When most people think of conflicts within the IT industry, they probably immediately of intellectual property disputes. While it is true that there are often disputes between two (or more) companies, it is also common for disputes to arise between employees of the same IT company.
Most IT fields, from UX to data science, rely on teams of people to get the job done. When you have teams of people, each with their own priorities and opinions, there are bound to be conflicts that arise. Considering how in-demand IT professionals are at the moment, it would behoove any competent leader to keep those professionals happy in their jobs.
You can find information about using mediation to keep employees here. The information in that article is just as relevant to IT professionals as it is to any other industry. However, IT professionals also tend to speak in their own language. Most people outside the IT industry consider coding to be a black box. As long as it works, there is no reason to think about how it works. IT professionals do not have that luxury. If there is a dispute between an IT professional and management, and management doesn’t actually understand the details of what the job entails, the two parties in the conflict will likely talk past each other.
This is when a professional mediator can step in to help the parties see each other’s point of view. However, what happens if that mediator understands even less than the manager. The manager might not know the difference between CSS and HTML, but the mediator may not know the difference between files on their HDD vs files on the cloud. While it is my humble opinion that bringing in any trained mediator is better than continuing to argue, a mediator that understands technology is even better.
Brandon S. Diamond, PhD of Diamond Mediations has years of experience supporting colleagues with IT problems. He is a certified data analyst and knows several coding languages to varying degrees. If you are looking for someone to help all sides in an IT-related conflict understand each other, schedule a consultation at diamondmediations.com/schedule.
Prior to becoming a mediator, Brandon had experience ranging everywhere from a minimum-wage employee to directly managing over thirty (30) professionals. He has certifications in human resource…
