When Task Conflict Turns Personal: Personality, Conflict Management, and Workplace Bullying

Abstract: Workplace bullying represents a severe form of escalated interpersonal conflict with detrimental consequences for employee well-being and organizational functioning. This study proposes an integrative model grounded in task and relationship conflict, conflict escalation theory, and the Dual Concern framework to explain how everyday task disagreements escalate into systematic harassment. Focusing on Openness to Experience and the Problem-Solving conflict management style, we examine how dispositional diversity and trainable negotiation strategies jointly shape vulnerability to bullying. Data from 897 employees in three organizations were analyzed using mediation and moderated mediation models. Relationship conflict partially mediated the effect of task conflict on workplace bullying. Higher Openness strengthened the task conflict–bullying link, whereas Problem Solving alone showed no buffering effect. However, their interaction significantly attenuated escalation, indicating a conditional protective effect. The findings highlight that integrative conflict management is most effective when aligned with dispositional profiles, offering actionable guidance for D&I-oriented bullying prevention.

Keywords: Workplace bullying, Openness, Problem solving, conflict, diversity management