Conflict is Normal and Handling It Well Is a Skill We Can Build
Karl Pister uses my Best Conflict Conversation Cards in his consulting work, and this fall he invited me onto his Healthcare Leadership Excellence podcast for two conversations built around them, which covered more ground than either of us expected.
In Episode 212, Becoming Conflict Competent, we talked about why conflict can feel so threatening, how the stories we tell ourselves shape what we see in other people, and why organizations need conflict competence rather than expecting HR to handle every disagreement.
In Episode 217, Beyond the Surface: Better Conversations, we kept going through the deck, and most of the ideas below come straight from it, from the anger iceberg to the power of a generous assumption.
Karl's audience is healthcare leaders, and healthcare is a place where these skills carry real weight, because a strained conversation between a nurse and a physician, or between a manager and an exhausted team, can shape the care a patient receives. As we talked, though, I reminded him about how the same ideas apply far beyond the hospital. They show up when a manager and an employee see a project very differently, when colleagues leave a meeting with two different stories about what was decided, and when adult siblings sit around a kitchen table trying to agree on care for an aging parent. The setting changes, and the skills stay remarkably the same.
These nine ideas came out of those two conversations. I've written each one with a few examples from different parts of life, in the hope that at least one of them meets you where you are this week, whether you lead a unit, a team, a company, or a family.
Why Does Conflict Feel So Threatening, Even When We Know It's Normal?
Conflict will keep showing up wherever people care about outcomes, which means it will show up at work, at home, and in every place in between. A charge nurse and a new graduate disagree about how a shift should run, two department heads compete for the same budget, a couple argues about money, and a family can't agree on whether Mom should still be driving. Part of what makes these moments feel so threatening is that our brains are wired to treat a tense conversation a little like danger, which I wrote about in Understanding Conflict: The Myth of the Amygdala Hijack. When we can see conflict as a normal part of caring about something, it loses some of its power over us, and we can start to treat it as information about what matters to the people involved.
The goal is to build the skills to handle it well.
What Is the Ladder of Inference, and How Does It Shape Conflict?
The ladder of inference describes how quickly we can climb from one small observation to a firm conclusion about another person, often before we understand what is happening. A physician walks past without saying good morning, and within a few steps a nurse has decided he doesn't respect her. A colleague doesn't answer an email, and we decide she is dismissive. A brother doesn't call back about Dad's doctor appointment, and his sister decides he has checked out of the family again. Our past experiences supply much of that climb, which is why two people can watch the same moment and walk away with completely different stories. One question can bring us back down the ladder: what do I know for certain, and what am I assuming? In the Conversation Cards, this skill is called "The Story I'm Telling Myself," because in the absence of knowing, our brains will fill in the gaps, and the story we create often says more about our own fears than about the other person.
How Do We Separate the Person From the Problem?
When we label someone as the problem, the conversation narrows to defending or attacking that person, and there is very little room left to work on anything. Saying "she's impossible to work with" leaves nowhere to go, while saying "we keep missing each other on handoffs" gives two people something they can fix together. The same is true in families, where "you never help with Mom" tends to end the conversation and "I need more help with Mom's appointments on weekdays" can begin one. This is also why I try never to call anyone a "difficult person." I've found there aren't people problems so much as skills gaps, and skills can be learned. "Separate the Person From the Problem" has its own card in the deck, with a reminder that when we make the person the problem, we also stop seeing the good in them.
What Is the Anger Iceberg?
The anger iceberg is the idea that anger is often only the visible tip of what someone is feeling, while quieter emotions sit beneath the surface, such as feeling scared, hurt, left out, overwhelmed, unheard, disrespected, hopeless, or powerless. A patient's daughter who snaps at the nurse may be terrified of losing her mother. An employee who pushes back hard in a meeting may be worried about his job or embarrassed that his idea was dismissed. A teenager who slams a door may be feeling left out in ways she can't yet put into words. When someone's reaction seems bigger than the moment, slowing down long enough to wonder what might be underneath can change the whole conversation, and it can also help us notice what sits beneath our own anger. On the anger iceberg card I put it this way: the angrier someone is, the more important something is to them, and that intensity deserves curiosity rather than dismissal. The Gottman Institute has a well-known article and illustration of the anger iceberg by therapist Kyle Benson that is worth reading if this idea is new to you.
Does Disagreement Have to Mean Opposition?
We can disagree with someone and still be working toward the same outcome. Two clinicians can disagree about a treatment plan while both wanting the best for the patient, two partners in a business can disagree about growth while both wanting the company to thrive, and two siblings can disagree about selling the family home while both loving the parent who lived there. In mediation I often see people avoid a difficult conversation in the name of keeping the peace, and the real issue stays untouched while the tension grows quietly around it. Naming the disagreement out loud, with care, gives everyone a chance to work on it together rather than around it. The card for this one is called "Disagreement Isn't Opposition," and it starts from a simple idea: "Just because I don't agree with you doesn't mean I'm against you. It means I'm different than you. I'm me.
What Does It Mean to Really Listen?
Listening asks more of us than waiting for our turn to speak. It means staying curious about what the other person needs us to understand, and checking that we heard it before we respond, whether that's a manager hearing out a frustrated employee, a nurse listening to a worried family member at the bedside, or a parent hearing the whole story before deciding who started it. A simple reflection such as "it sounds like you felt left out of that decision" can do more than a well-reasoned argument. When people feel heard, I've watched them soften, even when nothing else about the situation has changed yet. Two of the cards, "Acknowledge Others' Perspectives" and "Listen and Mirror," are built around this one skill, because people need to feel heard before they can hear us.
Why Does Impact Matter When Our Intentions Were Good?
