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Léa suggests postponing the launch by a week. The data speaks for itself, and the recommendation seems reasonable. However, at the last team meeting, Marc had defended sticking to the original date. Agreeing to the change now would mean admitting he was wrong. The issue gets resolved when management decides to side with Léa, but Marc feels rejected as a result, and his working relationship with Léa suffers.

Conflicts with our colleagues, loved ones or team members can quickly stifle communication, heighten tensions and undermine relationships. However, a decision or compromise is not always enough to restore co-operation — for a solution to last, we must also repair the bond that will allow people to continue moving forward together.

Primates offer us a useful mirror here. Among them, the repair of that bond generally appears more direct — they re-establish contact, soothe one another and restore their relationships in the process.

Studies in primatology have documented these reconciliation behaviours and demonstrated their great importance: in species that depend heavily on co-operation for survival, maintaining group cohesion is vital.

But this mirror has its limits. Monkeys don’t have to grapple with bureaucratic, ideological or legal issues and they, too, are sensitive to experiences of domination, rivalry and aggression. But precisely because their conflicts are less complicated, they focus on aspects that human beings tend to obscure. Repairing social bonds takes centre stage.

Some research on social psychology and primatology suggests humans and primates differ in the weight they place on the ego. Among monkeys, reconciliation primarily serves to preserve the valuable social relationships essential to preserving access to resources, alliances and group protection. Humans add another layer — a positive but fragile self–concept, which can fuel aggression when questioned.

The following three mechanisms have one thing in common — they push the relational dimension of the conflict into the background, driven by the need to protect the ego:

The threat to identity, which transforms disagreement into a judgment of our personal worth.

Making conflicts invisible, which deprives the group of opportunities for collective learning.

Prioritizing the solution over the relationship, which weakens the bond even when the problem seems resolved.

When disagreement turns into judgment

In humans, when the ego feels attacked, we no longer simply strive to resolve the problem — we make sure we aren’t wrong. We view the other person’s opinions as personal attacks and the discussion focuses more on protecting our identity than on understanding.

Under these conditions, the bond weakens, trust erodes and even a good solution may be rejected if it means one party will lose face. In other words, the conflict itself does not threaten the relationship; rather, the problem arises when the ego gets involved. As long as everyone is primarily focused on protecting their image, finding a lasting solution will be difficult.

But we must qualify this: the importance placed on defending one’s own image varies according to cultural orientations. In more collectivist situations, conflict management tends to place greater emphasis on allowing the other party to save face and preserving the relationship. In more individualistic contexts, individual concern for saving face is generally more pronounced. Conflict can more easily shift from the initial disagreement to the defence of one’s position, autonomy or personal image.

Therefore, when tension rises, it’s important to ask whether the interaction seems more like a conversation or an implicit judgment, rather than continuing to argue. If necessary, the threat to identity should be defused before returning to the substance of the issue.

Hiding conflicts hinders learning

Among primates, conflicts and reconciliations are generally visible to the group. Since there is no longer a need to protect a particular image, the parties can openly reconcile. The other members then observe these social behaviours and, through repeated exposure, learn the ways of interacting within the group — including how relationships are repaired.

Among humans, the fear of losing face tends to lead people to avoid disagreements or to attempt to resolve them behind the scenes. As a result, the group rarely sees how a conflict can be addressed constructively, depriving members of shared models and learning opportunities. A frank and guided discussion of opposing viewpoints, by contrast, can promote more constructive conflict management.

This idea applies especially to conflicts that affect the entire group’s roles, rules or ways of working. Strictly interpersonal disputes are generally best addressed privately at first, since the presence of witnesses can intensify the need to protect one’s image. The goal, therefore, is not to make disputes public, but to highlight collective approaches that can serve as models.

When the solution is put ahead of the relationship

Among monkeys, reconciliation behaviours directly contribute to maintaining the group cohesion that their survival depends heavily upon. Conversely, modern humans, especially in the West, often prioritize outcomes at the expense of relationships — although humans remain social beings above all.

When relational tensions go unresolved, they don’t necessarily prevent the group from functioning; however, this facade is deceptive. Social cohesion acts as a protective mechanism that, when it’s absent, deprives the group of its ability to absorb shocks and limit “everyone for themselves” behaviour.

This is a common blind spot: performance metrics measure results, but not the quality of the relationships that make those results possible. A team can achieve its goals but become weaker in the process if it neglects relationships. The deterioration of relationships may go unnoticed if results remain high, but success will eventually be eroded because of unresolved tensions.

Treating conflict as a threat to relationships, rather than simply a problem to be solved, changes the nature of the intervention. The question turns out to be deeper than: Have we found the right answer? It boils down to: Have we repaired the relationship enough for this solution to be truly sustainable?

Centring the group

A debate can be settled with a single decision, but a relationship can only be repaired by devoting time to it — and that’s precisely what is most rarely addressed in a conflict.

Our intelligence allows us to analyze conflicts with subtlety, but it also gives us the means to complicate them: we interpret intentions, defend our position and protect our image, often at the expense of the relationship. However, a solution alone is not enough to restore the bond; it is the restored bond that allows the solution to hold.

It wouldn’t have taken much for Marc and Léa to do this. All they had to do was acknowledge that the original deadline was proposed in good faith, but that new information justified changing it. Allowing someone to change their position without losing face preserves the bond — and with it, the collaboration that must continue.

Jean Poitras ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d’une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n’a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.