Welcome back to the Look and Sound of Leadership, an ongoing series of

executive coaching tips designed to help you be perceived in the workplace the

way you want to be perceived.

I'm Tom Henschel, your executive coach,

and today we're talking about resolving conflicts.

Halfway through Jean-Claude's coaching engagement, I was on the phone with his boss,

Carrie. My intention was to give him a brief update on the coaching. Much to my surprise,

I heard Carrie thanking me for helping Jean-Claude resolve the long-standing

antagonism between the data management group that Jean-Claude led and the accounting group. The rift between those groups started long before Jean-Claude got here, Carrie told me.

I never imagine this would be one of the outcomes of the coaching.

Well, I said, I'd love to take the coaching. Well I said I'd love to take the credit but Jean-Claude

and I actually haven't spoken much about this issue. I knew the two groups weren't

getting along but the coaching is focused on other issues.

At our next session, I asked Jean-Claude what he had done to bring the two groups together.

Here's what he told me.

By the way, I contributed very little to Jean-Claude's success,

but his story feels important to share.

His approach is a great model for averting situations that could become costly or demoralizing.

Okay, here's the story.

Within months of taking over the data management group, Jean-Claude heard complaints from his people

about poor data coming from accounting.

At about the same time, he received a nasty gram from an executive in accounting listing grievances about Jean-Claude's data management team.

...