Managing Workplace Conflict: How to Find Meaning and Calm When Tensions Rise
The Real Skill You’re Missing: Conflict Mastery with Nadeen Sivic
Nadeen Sivic has spent 27 years leading tech teams across Australia and the UK — from complex corporates to creative startups. She is known as the fixer of messy teams. She brings a fresh, street-smart take on conflict: not as a crisis for HR, but as a normal part of work life to master. Follow her on LinkedIn.
Workplace conflict has a way of unsettling even the most experienced professionals. Whether it’s an unspoken disagreement in a meeting or a full-blown clash between personalities, tension at work often feels like something to avoid or fix quickly. But what if conflict isn’t the enemy?
Leadership coach Nadeen Sivic invites us to see it differently. Her view is refreshingly simple: conflict is a natural part of the human experience — and when we learn to understand it, it can become one of our greatest teachers.
Why We’re Thinking About Conflict All Wrong
For decades, many workplaces have operated under the unspoken rule that “good teams don’t fight.” Harmony is prized, differences are downplayed, and anything uncomfortable is quietly redirected to HR.
The result? A surface-level calm that hides a quiet storm. When teams treat conflict as a problem to be avoided, they also lose the opportunity for clarity, creativity, and connection.
As Sivic puts it, we’ve conditioned ourselves to believe the workplace should be perfect — as if tension is a sign of dysfunction rather than a sign of difference. But in reality, difference is the raw material of progress. It’s how ideas sharpen, innovation happens, and trust deepens.
Conflict Isn’t Chaos — It’s Contrast
Sivic describes conflict as part of a universal “law of contrast.” Just as light defines shadow and texture defines smoothness, differences in perspective define our understanding of the world — and of each other.
Her favourite analogy compares conflict to a tire meeting the road. A tire’s grip, after all, depends on friction. Too little, and we slide off course; too much, and we burn out. The goal isn’t to remove friction but to learn how to navigate it — to recognize the signs early and adjust with skill, rather than panic.
In the workplace, that means learning to spot early signals: a sharp tone, a missed deadline, a recurring tension in meetings. These aren’t failures. They’re feedback — clues that something beneath the surface needs attention.
From Contrast to Friction to Conflict
Sivic breaks down tension into three evolving stages: contrast, friction, and conflict.
Contrast begins when differences in personality, belief, or communication style emerge. This is the most creative phase — where diversity of thought can fuel innovation if handled with curiosity.
Friction develops when those differences are ignored or misunderstood. It’s the subtle tension that arises when something feels “off,” but no one names it.
Conflict surfaces when friction is left unchecked, often turning into resentment, defensiveness, or withdrawal.
The key, Sivic says, is learning to work at the level of contrast — where awareness and openness can prevent friction from taking root. “You can’t fix what you can’t see,” she reminds us. Awareness is the antidote.
Why Middle Managers Are Caught in the Crossfire
While senior leaders often receive extensive training in communication and leadership, many mid-level managers are left to navigate tension alone. Sivic calls this the “execution mosh pit” — the messy middle where strategy meets reality.
These managers are expected to meet deadlines, manage personalities, and deliver results, often with little guidance on human dynamics. They’re handed policies and status reports but not the emotional tools to address the real cause of most performance problems: unspoken conflict.
When unresolved tensions pile up, they quietly erode trust, creativity, and motivation. Delays, disengagement, and quiet quitting often trace back not to incompetence — but to discomfort around conflict.
How to Build Conflict Mastery
Sivic’s practical advice starts with something deceptively simple: observation.
She uses a tool she calls “Said, Done, Produced.” It’s a reflective exercise to help managers and team members alike see what’s really happening beneath the surface of a situation.
Said – What was said in the interaction?
Done – What was actually done afterward?
Produced – What result did it create?
The power of this tool lies in identifying misalignment. If what was said doesn’t match what was done, or the outcome feels off, that’s a signal to dig deeper. Instead of blaming or reacting, it encourages curiosity — what might be going on here that I can’t yet see?
This kind of reflective practice helps transform reaction into response. Over time, it builds what Sivic calls “conflict mastery” — the ability to stay calm, open, and aware when emotions run high.
