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Episode 108: Harnessing Conflict for Team Innovation: Transformative Coaching with guest, Betsy Block

• Garry Schleifer

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Unlock the hidden potential of conflict with Betsy Block, the lead coach catalyst at B3 Coach, as she uncovers the transformative power of dissenting ideas in team coaching. Discover how reframing conflict can be a driving force behind creativity and innovation, rather than a barrier. Betsy shares her extensive experience from nonprofit leadership, research, and program evaluation, offering invaluable insights into embracing seemingly incompatible ideas to foster meaningful breakthroughs in team dynamics.

Understand the subtle yet crucial differences between conflict management and coaching into conflict in the professional realm. We delve into the importance of building an environment where healthy conflict is not only accepted but encouraged, to boost mission fulfillment and innovation. Betsy sheds light on the necessity of trust-building and addressing systemic issues, such as white supremacy culture, to prepare teams for constructive conflict. Explore the scenarios that call for third-party mediation and how a solid foundation in team coaching can pave the way for healthy conflict engagement.

Get ready to challenge your assumptions and explore innovative approaches to conflict with exercises designed to spark creative thinking and diminish ego-driven tensions. Betsy discusses her strategies, including designing the worst possible solutions, to foster an open and relaxed environment where all ideas are welcome. Learn how experience, myth-busting, and reflective practices can help coaches become more comfortable with conflict, ultimately leading to deeper coaching and greater impact. Join us for an eye-opening episode that redefines the way you perceive and handle conflict in professional settings.

Watch the full interview by clicking here.

Find the full article here.

Learn more about Betsy Block here.

Betsy will be starting up a supervision group this fall and would like to extend $75 off to our choice Magazine podcast listeners. To learn more, please go  here.

Grab your free issue of choice Magazine here - https://choice-online.com/

Garry Schleifer:

Welcome to the choice Magazine podcast, Beyond the Page. choice, the magazine of professional coaching, is your go-to source for expert insights and in-depth features from the world of professional coaching. I'm Garry Schleifer and I'm thrilled to have you joining us today. In each episode, we go beyond the page of articles published in choice magazine and just dive deeper and learn more about some of the most recent and relevant topics impacting the world of professional coaching, exploring the content and interviewing the talented minds, like our guest today, I got it right this time this mirroring thing, behind the articles and uncovering the stories that make an impact. choice is more than a magazine. For over 21 years, we've built a community of like-minded people who create, use and share coaching tools, tips and techniques to add value to their businesses, because that's what we're doing making money and, of course, what we all want to do make a difference with our clients.

Garry Schleifer:

In today's episode, I'm speaking with team coach Betsy Block, who is the author of an article in our latest issue. Now let's see if I can get this for our watching people. Ta-da, I got it fresh in the mail the other day. "A Livelihood From Coaching - Feasible or fanciful? That is the question. The article is entitled "Reframing Conflict the Power of Dissenting Ideas in Support of Innovation.

Garry Schleifer:

A little bit about Betsy. She's the Lead Coach Catalyst at B3 Coach, where she helps emerging management teams at small and mid-sized nonprofits navigate strategic changes intentionally, effectively and confidently. She has served in several leadership roles in the nonprofit, government and philanthropy and for-profit. I was going to ask about that. She holds the ICF Advanced Certification in Team Coaching, is certified in Co-Active Coaching, as am I, in Organizational Relationship Systems Coaching, and is trained in various other tools. In addition to supporting teams, she's also a trained Mentor Coach, as am I, and a Supervisor, as I am not. Thank you so much for joining me today, Betsy. It's like we're like on similar paths like CTI. Did you do leadership?

Betsy Block:

Not yet, but it's coming, it's coming.

Garry Schleifer:

I did leadership in '09. There was a separate pod of a group of people kept talking from 09. And they wouldn't let anybody else in. So somebody else created another one and we started in January of 2020. And we met last year and we meet every other week for an hour, and last month, we all met in Florida for a week of totally unstructured. So I kind of think that, you know, it could have been a real conflict because we've not lived together in the same house, 5 people. So, you know, it's kind of interesting that we have the possibility, but, according to your article, it doesn't always have to be so. So, okay, the big question. Are you ready?

