Submitted by Faye1920 on
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Hello -I've got two employees who are NOT comunicating with eachother. One has been upfront about their feelings - they do not trust or feel they can rely on their teammate. The other when I ask him about how he feels - says everything is great and fine. I was informed by a fellow manager that he had overheard this employee ranting and raving about his peer. That he felt she throws him under the bus and doesn't want to talk to her. I am having individual conversations with both but wanted to imput and advise if anyone else has been in this same situation.
"Have you talked with them?"
Try this cast. This is Mike and Dani going through a play-by-play on how that conversation can happen. The cast is called, "Have you talked with them?" Here's the link: https://www.manager-tools.com/2014/08/have-you-talked-them. It mainly goes through how to prompt them to have their own work it out between themselves.
Good luck!
Similar Experience
I had a similar experience with two of my directs. I talked to them individually and then brought them together in an attempt to find a way forward. I let them discuss what each felt led to their issues, and identified a path forward. The core of the problem seemed to be their very different communication styles, so I tried to get them to just be more direct and when there was an issue bring it up instead of letting it fester barely under the surface. They did seem to be able to work together after that.
I would just recommend you keep the conversation moving forward with an eye on the goal of directing behavior in the future. Having them dwell on the specific issues of the past, instead of finding ways to overcome the barriers, will result in nothing but a "he said/she said" session of airing grievences.