Conscious conflict [culture at work]

Despite the self-reliant focus of our formal training as software engineers, our profession entails significant human contact. Most likely, we will experience some conflict with co-workers, bosses, subordinates, customers or suppliers. Constructively resolving these differences can make or break our ongoing relationships. It can also determine how effectively a group of people will transition through the stages of team development. Effective conflict resolution thus significantly impacts the quality of our jobs and even our lives. Skills to constructively handle conflict are typically not part of a software engineer's training. Not surprisingly, human resources departments frequently offer courses to help us, although we sometimes ignore them because we don't have enough time or we dismiss the topics as being too touchy-feely.