Betsy Block:

I'm ready.

Garry Schleifer:

What called you to write this article at this time, other than me calling you?

Betsy Block:

Like any great idea, the idea comes to you. You don't get to the idea. It shows up and you can't avoid it and it's in everything that you do. And there was a feedback that I got from a client who said to me you know, the best thing about this engagement with you was you were able to bring us to conflict without it burning. And when you go through systemic team coaching training, you talk about sitting in the fire with your clients and we think about this spicy, difficult area of being with clients. And I started reflecting right, why was I getting this feedback? What was different? That they were able to do this in partnership with me and this was unusual. And I realized I'd heard this feedback a few times.

Betsy Block:

And then I went back and I mentioned this client in the article of this client that said what we want to get to is conflict. That's what we're doing on purpose. We want to be here and, like any good researcher, I went off the deep end because I have a, having worked in my leadership roles in the nonprofit sector, I was in research and program evaluation, and had done strategic planning and all kinds of things before that. So research is part of my zone of genius and and I just went down the rabbit hole about this and it just kept opening up to me and the realizations and I just kept dipping back into it and it was so rich but it t he idea sat in front of me and wasn't going anywhere.

Garry Schleifer:

And we prompted you. Then came the email that said why not write for choice? And you went maybe it's time. Well, we're glad you did. We're glad you did. And just to refer back for those listening, the article states about this particular client and they said what they wanted their system to look like. They said we will be going in full tilt, disagreeing with and supporting each other until we get to the aha moment. And when you just think about conflict, oh my goodness, when you define, like when I first saw it, and you see conflict, I'm like and I do what most people do. Like you said, people tense up when they hear the word conflict. Their definition of conflict references serious arguments, childhood parental fights or even warfare. Tell us more about how you see conflict.

Betsy Block:

Well, I think conflict is a broad definition and I think the basis of conflict is you have seemingly incompatible ideas, you're surfacing seemingly incompatible ideas and one of the things that I want to posit is you have to think about that as a continuum, right? There's unskilled conflict when it gets to the shouting and the yelling and the hurt, and that's an unskilled variation of conflict. But there's another end of the continuum where ideas get surfaced and they differ from each other and we know what to do and how to handle them, and it's skilled and it's creative. And what this client in particular held and when I started dipping into the research about this is if you want to innovate, if you want to stretch, you have to be able to surface those ideas, let them be incompatible and piece through them. You have to be able to dissent.

Betsy Block:

And what was unique about this client? They were starting a nonprofit in the social justice arena that was really innovative and different and pushing boundaries at the time and creating a nonprofit in that arena. What they were trying to do, the message they wanted to create, following a simple, easy, harmonious path and bypassing conflict altogether they weren't going to get anywhere creative and, as I said, research backs up what they already knew and they had just a special relationship, and still do, and they were able to kind of create and push and they designed that with such an intention. It was really gorgeous.

Garry Schleifer:

That's great, yeah, and you said it really well. I had to reread it. I'm going they did, like really you can do this? And then, throughout your article too, you mentioned like, for example, you stated teams so focused on consensus that failure to allow dissenting ideas in the mix, while possibly efficient, can result in missing opportunities to innovate. And that just goes back to your whole title Supportive Innovation, right Conflict and Supportive Innovation.

Betsy Block:

There are these conflicting ideas. I'm really conflict-averse. I don't want to do conflict. Conflict makes me nervous. But are you going to be the person who sits in the room and sits on your hands and feels your nervous system tense up in the other direction from not saying the thing you want to say because, well, everybody's already agreed, there's harmony. I don't want to disrupt harmony. I'm not going to rock the boat, right? So which is the worst? Hating conflict? It is like choking on bile and that's kind of a false consensus because people aren't speaking out, people aren't sharing ideas, and it's not a positive work culture. It's toxic positivity.

Garry Schleifer:

Oh yeah, I think we talked about in that Unspeakables issue, a toxic positivity, yeah.

Betsy Block:

Yeah.

Garry Schleifer:

That's great.

Betsy Block:

That's why, you know, there's all this psychological research and I can't remember if I put it in the article or not, but individuals are more creative than teams unless you allow dissent.

