High Conflict

Adoption and change often lead to the kind of conflict that regularly breaks people.

I find that creators are often equipped to deal with technical creation, but are rarely equipped to deal with conflict. In this book, Amanda Ripley walks through how several skilled professionals found themselves in conflict.

Then she walks through how those conflicts started, who the players are, how they interact, how to engage in healthy conflict, and eventually how to get back out again.

Many of my peers in open-source technology, especially creators of languages and frameworks, find themselves in conflict and don’t have the tools… show more.

Amanda Ripley is a personable and compelling author and speaker.

She’s also a great storyteller. Her book is full of research, yes, experience, yes, but she wraps up that package with a bow of great stories. You will find yourself reading past your bedtime (guilty)!

She emphasizes what I think is the key to good communication – listening – really, really, really listening.

You’re gonna be a fan!

Amanda Ripley is a smart journalist and exquisite writer who knows how to weave a compelling tale. She spent several years studying mediation and conflict resolution, and visiting conflict research labs like mine at Columbia and Jon Haidt’s at NYU, in order to offer this informed, accessible book. Amanda is able to easily communicate the problem of what she calls “high conflict”, the opposite of “good conflict”, and steps we all can take to decrease the worst forms of these in our life. An excellent and useful book.