Higher Education

Do your students need a better way to learn to manage conflict?

Put powerful, just-in-time solutions at their fingertips with the Conflict Coach app and micro-credential

Universities and colleges know it’s their job to provide students with the skills to succeed. And while their curricula might cover leadership and team building, the subject of conflict management — such as how to have a hard conversation with a boss, peer, or roommate – is rarely explicitly taught.

Now there’s a better way. Conflict Coach is an affordable, effective coach on your phone, that walks users step-by-step through choosing a strategy and preparing for a hard conversation. By practicing with the app and completing a few basic requirements, students can earn a microcredential in basic conflict resolution

Conflict Coach is an amazing tool that the students love! It helps them and that’s why we’re using it again.

Leanne Meyer

Director of the Accelerate Leadership Center, Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University

How Conflict Coach works

The Conflict Coach app puts just-in-time solutions at students’ fingertips PLUS serves as a learning tool with supplemental screens that explain the concepts behind its recommendations. It’s a new way of learning that eliminates the skills transfer gap.

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The Coach gathers information

Students input critical data: the issue, the timing, how upset they’re feeling, and who has the power. For example, is the problem with a boss or professor; an equal like a co-worker or friend; or someone over whom you have power?

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The Coach recommends strategies

The Сoach recommends one of seven possible strategies. And if the selected strategy involves negotiating, the Coach helps the user develop tailored talking points and offers advice on how to initiate and structure a conversation.

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The Coach Awards Microcredit

As students resolve conflicts and gain confidence to initiate difficult conversations, they can also earn credit toward a microcredential in basic conflict resolution. The syllabus includes a variety of conflicts and strategies, written reflections and a quiz.

Why invest in Conflict Coach for your students?

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Because students need life skills

Students need jobs, employers need workers with soft skills, and if they want to compete, educators need to help students increase their competence and confidence. Plus, students use apps!

The Enterprise package gives you access to de-identified Conflict Coach usage data, enabling you to measure the type and quantity of conflicts your students are managing.

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Because you can collect useful data

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Because it works

Proof is in the pudding: 48% of MBA students report increased confidence after a single use of Conflict Coach. Watch a demo and see for yourself how powerful Conflict Coach can be.

Conflict Coach advances your efforts in

  • Recruitment: Deliver on your promise to facilitate a smooth transition from high school to higher ed (and ultimately, the workforce)
  • Retention: Decrease transfer and drop-out rates by reducing roommate conflict and improving social integration
  • Reputation: Give your students another reason to praise rather than badmouth your institution on social media
  • Return: Equip your graduates with skills for workplace success, and encourage them to become lifelong supporters
The problem with training in conflict management is that trainees don’t transfer skills from the workshop to the work team. Personal coaching and counseling are better, but they don’t scale. That’s why we invented Conflict Coach.

Martha Harty

Professional Mediator and Professor of Learning Science Carnegie Mellon University
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Business schools and workforce development

Are your graduates equipped to handle conflict in the workplace?

85% of employees experience conflict—29% nearly constantly. Business schools know it’s their job to equip grads with skills to succeed in the marketplace, but most curricula don’t cover how to have a hard conversation with a boss, peer, or subordinate.

And when programs do offer conflict management training, students often fail to transfer their new skills to real life situations, especially when emotions run high. Group projects are a common hotbed for conflict: students get frustrated quickly in the face of clashing personalities, different work styles, and competing priorities – which can degrade academic results and foster longterm animosity.

The solution? Affordable, easy-to-use Conflict Coach puts the right strategy for handling a hard conversation at your students’ fingertips. And no other app on the market comes close in terms of just-in-time, individualized advice.

Read how one business school is benefitting from Conflict Coach

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Residence life, clubs and teams

Powerful tool to help your students learn to manage conflict

Students today have a low tolerance for conflict and expect immediate resolutions—do your RAs have the skills needed to solve their problems?

When students have unresolved conflicts, all sorts of negative fallout may ensue: their grades can suffer, parents may get involved, the student might transfer, or might badmouth your institution on social media, costing you precious reputation points or tuition dollars.

Conflict Coach puts strategies for conflict resolution right on your students’ phones so situations de-escalate or get resolved before your staff need to get involved. And with the Enterprise version, administrators get access to de-identified usage data. At last, you’ll have a quantifiable means to measure the volume and type of conflicts students are dealing with. Now your school can introduce programming tailored to address the most pressing issues.

Read how one student used Conflict Coach

Pricing and Packages

Conflict Coach institutional pilot packages start at $15 per seat.

The micro-credential can be tailored and branded for your school.

For more information, call 724-201-6474 or email roseann@martrisllc.com