Garry Schleifer:

Say that again.

Betsy Block:

Individuals are more creative than teams or groups unless there is a voice of dissent unless dissent is welcome in the room. Got it?

Garry Schleifer:

Oh wow, that's interesting. That's why I had to say it again. It sounded very profound, thank you so.

Betsy Block:

OH, you were going to ask a question.

Garry Schleifer:

Well, I am, but I want to make sure there weren't other, other drops of wisdom about to pop out.

Betsy Block:

I think the reason this really came up in the non-profit sector is that I think, culturally, non-profits have their mission-driven organizations and when we think about mission driven organizations there's a close connection to wanting harmony, that when you're mission driven you're thinking a lot more about connection, because a lot of organizations I have worked with have social purpose and so social connection is really high value.

Betsy Block:

And so there's this perception that if I value social connection, I'm not going to disagree with you. I'm not going to argue with you. That would be disruptive to our culture and it's this myth that the people are stepping over that if I disagree with you, that's going to impact our relationship as opposed to support it and feed it and actually be more in service of our mission.

Garry Schleifer:

Wow, okay, so I'm having trouble putting the not-for-profit together with innovation. Without giving away names or confidentiality, can you give an example of what's happened in that realm?

Betsy Block:

Non-profits are at a really difficult time right now and you know the funding is harder to get. Resources are more scarce, funders are changing how they work, going after donors is harder and a lot of nonprofits that we're seeing have been working on their objectives for 10, 15, 30, 50 years and the ideal for a nonprofit is to put itself out of business. If I'm addressing a social issue, I want to put myself out of business. If I haven't solved it in 10, 30, however many years, that problem has gotten more complex. If you're gonna solve a more complex problem, you're not going to get there by the same ways that you've been doing it up till now. And so I think about oh gosh, without violating confidentiality, some of the work that I do is in the government sector, right so, and work with like a Department of Social Services, and they have new technology being introduced all the time. Their software systems are changing, government regulations are changing. I think about in the US one of the big changes that just got handed down is homelessness is going to be more criminalized and that's a sweeping change that's going to have a lot of impacts on delivery of fundamental social services to the unhoused or marginally housed and all of the connected social services that go with that.

Garry Schleifer:

Did

Betsy Block:

Yes, it is. There was a recent Supreme Court decision that said we can criminalize being homeless. That's a topic for a whole other day.

Betsy Block:

But if you think of the impact of that and the government not just that's not there's a police impact, but there's a whole network of how social services work together that if you want to avoid actually treating people as criminals and you want to solve the problem, you now have to do it differently, and you have to do it quickly. If everybody shut up and tried to agree with everybody else, and wasn't willing to shift how they do work, to push at the edges, to disagree with each other, to push innovation and the way that we think of human-centered design and a lot of the work around how you really want to do consensus building. We're not going to innovate, and then the people that we care most about are going to suffer because we're not adapting fast enough.

Garry Schleifer:

Yeah, Wow, great Thank you. Thank you for that. That was very helpful. I want to reel back a little bit to what something you said like five minutes ago that was also of interest and I was holding on to this one is so okay, there's, I hear conflict management out in the profession and then what you're saying is coaching into conflict. So what's the distinction?

Betsy Block:

So conflict management is when we've you know, not all conflicts created equal. Right, we conflict over different things and you have to distinguish between is there interpersonal conflict going on between you? Is this a values conflict that's between people that's not in service of a complex thing we're trying to get done. Because when I talk about conflict in service of innovation, we're talking about how we do, how we serve our mission. What we're not talking about, what we're not trying to conflict around, is how we connect and relate to each other. Disagreements over politics or values or socio-demographic stuff, like when there's a lot of intergenerational conflict in the workplace and navigating a lot of those things, and sometimes those things go off the rails and that's where conflict management comes in.

Betsy Block:

How do you reel back? How do you repair? That's when you want conflict management. When conflict has gotten to the destructive side, you need to manage that and repair and bring that back in.

