An Analysis of the effect of Organisational Conflict Management on Employee Performance in Lyantonde District Local Government

Abstract

Conflict at the workplace and among people is inevitable. This study was conducted to analyse the effect of organisational conflict management on employee performance in Lyantonde district local government, based on the objectives to establish the causes of conflict among employees, the understanding and perception of the employees on how the conflict management approaches have improved their work performance and the effects and different approaches/mechanisms in place to resolve conflict which arise among the district employees. An analytical study research design was undertaken with the use of both qualitative and quantitative approaches for data collection to explore the effect of organisational conflict management on employee performance. A total of 350 respondents including political leaders, employees and members of the public/service users, were included in the study. The findings revealed that different causes of conflict exist in the district administration are social, political and economic in nature. The most one being dictatorial governance from the top leaders. The district administration uses different mechanism, mostly applying open door mechanism but less has been achieved out of them as employees hold both positive and negative perceptions to conflict and its management. It was concluded that conflict exists in different forms and with different causes, therefore, demanding a multi-dimension approach in resolving it. Eemployees’ have a positive and negative perception to conflict and conflict is affecting the performance of the employees and negatively impacting on the progress of the entire infant district. It was accordingly recommended that, Lyantonde district administrators should recognize that conflict exists, and bring it out into the open so that arising issues can be effectively dealt with