**2. What is organizational conflict?**

The term organizational conflict can be defined as any phenomenon that depicts disagreement within or among individuals or group working together in an organization over means or ends; or in an attempt to establish their views in preference to others. It can also be referred to as a feeling of displeasure or misunderstanding between people at workplace which stemmed from uncontrolled workplace exigencies such as unclearly defined roles, assignments or tasks, organizational structure, sharing of resources, role dependency, communication gap, poor remuneration or compensation scheme, job insecurity, differences in managerial styles, organizational change and so on. Flowing from the mainstream of definition of organizational conflict, three distinct views have emerged. These include; traditional view, human relation view and interactionist view. The traditional view considers organizational conflict as a negative occurrence, violence or destruction that has devastating impact on organizational performance and effectiveness. The human relation view perceives organizational conflict as a natural event that may enhance organization performance and effectiveness; if it is effectively managed. While the interactionist view believes that organizational conflict is not only positive or negative force but is an essential part of organizational life-circle.

Regardless of the view, that organizational conflict is perceived, the way it is managed determines the effect it will have on an organization. This suggests that organizational conflict should be effectively and efficiently managed. For instance, see [9] in their study revealed that the effects of organizational conflict can either be negative or positive. It can be negative in terms of psychological responses (i.e. inattentiveness to other things, lack of interest in work, job dissatisfaction, work anxiety, frustration and alienation from other), behavioral responses (i.e. excessive smoking, alcoholism, aggression towards others, work sabotage, decrease communication, resisting influence attempts) and physiological responses (health and physical challenges). Also, it can be positive in terms of personal initiative, innovation, motivation, shared opinions, effective communication and understanding of work place problems.

Moreover, a better understanding of the causes of organizational conflict will help in adopting suitable strategies or mechanisms to resolve it. Some researchers such as [10–14] have mostly classified the causes of organizational conflict under three categories which include; task conflict, interpersonal conflict and procedural conflict. Task conflict occurs when an employee is unclear about what is expected of him/her to perform, or how to perform the assigned task, task interdependent and/or when the task given to employees working in a group is not clearly defined by the supervisor. Interpersonal conflict arises when there is proliferation of ideas, or interests between individuals working together, scarce resources, lack of corporation, personality clash or interference over whom to be the first to complete a specific task. While, procedural conflict occurs as a result of bureaucratic bottle neck or disagreement over the procedures to be followed in achieving the set organizational targets or goals. In otherwise, management of organizational conflict cannot be handled with the impression of one-size-fit-all approach.

In fact, within the spectrum of managing organizational conflict, there are difference approaches that have been developed by management experts such as; structural approach (i.e. change procedures of work, organization of work systems, physical layout or add more resources to resolve the disagreement between the conflicting parties), interpersonal approach (i.e. withdrawal, third-party intervention, smoothing, win-lose method, neutrality, bargaining or problem solving method) in handling workplace disagreements and disputes [15–18]. Apart from these approaches, organizational trust has been identified as a conflict resolution technique. This is partly to the fact that when there is conflict in an organization, there will be lack of cooperation, dissatisfaction, dishonestly and counter-productive behaviors which will invariably hinder the process of resolving the conflict for improve organizational behavior and performance. Thus, organizational trust is seen as a tool for conflict management in work organizations.
