Conflict Management Styles of School Principals: Input for Managing Conflicts

Abstract

INTRODUCTION

The principal, as the head of the school, has a great responsibility in ensuring that the mission and vision of the school is greatly achieved. But oftentimes, just like any other organization, conflicts in school are inevitable. Conflicts exist due to opposing views, interests, personalities, and expectations of all the stakeholders. This study focused in identifying the frequent intrapersonal, interpersonal, and intergroup conflict situations encountered by the principals in school and which among the five styles of conflict management is used to manage these kinds of conflict situations.

METHODS

Mixed method research design was used. In data gathering was accomplished using the following instruments: (1) Conflict Checklist (Mendoza, 2001), (2) Thomas -Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument and (3) semi - structured interview. The Conflict Checklist is used to identify what type of conflict situations under intrapersonal, interpersonal and intergroup were frequently experienced by principals in running their schools. Meanwhile, the Thomas -Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument gauged their most prevalent conflict management styles when dealing with various conflict situations. Responses taken from the semi -structured interviews were consolidated through thematic analysis and categorized themes were developed to support their claims. There were forty -nine (49) participants in this study which came from both government -owned and private -owned elementary schools.

RESULTS

Respondents claimed that intrapersonal, interpersonal, and intergroup conflict situations were seldom encountered in their schools. They commonly used the avoiding style (34.7%) in managing conflicts. Based on the ranking of Thomas -Kilmann percentile scores, principals also used other styles in conflict management such as Accommodating (24.5%), Competing (18.4%), Collaborating (12.2%), and Compromising (10.2%). The principals' perceptions in using avoiding style were explained into themes: (1) Make it First, (2) Pause for a while, (3) Cooling off period, (4) Conflict's potential matters and (5) Let them, Do it.

DISCUSSIONS

Conflicts in school vary. Based on the results, principals claimed that conflict situations were seldom encountered because they have contingency solutions to prevent them. The top conflict management style used is “avoiding” but this is not because they avoid the problem but instead, they want to understand it beforehand, identify its root cause before doing any resolution, and ensure that effective conflict management will come into place.