Our intentions are worth naming, and so is the effect our words had on someone else, and both can be true at the same time. A supervisor who meant to give helpful feedback in front of the team may have left a nurse feeling humiliated, and a mother who meant to offer advice may have left her adult son feeling judged. A conversation often stalls when one person keeps defending what they meant while the other is trying to describe how it landed. Acknowledging the impact first, without giving up what we meant, tends to open the door again. As the "Impact Matters More Than Intent" card reminds us, we can be sorry that someone was hurt even when hurting them was never our intent.
What Is a Generous Assumption?
When we don't know someone's motives, we get to choose the story we tell ourselves about them, and a more generous assumption protects both the relationship and the conversation. The coworker who missed a deadline may be caring for a sick child, the physician who seemed curt may have just lost a patient, and the sister who forgot the birthday may be more overwhelmed than she lets on. Choosing the generous story doesn't mean ignoring a real pattern of harm. It means giving the other person room to explain before we decide what their behavior means. The "Choose Generous Assumptions" card asks a question I find myself coming back to: when I make a mistake, how do I hope others will interpret it?
Does Moving Forward Mean Ignoring What Happened?
Moving forward doesn't mean pretending the past didn't happen, especially when trust has been broken. It means understanding what happened, learning from it, and getting clear about what needs to change so the same harm is less likely to happen again. That is true for a team rebuilding trust after a difficult reorganization, for business partners recovering from a broken promise, and for families who carry old hurts into every holiday. In the conflicts I help people work through, that shared understanding is often what makes a fresh start possible. The last card in the deck says it this way: conflicts are temporary, and relationships are ongoing.
Who Is Responsible for Handling Conflict at Work?
When every disagreement gets sent to HR, teams lose the chance to build their own skills, and HR becomes a bottleneck for conversations that people could learn to have themselves. Organizations are stronger when conflict competence lives throughout the team, with leaders and staff who know how to raise a concern, listen, and find a way forward together, whether they work in a hospital, a law firm, a school, or a small business. The same principle holds at home, where families do better when everyone has a few skills for hard conversations rather than relying on one person to keep the peace. That is also why I believe that we owe it to healthcare to teach them conflict management competence and healthcare teams should practice difficult conversations before they need them. I believe these are skills that would serve us all, whether at work or at home.
Key Takeaways
Conflict is normal, and handling it well is a skill we can build rather than a trait we either have or lack.
The ladder of inference can carry us to conclusions before we understand what is happening; asking what we know for certain brings us back down.
Separating the person from the problem gives both people room to work on the issue together.
Anger often sits on top of quieter feelings like fear, rejection, overwhelm, or feeling unheard.
Disagreement doesn't have to mean opposition, and avoiding the conversation can leave the real issue untouched.
Impact matters even when our intentions were good, and both can be acknowledged.
A generous assumption protects the relationship while we learn more.
Organizations are stronger when conflict competence lives throughout the team, not only in HR.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where Can I Listen to These Conversations?
Both episodes are on the Healthcare Leadership Excellence podcast with host Karl Pister: Episode 212, Becoming Conflict Competent and Episode 217, Beyond the Surface: Better Conversations.
What Is Conflict Competence?
Conflict competence is the set of skills that lets individuals and teams raise concerns, listen, and work through disagreement in ways that keep relationships intact. It can be learned and practiced, much like any clinical or leadership skil.
Why Does Conflict Competence Matter in Healthcare, Workplaces, and Families?
In healthcare, unaddressed tension can affect morale, retention, and the collaboration that patient care depends on. In other workplaces it can slow decisions and push good people out the door, and in families it can turn a hard season, like caring for an aging parent, into a lasting rift. In each setting, people who can have hard conversations well help everyone around them do the same.
What Are the Best Conflict Conversation Cards?
The Best Conflict Conversation Cards are a deck of prompts that help individuals and teams build conflict skills before a hard conversation arrives. Karl Pister uses the cards in his consulting work, and both of our conversations grew out of them. The Workplace Edition holds 50 cards: 20 story cards for reflection and team conversation and 30 practice cards, each with ideas to try and questions to work through.
Does Best Conflict Solutions Work Outside St. Louis?
Yes. Best Conflict Solutions is based in St. Louis, Missouri, and works with healthcare organizations, workplaces, families, and individuals nationwide, in person and virtually.
Where Can We Go From Here?
If you'd like to hear these ideas the way they first came up, both conversations with Karl are worth a listen, and he asks the kind of questions that leaders in any field will recognize. You can find them on Healthcare Leadership Excellence as Episode 212, Becoming Conflict Competent and Episode 217, Beyond the Surface: Better Conversations. You might also try one idea this week, perhaps catching yourself partway up the ladder of inference, or wondering what might sit beneath someone's anger before you respond to it. Small practice like that is how these skills take root.
And if there's a conversation you've been avoiding, at work or at home, and you'd like someone to think it through with, I'm always glad to talk. You're welcome to book a free 15-minute introduction call, with no pressure and no obligation, just a chance to ask questions and see whether working together would help.
About Kimberly Best
Kimberly Best, RN, MA, is the founder of Best Conflict Solutions in St. Louis, Missouri, where she helps healthcare organizations, workplaces, families, and individuals across the country find their best way forward through mediation, conflict coaching, conflict management system design, and training. Drawing on decades as a critical care nurse, she is a Missouri and Tennessee court-listed civil and family mediator, a FINRA arbitrator, and an adjunct professor at Lipscomb University's Institute for Conflict Management. She is the creator of the Best Conflict Conversation Cards and the author of How to Live Forever: A Guide to Writing the Final Chapter of Your Life Story.
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