An assessment of workplace conflict in the Asokwa Municipal Assembly

Abstract

The work was designed to examine workplace conflicts at Asokwa Municipal Assembly. The objectives were to analyse the forms of workplace conflict in the Asokwa Municipal Assembly, examine the sources of workplace conflict on the employees in Asokwa Municipal Assembly, explore the consequences of workplace conflict in the Asokwa Municipal Assembly and analyse the preferred workplace conflict management strategies among the staff of the Asokwa Municipal Assembly. The research was mainly designed as a qualitative case study that employed multiple methods of data collection. Data was collected using questionnaire and interviews. A total of 60 participants were involved in the study. They were selected using convenience, multi-stage and purposive sampling techniques. The analysis highlights that there are different kinds of workplace conflicts at the Asokwa Municipal Assembly all of which are counter-productive. The conflicts are caused by human factors such as discrimination or preferential treatment in promotion processes and unfair workloads and disparity over work hours. Politicisation of the management of the Asokwa Municipal Assembly also emerged strongly as one of the major causes of staff-management conflict. The effects of conflict on the Asokwa Municipal Assembly are low morale and loss of quality personnel leading to low productivity and efficiency. The conflicts have created divisions, groups and cliques within the Asokwa Municipal Assembly. Base on the outcome of the study, it is recommended that the Asokwa Municipal Assembly should develop clear, concise and publicly available policy on conflict management. Also, the Assembly should develop workplace conflict resolution protocols to provide guidelines on how grievances should be addressed.