How to manage your negotiating team.

You are leading a negotiating team for your company. When you sit down with the other party, someone on your side of the table blurts out: "Just tell us--what do we need to do to get more of your business?" And in that moment, you know you've lost the upper hand. Gaffes like this are more common than most businesspeople would care to admit, management professors Brett, Friedman, and Behfar have found in their research.

The critical role of conflict resolution in teams: a close look at the links between conflict type, conflict management strategies, and team outcomes.

This article explores the linkages between strategies for managing different types of conflict and group performance and satisfaction. Results from a qualitative study of 57 autonomous teams suggest that groups that improve or maintain top performance over time share 3 conflict resolution tendencies: (a) focusing on the content of interpersonal interactions rather than delivery style, (b) explicitly discussing reasons behind any decisions reached in accepting and distributing work assignments, and (c) assigning work to members who have the relevant task expertise rather than assigning by other common means such as volunteering, default, or convenience. The authors' results also suggest that teams that are successful over time are likely to be both proactive in anticipating the need for conflict resolution and pluralistic in developing conflict resolution strategies that apply to all group members.

Managing multicultural teams.

Multicultural teams offer a number of advantages to international firms, including deep knowledge of different product markets, culturally sensitive customer service, and 24-hour work rotations. But those advantages may be outweighed by problems stemming from cultural differences, which can seriously impair the effectiveness of a team or even bring itto a stalemate. How can managers best cope with culture-based challenges? The authors conducted in-depth interviews with managers and members of multicultural teams from all over the world.