Managing former peers and friends is genuinely hard, and pretending nothing has changed is the fastest way to make it harder. Lia walks through three moves: name the relationship shift out loud, co-create norms for feedback and hard conversations, and own your authority instead of downplaying it. This episode is especially useful for new managers who got promoted from within their own team.
This episode is part of the Team Culture, Dynamics & Tough Personalities series. Browse all episodes →
Mic drop moments
“Just because two people aren’t getting along at the moment, don’t really wanna talk to each other, this doesn’t mean you have to change each of their jobs around completely.”
“This is how we manage as a coach. This is how we make sure our teams are responsible and accountable for their work because it is their jobs.”
“…when we get out of that default of someone comes to me with a problem and let me just run it and solve it immediately, that’s where we start to see our team members really step up as leaders.”
“If two people are in a weird vibe, in a weird space, this will throw off the whole vibe of the team. It’s something you can’t let continue.”
Episode highlights
Why you cannot let team conflict fester
Two people in a weird vibe will throw off the entire team. Productivity slows, motivation chips away, and the longer you wait, the worse it gets. Lia’s framing is direct: conflict makes a lot of managers uncomfortable, but dealing with it is the job. People do not have to be best friends. They do have to be able to work together effectively.
Strategy 1: Help them find common ground first
When people are in conflict, they assume the other person is completely opposed to them on everything. Lia’s first move is to bring them together and ask what they actually agree on. This technique comes from negotiation tactics. It shifts the conversation from win-or-lose to “we’re not as far apart as we thought.”
The example she uses: two people co-presenting on a project, and one person put their name on more slides and took more credit. A productive common-ground conversation surfaces things like: we both cared about this project, we both wanted it to succeed, we both put our best effort in. That shared foundation makes the specific disagreement easier to address.
Strategy 2: Do not take sides, even privately
Even if you privately agree with one person, showing favoritism as the manager makes things worse. The other team member will feel the situation is irreparable and may become more disruptive. If you have a closer relationship with one of them, Lia recommends addressing it directly behind the scenes: tell them you are not going to weigh in, you have to stay neutral, and that their frustration is valid but this is not the conversation for it.
The manager’s job is to act in the interest of the whole team. Favoring one person over another creates problems that outlast the original conflict.
Strategy 3: Hold both people accountable for the work anyway
This is Lia’s biggest lever for calming the Sunday Scaries around a conflict. Two people not getting along does not mean the work stops or that you have to redesign their entire jobs. The work still has to get done, and they are still responsible for it.
The coaching move here is to ask them to propose the solution: “What do you two suggest? How do we get this over the finish line? Come back to me with a plan.” You are available to support and mediate, but the accountability stays with them. This is what managing as a coach looks like, and it is also where you learn a lot about your people. How someone shows up during a conflict is a real signal when you are deciding who to develop into a leadership role.
One important caveat
All three strategies apply to everyday workplace conflicts, like disagreements over how a project should run or who gets credit on a presentation. If something has crossed a line and HR needs to be involved, get HR involved immediately. If you are a business owner without an HR person, find an HR consultant. Do not try to manage outside your depth when legal or safety issues are in play.
Related episodes in this cluster
- Ep 224: Why certain team members bug you (and how to actually handle it). When a team member drives you up the wall but is technically doing their job, the problem is rarely performance. Lia breaks down three specific archetypes that trigger leaders, explains what each one is actually signaling, and gives you a concrete strategy for each. This episode is especially useful for owners and founders who keep dreading their own one-on-ones.
- Ep 218: How to get out of the friend zone with your team members. Being friendly with your team is great until it erodes accountability and makes hard conversations feel impossible. Lia walks through a three-step reset: name your leadership style out loud, set real boundaries, and commit to having the hard conversations consistently. This episode is especially useful for small-team owners and founders who hired people they already knew personally.
- Ep 144: How to motivate and align your team when everyone feels like they are sprinting a marathon. Motivating a team under tight deadlines comes down to shared context, early visibility, and a culture where people feel seen beyond their project output. Alison Curtis and Janessa Mason, leaders at creative agency Skona, share how they align client services and creative teams through transparent communication, collaborative timeline-setting, and deliberate relationship-building at every level. This episode is especially useful for founders, agency leaders, and anyone managing across departments that can feel like they have competing agendas.
