Crafting Solutions to Conflict

Gratitude is a deeply personal emotion. Embracing a platitude that doesn’t feel right to us can lead to inner -- and even outer – conflict. Attitudes of judgment about other people’s apparent gratitude, based on our own perspective start us down the path of conflict.Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving.  

Next week, Thanksgiving Day is celebrated in the U.S. Turkey is often on the menu. And conflict is a frequent accompaniment as extended, intergenerational families come together. Our “lizard brain”, in the context of interpersonal conflict, is the part of our human brain that is like a lizard’s: quick but not careful. We can think ahead about how to avoid problems that we know are likely to occur; we can prepare to be at our own best; and we can take a pause (and not the bait) if an opportunity to lash out presents itself.These ideas can be useful in many contexts beyond Thanksgiving in the U.S. Family gatherings, workplace situations, and neighborhood meetings are all opportunities to be thoughtful and to plan ahead.Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving.  

Toxic positivity is excessive and ineffective emphasis on a happy and optimistic take on a situation. It can do harm to the person on the receiving end of it and to the relationship between that person and the person engaging it. Even when – as is usually the case, good intentions motivate it. Still, an opportunity for unnecessary interpersonal conflict.Better to listen and to offer authentic support that doesn’t do damage to a person already upset or to the relationship that person has with someone who they thought would make them feel better, not worse.Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving. 

There’s an expression that “to assume” is to make an a-s-s out of u and me. Note that it’s a two-way street of trouble: it’s bad for both of us.  Assumptions can be harmful in many contexts. One is inherited personal property. We have heard plenty about conflicts over items of limited monetary value that have the same or similar significant emotional value to family members.  My guest last week, Marlene Stum, cautioned that conflict can arise when some people value an item deeply and another can’t understand what all the fuss is about and why time and energy are wasted on it.Another context is that of unequal wealth. Harmful assumptions, often applied to the wealthier family, can lead to hurt feelings and lost opportunities. Better to check our assumptions and find out if they are truly justified.Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving. 

Marlene Stum is in her thirty-third year at the University of Minnesota. Her particular interest and expertise involves research and educational resources to help later life families preserver their financial security and social well-being. We discuss the six factors of the Who Gets Granma’s Yellow Pie Plate? project. Practical research-based resources are available through https://extension.umn.edu/transferring-property/transferring-non-titled-property. Marlene suggests that families could watch the 38 minute video available there or on YouTube, and then discuss the implications for their own family. The workbook is another way for families to take advantage of the findings of the research of Marlene and her team.Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving.  

In a recently published article, Deborah Tannen described the concept of “cooperative overlapping”. In the article, she explains how she coined the phrase in her 1984 book, Conversational Style. The idea is that interrupting someone who is speaking can be a positive: it’s meant to show engagement in what the speaker is saying and to encourage the speaker to continue. Read her article here:https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/25/opinion/interrupting-cooperative-overlapping.html?searchResultPosition=1Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving. 

Deborah Tannen describes herself as a linguist who studies the mechanics of conversation. Her studies, articles, and books cover a wide range of potentially thorny types of conversation. The key takeaways regarding conflict? Although we may have different approaches to conversation, one is not necessarily better than another. Our challenge is understanding that we have these differences and not jumping to make negative assumptions about them.http://www.deborahtannen.com/Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving. 

Cindy Radu brings a background in law and accounting to her work with legacy families. In particular, her deep expertise with trusts enables Cindy to help families achieve their wealth legacy goals. She offers three specific takeaways. First, communicate about the purpose of a trust -- the mission, vision, and values behind it. Second, intentionally activate the trust. Third, collaboration among all involved is essential: the grantors, the trustees, the beneficiaries, and the professional advisors.You can learn more about Cindy’s work at her website: https://cindyradu.com/ . Reach her by email here: connect@cindyradu.com. She welcomes messages through LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/raducindy/Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving. 

The phrase “giving someone the benefit of the doubt” suggests only one benefit, bestowed by one person upon another, when trustworthiness is accepted, even though there is some question about it. The benefits are actually broader: the relationship is spared the stress of distrust and possible rupture and the one “giving” the benefit is relieved of the burden of judging the other person as untrustworthy.Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving. 

Availability bias, also known as the availability heuristic, is the idea that we tend to value --  overweight even -- information that comes to mind quickly when making decisions. It’s a mental shortcut in processing information. Recent events, those that touch us personally, and those that are highly unusual come to mind more readily.In a conflict, if two people are trying to reach a decision, it’s to be expected that both people are affected by availability bias. And, it’s only logical, that this brain shortcut will lead them to slightly different or tremendously different results. Because they are processing different data. An awareness of this type of bias is an important first step by in itself. Next, we can slow ourselves down in the decision-making process. We can consider if we are giving too much weight to a piece of information or occurrence because it affected us, individually; because it was highly unusual (and thus the subject of lots of attention); or because it happened recently.Do you have comments or suggestions about a topic or guest? An idea or question about conflict management or conflict resolution? Let me know at jb@dovetailresolutions.com! And you can learn more about me and my work as a mediator and a Certified CINERGY® Conflict Coach at www.dovetailresolutions.com and https://www.linkedin.com/in/janebeddall/.Enjoy the show for free on your favorite podcast app or on the podcast website: https://craftingsolutionstoconflict.com/And you can follow us on Twitter @conflictsolving.