Betsy Block:

Versus coaching into conflict which is looking for the right arenas, looking for the right tools, looking for the right purposes and bringing in that conflict that's going to be of service. Lencioni, who we all think about in the Five Dysfunctions of Team, wrote a book called the Advantage and in there he talks about the conflict continuum. Earlier we talked about kind of that toxic positivity at one end and the destructive at the other, and that sweet spot in the middle is where innovation really happens. They're optimal conflict zone. But conflict management really comes in when you're on that destructive end of things and you need to bring it back and heal and repair.

Garry Schleifer:

That's amazing. It has me throughout this part of the conversation. I'm remembering a client who listens to this podcast regularly, so they know who they are and when we first started our engagement, the key word that struck with me about conflict management was the word values. There was a value of trust that wasn't there and so we just leaned into that. That person, my clients, importance of trust and where it was there and where it was not. And now the relationship with a particular person that was first mentioned in the beginning of the engagement has totally transformed. Totally transformed. It was like it's kind of like you're just calling it out in the room and saying, ok, so why is that important to you to have the relationship? W hat's causing the breakdown? It was a misalignment with your values and things like that.

Betsy Block:

There's a place where conflict management comes into what happens when we bring in conflict and it goes off the rails.

Betsy Block:

What happens when we have a history of what conflict looks like and how we talk about that, when we manage things that go wrong that we need to discuss, so they're interconnected. You have to be ready that it's not going to go perfect. What if you fail at this if it doesn't go well? So they're not disconnected. But I think, because we all talk about conflict management so much, it's a thing we need to fix. Conflict management implies that conflict has become problematic and we need to manage it or fix it. Performance improvement plan for conflict.

Garry Schleifer:

That's a whole parking lot, that one too.

Betsy Block:

I'm sure there's going to be some feedback from people who are really well trained in conflict management who are going to tell me that's not the case, but I'm talking about the association. I think when people hear about conflict management because we've talked a lot about what happens to our nervous system and how we deregulate when we think about conflict, and I think when people hear we're going to get trained on conflict management, they're like, oh, we're going to get trained on how to fix something that went wrong.

Betsy Block:

Because I suspect for people who are really well trained in conflict mediation and conflict management and I have a dear colleague who is and we spent a lot of time talking about the difference and the connection between what we were doing. One of the other pieces is when do you need a third party to help you navigate? When do you need somebody to represent that neutral perspective to help everybody come together, and when are you able to hold it as a team yourself?

Garry Schleifer:

Yeah.

Betsy Block:

And thinking about it also from that perspective.

Garry Schleifer:

Well, then brings up the question you know what are signals that the team is not ready for constructive conflict, and how do you manage that?

Betsy Block:

So I think one of the big things is you know you have to assess and you brought up trust right.

Betsy Block:

Anytime I'm going into a team coaching engagement, we start with an assessment and we look and see what are the strengths and assets of that team and where do they feel like they need to shore up a little more? And trust is definitely one of those things. Another that I'm really careful about is, you know, particularly in the US, and I'm not sure if it's true in Canada as well is if you can't, and especially in the social sector, talk about a white supremacy culture, you probably are headed into toxic positivity. There's a lot of things about how we manage, how we communicate, how we deal with hierarchy and systems that, if you can't acknowledge and talk about that showing up in the room, probably haven't met the ground conditions for having healthy conflict yet.

Garry Schleifer:

Right. I guess somebody like yourself you would teach healthy conflict what that is like instructurally versus coach-like.

Betsy Block:

Well, I think teach is a difficult word, right? I think every team has to get there on their own, and there are those steps that facilitate them yeah.

Betsy Block:

Well, get the team to define what conflict is for them, right, because for every team it's going to look different. Every team has its own culture and I think you pointed to another prerequisite is that it has to have a clear sense of its values. And how is, how is the kind of conflict that team going to engage in supportive of their values and supportive of their mission? So each team is going to look a little bit different.

Garry Schleifer:

Oh, of course, Right, yeah, granted it.

Betsy Block:

So I think the way that I step organizations into it right is first let them notice that that conflict is an issue. Just talk about where is it right now. Be real honest about where it is right now and what's coming up for people and think about that. The second thing is how do you define conflict for this team? Do you want to call it rumbles?

Betsy Block:

it conflict, what do you call it? That is the thing that's right for your team, because maybe the word con, maybe that team is never going to get to the word like let's dive into conflict.

