In any healthy team of professionals, there will occasionally be disagreement. Team members bring different perspectives, priorities, and risk tolerances, so they will advocate for different paths forward. This discord seems like an annoying roadblock until you realize it’s better than the alternative. Corporate cultures where a single suggestion is mindlessly accepted offer far fewer opportunities for refining and finding the best option available.  

You don't have to give up efficiency or give up having a variety of opinions on the table. Healthy disagreement, respectful conversation, and finding a truly ideal solution are possible when you work toward inclusive leadership.  

Portland, Oregon has had its share of challenges, both front-and-center in workplaces as well as environmental concerns from stressful weather to global health crises. Even the most mild-mannered person can grow more irritable in the wake of major challenges and stressors. When stress reaches a breaking point, workplace conflict tends to increase. When this happens, managers and colleagues can feel like they don't have the strategies to help them de-escalate tensions in their workplace.

From first-time management roles up to C-suite executives, one of the challenges of leadership is experiencing more responsibility and as a result, more pressure. While your direct reports feel pressure from you to complete their work objectives, management up through the ranks have bigger goals to meet and less direct control over the outcome. It's important when implementing your leadership style to make sure you're maintaining balance even as things get stressful. These maintenance choices are part of what helps you ride the waves of pressure and come through stronger and more capable than before.

Many businesses and organizations strive for inclusivity, but what does it really mean to lead with inclusion in mind? An inclusive leader is someone who can pair and effectively use the skills of leadership, which often include making tough decisions, with the skills of inclusion, which mean listening effectively, taking all suggestions into account, and formulating teams that feel their input is weighted equally with the input of others. When you successfully become an inclusive leader, you find greater trust in your team, better working conditions that result in lower turnover, and general functionality in the office that leads to long-term success.

Different people use different methods to resolve conflict, and most people have one or more natural, preferred conflict resolution strategies that they use regularly. It is possible to scientifically measure an individual's inclinations toward specific conflict resolution strategies. In this article, we will discuss the five different categories of conflict resolution from the Thomas-Kilmann model, as well as their advantages and disadvantages.

It is no secret that in the last decade, Portland's population has grown and the makeup of its workforce has changed drastically to include multiple protected classes. As a business manager, you must provide a healthy, safe, and respectful workplace for every employee. You must also continue to grow and improve in areas such as diversity, transgender employees, and workplace harassment. Workplace stress affects everyone within the company and can impact not only your team's morale but also their productivity. 

Heiko Spoddeck has worked at PCC for the last 16.5 years teaching math, physics, and chemistry. This year is the first time he will teach “Transgender Employees - Creating an Inclusive Community.”

Having been with Portland Community College since 1999, Carolyn Waterfall has taught a wide variety of highly experiential and fun courses designed to enhance leadership, management and communication skills.

PCC's Continuing Education programming offers professional development workshops in addition to its long term certification programming. This Fall, PCC Professional Development & Training offers 4-8 hour courses in communication, leadership, delegating, resolving conflict, supervision and project management. 

Our personal and professional development courses offered this Fall provide advanced training in communication skills, motivating others, leadership and real estate, among other subjects.