Managing Conflicts in a Multicultural Organization : A Perspective of Educators

Personal conflicts in an organization can lead to a poorer performance of a good team and it may cause a bigger problem if there's no proper understanding and consideration from all parties involved. This study investigated the differences of conflict style of teachers teaching in St. Theresa International College and how they react to conflicts. The sample consisted of 52 teachers from 7 different countries. Research instruments were the 5-Likert scaled questionnaires and the structured in-depth interviews, utilizing the adaptation of conflict styles from Thomas and Kilmann (2008). Four conflict styles were measured: dominating, compromising, accommodating and avoiding. Findings indicated that the accommodating style is the most preferred; compromising is next, followed by avoiding and dominating. Interviewed teachers accepted that the problems affected their productivity and teamwork. In this regard, teachers need to adjust their conflict management styles towards compromising strategy in order to bring harmony to the organization. More college activities promoting multicultural differences were advised