Garry Schleifer:

Yeah.

Betsy Block:

Some may say like we do rumbles. There's a term that comes out of a lot of the anti-racist movement and a lot of the work on liberatory frameworks. That talks about principled struggle. Right, If we're going to fight the big things, we have to be able to navigate complexity in our own system. And the Tanya Lee is the one who coined this term and talks about principled struggle. And so, depending on the context within each organization and their values, they're going to name that and so that's how you coach into.

Betsy Block:

That is not telling, not offering reminding, like all the basic coach competency stuff of holding your client creative resource fallen whole. And when you're talking about team coaching generative, let's surface your values and let's anchor in your values. And then how do you define this thing that keeps showing up? What do you do when there's conflicting or seemingly incompatible ideas in the room? What do you want to call it and how does it look for you to walk through this? And I think, as coaches, one of the things I want to, one of the things I didn't really talk about in the article because there's so many pieces to this gets into drama triangle.

Garry Schleifer:

Say that again.

Betsy Block:

Gets into drama triangle.

Garry Schleifer:

Okay.

Betsy Block:

Which is if I think, if I don't trust my team to handle the conflict, I'm trying to be their hero. I am trying to rescue them from the perils of conflict rather than being their coach, holding them as creators to navigate the challenge.

Garry Schleifer:

Right.

Betsy Block:

So when I think about working with my clients, teams and also individuals I have to remember to position them as creators in this, Holding those definitions and looking for the frameworks that serve them, and I can give guideposts right I do have some expertise in this. There are guideposts that are there. There's fun stuff. There's fun conflict. There's stuff that teams don't even think is conflict.

Betsy Block:

Oh never thought of that. There's an improv game world's worst. And when I'm working with a team that's trying to solve something and there's so much weight attached to being right like, forget about designing the right thing. Design the absolute worst thing. Design the thing that absolutely won't solve this, and you know what they're really happy to disagree about and compete with each other. Out and throw in. There are the worst things that's funny and.

Betsy Block:

But what's amazing about it right is that the flip side to the worst thing is the best thing. And after you've gone through this process of getting people to sort through, like well, this is awful, this is awful, this will be worse. No, this would be worse. And there's no ego in it, because nobody's trying to be right, everybody's trying to actually be wrong.

Garry Schleifer:

Wrong.

Betsy Block:

There's no weight, there's no attachment.

Garry Schleifer:

.

Betsy Block:

That's different like no. Our nervous systems relax. Fine. But then we coach out to say, let's see what's here, let's mine this for the other side of it, you've given space for all these different ideas to come in and it's it's conflict. We're going to disagree about what's worse but, there's no attachment to it right, that's different.

Garry Schleifer:

like you said, no ego. Wow, a little sneaky. Garry That sounds like a lot of fun. I can't wait to be in a group that's coached by you, in a team. I love it, I love it, oh my goodness. Well, I have something else to ask you, and that is and you've kind of been leading throughout, you're very comfortable with this, but how does a coach like me what, what am I holding that's keeping me away from embracing more conflict?

Betsy Block:

Well going to be a total coach in a moment. Gary, what are you holding on to? is

Garry Schleifer:

well, no, . me. And uh, you know what? I will be more than happy to answer. That is is what we said earlier about what I think conflict is. Before we had this conversation before you, we published this article, but now it's I I actually hold it a lot, with a lot more space and grace than I did before.

Garry Schleifer:

It's like, wow, this is. I don't. I love it, right. It's like it's something to get your teeth into, it's a meat and skin in the game, whatever you want to call it. But to me it's a bit more fun because it's so revealing. It's like I took a course in Landmark called the Forum and they said unfulfilled expectation leads to upset and an unfulfilled possibility is just another possibility. So if a client is upset about something or there's a conflict, I'm like, oh, this is great. So what values were not being honored? What was the cause? What was the origin? What would you want differently? What was you know? So? So I'm not. I'm not as afraid of conflict as I might have been when I was first starting on my coaching journey.

Betsy Block:

I think there's probably a few pieces to coaches really stepping into conflict. I think one, as you point to it, is just experience.