Reframing Conflict as Growth
Managing workplace conflict isn’t about staying neutral or pretending everything is fine. It’s about being emotionally courageous enough to face difference without judgment.
For professionals in midlife, this reframe can be particularly powerful. By this stage, most people have seen enough corporate storms to know that tension is inevitable — but few have been taught to see it as a source of insight.
When we stop trying to eliminate conflict and instead engage with it mindfully, we often discover deeper truths about ourselves: our values, our triggers, and our capacity for empathy. In this sense, managing conflict becomes a form of personal growth — a pathway back to meaning in work that might have started to feel routine or draining.
Final Thoughts: The Quiet Power of Emotional Courage at Work
Conflict will always exist — but how we meet it defines our experience of work. When we shift from avoidance to awareness, we move from surviving tension to using it as a tool for alignment and growth.
Nadeen Sivic reminds us that friction isn’t a flaw in the system; it’s the place where energy and movement begin. The art of managing workplace conflict lies not in erasing differences, but in learning to listen, adjust, and lead with curiosity.
And perhaps that’s where meaning at work truly begins — in the willingness to stay present when things get uncomfortable, to see contrast not as division, but as the creative tension that makes us better, wiser, and more connected human beings.
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Managing Workplace Conflict with Nadeen Sivic
[00:00:00] Why we’ve been thinking about conflict all wrong
Lucia Knight: If you think workplace conflict is something to avoid, like the plague or handoff to hr, Nadeen Sivic wants you to think again.
In this episode, australian Nadeen shares her views on conflict as a natural, messy part of everyday work life that leaders are somehow expected to do well, but no one ever teaches managers conflict mastery.
We talk about boardroom brawls, execution mosh pits, and wearing summer tires on snowy roads, all while trying to survive your next teams meeting. Let's dive in. Nadeen, it seems to me that you believe we're thinking all wrong about conflict at work. Tell me more.
Nadeen Sivic: Okay. I, I do believe that we're thinking wrong about conflict at work. I think traditionally we have looked at conflict as a big bang event, and we've conditioned ourselves into believing that, you know, the workplace should be harmonious and perfect all the time. And that conflict is more of an. Admin place to be.
So it's a HR form to fill in. Hopefully not, but it can end in people exiting in tribunals and all sorts of things. And as a result, it comes with a lot of discomfort and we don't really like dealing with it. We like to tuck it away in a corner and say, well, that's where that lives, and let's just get on with the rest of our day.
And I, I don't believe that that's probably the right way to, to look at it.
[00:01:24] A new perspective: Conflict as contrast, not crisis
Lucia Knight: It prompts the question, what's a better way to think about conflict at work?
Nadeen Sivic: Well, I think we live with conflict. I think it's a natural part of the human state, and it conflict actually comes from this law of contrast that exists all through our universe. And if we look at every object in the planet, um, everything exists in contrast to each other so that we can see and recognize what it is.
So if we talk about things, you know, we've got color, so we've got depth and light and dark and texture and smells and, and you know, we're given the five senses to, to navigate that through the world.
[00:01:58] The “tire on snowy roads” analogy for managers
Nadeen Sivic: The best analogy I can come up with, the way that we should look at conflict or the way I certainly look at it is the tire and the road analogy.
So if we look at a tire and a road, these are two very, very different objects. We have a tire that has a different purpose and a different texture, and a and a road as well. Now for the manager navigating the tire on a road should be about the skill between the association of the tire and the road. If you've got a summer tire with a nice, beautiful, perfect asphalt road, everything's hunky dory.
But of course we know sometimes that that's not always the case. So sometimes we'll find ourselves driving a car that we've got a summer tire on and then it starts snowing and we think, well, how am I gonna get out of this? And the idea is to be able to recognize those signs early doors so that you can say, right, I've gotta bring a different set of skills to the table here.
Rather than just leave it and go hope for the best, and then of course, you know, slide off into a ditch and, and away we go. Yeah. So, and that's not what we want and that's how I, I see conflict as part of our day. Not a big bang event.
Lucia Knight: Lovely. And so, so it is just an everyday part of life, an everyday part of conversations, an everyday part of every meeting. Okay. So, but. That seems different to Norm.
