engleski

Representation and Gender Differences in Conflict Management Strategies for Civil Servants in the Croatian Constitutional Court

The aim of our research was to determine which are the most common ways of managing conflict with state officials in the Croatian Constitutional Court, and to describe the relationship between the ways of managing conflicts with certain demographic variables (gender, level of qualification, work experience). The study involved 71 subjects, 68% of the total, even from the basic population, i.e. the total number of employees in the Croatian Constitutional Court. For data collection we used questionnaire, conflict strategies, which measures the representation of conflict management styles. The results showed that there were statistically significant differences in the representation of different ways of managing conflict in the sample of employees of the Constitutional Court: the most common way to resolve conflicts was cooperation / integration, and the least was common competition / combat. No statistically significant correlations were found between the dimensions of conflict management and working experience. The only statistically significant (and negative) correlation was found between the level of qualification and strategy competition / combat. There are no gender differences in relation to the supposed "gender-neutral" ways of managing conflict dimensions (compromise, cooperation and avoidance). In accordance with expectations, we found a statistically significant difference in the expected direction for the dimension of adjustment (higher average results for women). Contrary to expectations is statistically insignificant difference in the sex dimension of competition / combat, where we expect the higher results for males. An overview of the advantages and disadvantages, and practical implications of research and guidelines for the future, was given.

strategy; communication; conflicts; differences; correlations; officials

, November 12-14, 2009, in Zadar,