Conflict resolution

One of the most important aspects of developing a project to benefit the community is meeting the people who are going to help you get there and creating lasting and fruitful relationships with them. This increases your chance of success as different people have different ideas, strengths, skills and experiences. We are certainly learning a lot about working effectively both within our ALG and with others we meet along the way. Unfortunately sometimes miscommunication and differing expectations can lead to relationships breaking down. Dealing with this has also been a challenge for our ALG.

We had decided to undertake a project involving a cooking program at the Coolibah Centre based largely on communication with the centre’s manager. After attending a meeting with the members we discovered that the need we sought to fill with this program was already being catered for with another cooking program and a variety of activities for the members. Furthermore, the members were not interested in our proposal. Somewhere along the way our wires got crossed and the information conveyed to us did not reflect the reality of the situation. After spending more time trying to come up with ideas that would meet the members’ needs we had to make the difficult decision to abandon the project and work with an organization that we felt really needed our help.

After conveying this in a polite email to the manager we were stunned to receive an unjustifiably harsh and negative response. Though hurt and angered as well as disappointed at having spent months developing a project with very little input and assistance from the organization and having to start again so late in the program, we knew that we must act professionally in order to do ourselves and SALP justice. After discussing the matter with Rita we sent an email back clearly outlining the reasons for our decision and stressing our respect for the organization and its members. We ended with the hope that future SALP groups would be able to work harmoniously with Coolibah as it had been added to the SALP database. Though we received no reply, we feel our professional and positive response will ensure that future SALP groups are still welcome at Coolibah.