This is how we fight: Developing a measure of perceived and ideal conflict cultures

The purpose of this project was to address a specific slice of organizational culture in order to better understand how the process of conflict at the organizational level influences individual members. Conflict cultures address an organization's norms, expectations, and shared understandings about how conflict should be initiated, managed, resolved, and interpreted. A survey instrument was developed to measure perceptions of conflict cultures as well as individuals' ideals for conflict cultures. The Conflict Cultures Survey was sent to all tenured and tenure-track faculty member at a large Midwestern university. Results supported a two-factor model of conflict cultures such that conflict cultures vary according to two dimensions: agreeableness and activeness. Intradepartmental agreement and intraclass correlations suggest that there do exist cohesive conflict cultures in some departments. Perceived conflict cultures predicted individual outcomes such that collaborative conflict cultures were associated with higher job satisfaction and organizational identification with the department, and with lower intent to leave. The department-level variable of conflict cultures are interpreted by faculty member which influences their individual level outcomes. Ideal conflict cultures varied little; faculty members uniformly idealize active and agreeable conflict cultures. These department-level collaborative conflict cultures can be cultivated to improve individual level outcomes. Outcomes were also affected by departmental conflict culture strength as well as fit between perceived and ideal conflict cultures. Overall, the results suggest that the Conflict Cultures Survey is useful for understanding the slice of organizational culture focused on conflict.