- Ep 141: How to manage former friends without making things weird. Managing former peers and friends is genuinely hard, and pretending nothing has changed is the fastest way to make it harder. Lia walks through three moves: name the relationship shift out loud, co-create norms for feedback and hard conversations, and own your authority instead of downplaying it. This episode is especially useful for new managers who got promoted from within their own team.
Want to go deeper?
The Unstoppable Team. How to build a team that runs without you in the room.
Full transcript (click to expand)
This is how we make sure our teams are responsible and accountable for their work because it is their jobs. And I think when we get out of that default of someone comes to me with a problem and let me just run it and solve it immediately, that’s where we start to see our team members really step up as leaders. Welcome to the Managing Made Simple podcast, where I bring a decade of experience working in some of the most influential companies in tech to help you navigate the ins and outs of being a people manager from conflicts to feedback, to delegating and more.
We will leave no stone unturned when it comes to what makes us love managing, kind of hate it and everything in between. Doesn’t matter if you’re a new manager looking for some tips or a seasoned manager looking up their game. Everyone is welcome to hang out with Managing Made Simple. Let’s go. Let’s go. Let’s go. Welcome back to the show and Happy Sunday, which means it is a Sunday Scaries episode. And today’s topic is that dreaded feeling of walking into the office, or if you are from home, flip and open that laptop, dialing into that first meeting, checking your emails when two of your team members are in a conflict.
This situation sucks. As the manager, let’s just call it out because you sort of have to play conflict mediator, and you have to get work done, and this thing is completely getting in the way. So it’s something that you really don’t wanna avoid and let’s. Fester because this can really slow down productivity and efficiency and effectiveness on a team. And worse, it can really chip away at motivation. If two people are in a weird vibe, in a weird space, this will throw off the whole vibe of the team.
It’s something you can’t let continue. Even if conflict makes you super uncomfortable, that’s the job as the manager. You have team members, you have to help figure it out. Doesn’t mean people have to be best friends. No. But it means people have to be able to work together effectively. And how do we get there using these three strategies? First one, helping your team members establish a common ground. A lot of times when we are in a conflict, we think the other person is so totally in the other direction and they’ll never see our point and we don’t agree on anything at all.
And actually sitting together and saying, okay, well what do we agree? That starts to show some empathy that shows to, so, okay, we’re not so far off. This isn’t so, so far gone. We’re just disagreeing on this one piece. And you as the manager can step in and say, Hey, let’s have a conversation. I want to kind of figure out what the, what the big issue is. Let’s start by figuring out what do we agree on?
Where are we aligned? This is a strategy used in negotiation tactics because it’s something that can help us see. It’s not a win or lose, it’s not a zero sum game that we can have an effective conversation. Using an example, let’s say two people were collaborating on a project and one person said, Hey, I want to get ahead, and they built out the presentation. They put their name on more of the slides and took more of the credit in the presentation, and the other person feels pretty slighted by that situation.
Getting these people together and saying, Hey, let’s figure out the common ground. Ideally the common ground is something like, we both really cared about this project. We both wanted it to succeed. We both put our best effort forward. That’s the kind of thing you’re trying to tease apart. Second, We don’t wanna side with someone, even if we kind of totally agree with one of the sides. We don’t want to put that forward. We don’t wanna make it seem like we’re siding with someone.
And this is even if you are closer with a team member, if you have a tighter relationship with a team member, because especially if you’re closer with a team member, that other person is gonna think there’s no point. Why bother? They might be even more disruptive. They might feel like it is irreparable. So it’s important to not take a side to be really objective. And again, if you’re closer to one of those team members behind the scenes saying, Hey, I’m not gonna take a side here.
I have to really be neutral as the manager, I understand you’re frustrated. This is not something I’m gonna talk about right now. That can be hard to do, but it’s really, really important because you want to be objective. You’ve gotta be neutral. You are the manager. Your interest is in the good of the whole team, and making it seem like you’re favoring one person over the next that is going to cause all sorts of problems later.
Third thing, and I think this is gonna really be the biggest thing that helps your Sunday scar is. Is to still hold those team members accountable to getting their work done. Okay? Just because two people aren’t getting along at the moment, don’t really wanna talk to each other, this doesn’t mean you have to change each of their jobs around completely. This doesn’t mean the work doesn’t get done. This essentially is between the two people. You absolutely can be there to coach and mediate and be there to help them work through it.
But they are ultimately responsible for getting their work done. And so I think coming at it with a framing of, Hey, what do you two suggest? Are there ways that you want to divide this up? What do you propose? How do we get this over the finish line? I’ll leave it to you two to come up with a plan. I’ll support it. Come back to me with ideas. Putting forward that you have an open mind around changing it, but that it does still have to get done.