[00:03:13] The gap in leadership training for middle managers
Lucia Knight: Why do you think we are so stuck on that older that that former way of thinking about conflict?
Nadeen Sivic: Well, I think we do leadership very well and I think we focus our attention on, you know, when you go into these large corporates, there's a lot of training and coaching and mentoring around the people dynamics and the team dynamics as you get up through the senior rank.
Lucia Knight: Mm-hmm.
Nadeen Sivic: But The poor managers that are left in the execution mosh pit, it's a sink or swim situation, more or less.
And a lot of them, you know, God bless their hearts, they're just thrown in with an employee handbook, uh, and how to fill in a status report and, and hope for the best. And then of course, they get in there in a few weeks in all of the, the people stuff comes up and think, well, what am I going to do with this?
Not actually recognizing what they're dealing with now is conflict, contrast and friction. So what we really need to do is take the management and look at that pool and say, how do we give them the tools and the habits so that they can learn all the team dynamics and the beautiful people dynamics and make that synergistic with their management function so that they're not just writing status reports and ignoring all them the stuff that is actually causing silent, compounded, you know, delays in delivery and, and reduction, in quality.
Lucia Knight: Oh my God. So say that again. So the three things that they need to focus on are, there's comfort
[00:04:37] Contrast → Friction → Conflict: The progression
Nadeen Sivic: So we have, so we have contrast. Usually it starts with contrast. So every human is, in contrast, we're all different. We're all little, you know, jelly beans in a bowl. So we start with contrast. So learning how to manage it at that contrast stage where we've got the different personalities, the different approaches, beliefs, et cetera.
That's where the power is. So we want to, to prevent instead of react at the end. So we have contrast if unmanaged, it can turn into friction and friction's. Okay. But if you say the wrong thing at the wrong time or say nothing at all, then it can actually fester. And at work, what we find, because it's not okay to kind of, you know, tops off and get into the 50 cuffs in an office, it will fester, you know?
[00:05:17] How conflict festers in modern teams
Nadeen Sivic: Yeah. Not that we haven't seen it, right. But we can, it'll feer, right? It will just sort of go underground in a very passive way, and then it will start to manifest in ways that we haven't seen before. And then we'll see things like weaponized delays and little backhanded compliments and suddenly. You know, you've got this little conflict kind of eroding slowly in the background, so it's, yeah, it goes from contrast to friction to conflict.
Lucia Knight: Conflict. And so one of the pieces of language I use a lot and I see it in work is boardroom brawling. And it doesn't have to be boardroom, but just meetings where there's nothing but lack of appreciation of the contrast, lack of interest or curiosity about the contrast, and there's nothing but friction that just builds into something giant like conflict.
So I love. I really love your work.
[00:06:07] Try this: Nadeen’s “Said / Done / Produced” framework
Lucia Knight: So if somebody is listening today and they've just heard the tiny tidbits of insight and it's resonating with them and they want to do something to become more adept at Conflict Mastery, can they do this week to start?
Nadeen Sivic: Okay. So I always start with, 'cause I, I believe that you can't fix what you can't see. So we have to start with a little observational tool that I call it said done produced. It's nothing flashy It's not like a piece of technology. You don't need a lot of, um, street smarts to use it. It's literally an observational skill where you look at a situation that you might have at work and you just take a little note and say what was said, what was done, and what was produced, and then look for the misalignment between those three points.
And it's, it's a tool that's very useful. 'cause it's not so much a leverage like, oh, you, you said you were gonna do this and, and I'm gonna wrap you now because you didn't. It's a tool to say, where do I need to shine a light to go a little bit deeper and what's going on under the hood here. So it's a very good a tool.
So it's said, done, and produced. And all you need is your pen and notebook and your brain thankfully
Lucia Knight: and produced. Lovely. And that's something that we don't need to put a link in the show notes too, because you've just told us exactly how to do it. So someone could do that in their next teams meeting or the next Zoom meeting or the next face-to-face meeting, and it would just shine a light on, Hey, this is working.
There's no conflict here, there's no, or I need to do something different and go a bit deeper. Wonderful. Thank you, Nadeen.
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