior--Psychological aspects
• Conflict management
• Personnel management

Licence

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language

English, eng

Repository record dc:identifier

https://scholar.utc.edu/theses/828

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:scholar.utc.edu:theses-1998