A good book

Title: Listening to Conflict: Finding Constructive Solutions to Workplace Disputes Author: Erik J. Van Slyke Publisher: AMACOM ISBN: 0-8144-0429-4

Whether negotiating a contract, implementing a new policy, dealing with an irate customer or clashing wills with one's spouse, conflict is a routine part of everyday life.

But most of us make antagonistic mountains out of even minor disputes. When reasoning fails, we manipulate, bully or storm away. As conflict specialist Erik J. Van Slyke makes clear, we seldom do the one thing proven to bring productive resolutions: listen.

In his book, Listening to Conflict: Finding Constructive Solutions to Workplace Disputes, Van Slyke reveals the keys to listening with a difference-- with both self-awareness and a clear, unbiased grasp of the other side's objectives-to open the way to enhanced agreements.

Advocating an "inside-out approach" to the resolution process, the author firmly believes: "We cannot listen to and understand another party until we know how to listen to and understand ourselves."

The book uses examples and exercises to help readers improve communication and listening skills and begins by exploring the factors that create barriers to meaningful interaction-including individual personalities and cultural perspectives.

The book will help you become an objective mediator, adept at guiding combative parties to settlements and create a culture of constructive conflict.