Betsy Block:

The more experience you have in coaching, the more times it shows up, the more you begin to realize my client's not going to break if I let them experience conflict and you get more and more confident about that creative, resourceful and whole aspect of your clients and their ability to hold that conflict the trust of the clients. I think the second piece is some myth busting, and I've written a different article on a different context for for myth busting. Right, what are all of the myths that you have around consensus, around conflict being unpleasant, around where the best ideas come from, around you know, are you the heroing of the teams and you're? You know, oh, my god, I'm not helping them when I do that. There's a handful of myths that are worth busting there.

Betsy Block:

I think the third piece is holding conflict is emotionally and all those things taxing as a coach and you have to design a space to notice and heal. And that's where I think coaching supervision plays a really fundamental role in being able to hold conflict. It both allows you to notice and drop those barriers to navigating it, building that maturity and awareness of clients, knocking through those myths. You're going to do that on your own if you have a space like reflective practice, like supervision, to notice and heal from that. That that's how you begin to see, oh gosh, I, I am going to be okay, doing this, those revelations really come through. Yeah, it's not going to kill us folks.

Garry Schleifer:

Let me. I'm here to tell you it actually leads to deeper coaching, deeper impact, deeper awareness, right? So, yeah, yeah, thank you, and would you be willing to make that available, the myth busting article, to our people?

Betsy Block:

Absolutely Awesome, thank you.

Garry Schleifer:

Thank you. I want to ask one last question, because we do have to wrap up shortly. So what would you like our audience to do as a result of this article and this conversation? .

Betsy Block:

So you're kind of saying what doesn't kill you makes you strong, right Becky? Where'd generally check in Becky with from, yourself Betsy? conflict with your clients and check all of your assumptions. And then I think the second thing is do find a space for supervision with somebody like me or many of the other amazing supervisors that are out there, to really sift and sort through what it is to hold conflict with your one-on-one clients or with, especially with teams, because it is incredibly powerful when you can let your clients walk into stuff, walk into that heat and navigate it and know that you have the fiber and the strength as a coach to hold your clients through that so you're kind of saying what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right becky?

Garry Schleifer:

oh my god, see where'd I get becky from B3, you too everybody does. B

Betsy Block:

Oh my goodness, oh wow, we uncovered something there. Everybody does that. It's the secret B3. to, my goodness, oh wow, we uncovered something there.

Garry Schleifer:

I was at wondering about the b3 um yeah, uh, it's my, it's just my name the three b's got it. .

Betsy Block:

Thank you very much. So yeah, but I would say, like I really invite my invite coaches into supervision as probably one of the the best pathways into feeling more comfortable navigating conflict and and noticing when you're doing it, noticing when you shy away from it and creating your own path into it yeah, well, thank you very much.

Garry Schleifer:

I want to leave our betsy@ b3coach. com a quote from the end b3coach. com your article and I will interject a bit into their coaching teams or one-on-one clients, like I do to. Productive conflict will involve some myth busting and making the case that innovation is worth it for them. The reward for clients will be organizational structures that are more innovative. The reward for clients will be organizational structures that are more innovative, sustainable and healthier. Healthy conflict, yay, wow. That is absolutely amazing, betsy. Where can we, where can our audience, reach you? What's the best way?

Betsy Block:

They can email me, betsy at b3coachcom or through my website, b3coachcom. .

Garry Schleifer:

Got it Awesome and I just want to say thank you so much, first of all, for writing this for us. I always love it when I learn so much from an article and from the conversation, so thank you very much for stepping in. Don't be a one-hit wonder If you got something else that you're thinking about write for us again. Theme or not theme we take them both. So thank you so much.

Betsy Block:

Thank you for having me. choice-online.

Garry Schleifer:

That's it for this episode of Beyond the Page. For more episodes, subscribe via your favorite podcast app, most likely the one that got you here. Don't forget to leave your remarks and share with a friend. We'd love to reach more people. If you're not a subscriber to Choice Magazine, you can sign up from your free digital issue of Choice Magazine by clicking on the QR code or by going to choice-onlinecom and clicking the sign up now button. I'm Gary Schleifer. Enjoy the journey of mastery. Thanks again, Betsy.

Betsy Block:

Thank you.