This sets the expectation that they are still accountable for the work. And again, this is that thing where just because something went wrong on your team, it doesn’t mean you as a manager have to jump in and solve everything. This is how we manage as a coach. This is how we make sure our teams are responsible and accountable for their work because it is their jobs. And I think when we get out of that default, Someone comes to me with a problem and let me just run it and solve it immediately.
That’s where we start to see our team members really step up as leaders and you might find through a conflict, one person really, really shows up well and one person really shows up poorly, and that’s an important signal to see when you are looking to make somebody into a manager or ask somebody to lead a project or whatever. They are ultimately responsible for figuring it out with your support, but they are ultimately responsible for figuring it.
So they can get that work done. Before I wrap, I do wanna caveat that this conversation is talking about conflicts that are kind of everyday conflicts, a disagreement, uh, around how a project should be run, how a presentation should go. These are not issues where HR is getting involved. If something is, is coming up on your team where it feels like, man, this really crossed a line, I’ve gotta get HR involved, then get HR involved. Or if you’re a business owner or, or you have a small business and you don’t have an HR person, then find an HR consultant who can advise you because we wanna make sure that everyone is always protected and, and if things feel like it’s crossed a line, you wanna get those answers right away so that you’re not outside of your depth.
With that said, I hope this has helped quiet some of those Sunday Scaries around a conflict amongst team members. It is rough when you’re a manager watching this unfold and you’re kind of like, uh, just figure it out. We gotta move forward. I get it. But these three things I talked about today, hopefully help you move it forward, get this resolved quickly, and, and show people that yeah, they are ultimately responsible for getting things done. And if you have questions, because I know you have questions, send me the text MANAGER to 4 1 5 2 3 4 5 7 1 6.
Then you’ll be notified when I have my q and a sessions where you can bring all your questions. You can send me your own questions directly through text, or you can get my manager tip of the week. Sign up for that. That is texting manager to 4 1 5 2 3 4 5 7 1 6. See you next. That’s all I have for today. Thank you so much for tuning in to the Managing Made Simple Podcast where my goal is to demystify the job of people management so that together we can make the workplace somewhere everyone can thrive.
I always love to hear from you, so please reach out at liagarvin.com or message me on LinkedIn. See you next time.
Questions this episode answers
What should I do first when two of my employees are in conflict?
Start by helping them find common ground. When people are in conflict, they tend to assume they disagree on everything, but getting them in a room and asking what they actually agree on shifts the dynamic. It shows them they are not as far apart as they think, and it moves the conversation away from win-or-lose thinking. As the leader, you facilitate that: ask where they are aligned, what they both care about, and build from there before getting into what went wrong.
Should I take sides when two team members are fighting?
No, even if you privately agree with one person, you cannot let that show. The moment it looks like you are favoring someone, the other person assumes the situation is hopeless and may become even more disruptive. If you are closer with one team member, you can tell them privately that you have to stay neutral as the leader, but make clear that favoritism is off the table. Your job is to serve the good of the whole team, and that requires being genuinely objective in how you show up.
How do I keep work moving forward when two employees aren't getting along?
Hold them accountable to getting the work done anyway. A conflict between two people does not mean their responsibilities disappear or that you have to restructure everything around them. Instead of solving it for them, ask what they propose: how do they want to divide things up, what is their plan to get it over the finish line? Make clear you are open to adjustments, but the work still has to happen. They are responsible for figuring it out with your support, not handing the problem over to you to fix.
What kind of employee conflict should involve HR instead of just the manager?
The strategies around finding common ground and staying neutral apply to everyday workplace disagreements, like a dispute over how a project was run or who got credit on a presentation. If the conflict feels like it has crossed a line, do not try to handle it yourself. Get HR involved right away. If you are a small business owner without an HR team, find an HR consultant who can advise you. You want to make sure everyone is protected and that you are not operating outside your depth.
How can a manager avoid jumping in and solving every conflict for their team?
Resist the instinct to take over the moment a problem surfaces. When someone brings you a conflict, your role is to coach and mediate, not to run point on solving it. Ask your team members what they suggest, what their plan is, how they want to handle it. This keeps accountability with them, which is where it belongs. It also gives you a real signal about who steps up and who does not, which matters when you are thinking about who to trust with bigger responsibilities down the road.