The Dove and Olive Branch
In heraldry, the dove with an olive branch symbolizes more than peace. It represents restoration, reconciliation, and the disciplined restraint required to meet conflict with clarity rather than force. It signals a principled approach to tension, grounded in calm intention. In coaching, this symbol aligns with one of the most critical and challenging aspects of leadership development. Leaders do not avoid conflict. They meet it with steadiness. They repair relationships. They engage in conversations that are easy to ignore. They rebuild trust where it has eroded. Coaching helps leaders develop these skills, not by offering scripts or tactics, but by strengthening the internal clarity and presence required to lead through tension rather than react to it.
Conflict is inevitable in work that matters. Pressure, interdependence, competing priorities, and human complexity guarantee it. The question is not whether conflict will arise. The question is how a leader will respond when it does. The dove offers a helpful starting point. It reflects the possibility of peace but not the promise of passivity. Peace in heraldic and leadership terms is an achievement that requires intention, integrity, and disciplined communication. Each section that follows uses the dove’s symbolism to explore a core dimension of conflict navigation in modern leadership.
How Leaders Navigate Interpersonal Conflict
Interpersonal conflict challenges even seasoned leaders. Most people default to one of three patterns: avoidance, aggression, or appeasement. Avoidance provides short-term comfort but often inflames the issue. Aggression can create compliance, but fractures trust. Appeasement reduces tension but erodes credibility. The work of leadership lies between these extremes, where clarity and steadiness replace reflexive patterns.
Research supports this view. Studies published in the Academy of Management Journal show that leaders who engage conflict directly and constructively foster higher trust and more resilient team performance than those who avoid or overpower it [1]. Constructive engagement requires emotional regulation, perspective taking, and a willingness to tolerate discomfort. Coaching helps leaders develop these internal capacities by encouraging them to examine the stories they tell themselves about conflict. Many discover that their pain stems from old narratives about criticism, failure, or rejection rather than the actual situation.
A key coaching intervention involves slowing down the leader’s interpretation of the conflict. Instead of reacting to an apparent slight or disagreement, the coach helps the client explore what was said, what was meant, and what assumptions shaped their reaction. This expanded awareness often reveals alternative interpretations. What felt personal may have been situational. What felt disrespectful may have been hurried. What felt like resistance may have been uncertainty. Leaders who see the whole picture can enter conversations with calm curiosity rather than defensive certainty. This steadiness echoes the dove: centered, principled, and focused on understanding rather than escalation.
Coaching Approaches for Repairing Strained Relationships
Strained relationships often begin with minor fractures. A missed signal. A moment of pressure. A misunderstanding that neither party addresses. Over time, these fractures widen. Coaching helps leaders confront these dynamics before they harden into cynicism or disengagement.
One research-based approach is perspective-taking. Empirical studies in organizational behavior and human decision processes show that leaders who actively adopt the viewpoint of the other party reduce attribution errors and increase the likelihood of reconciliation [2]. Coaches support this by asking leaders to articulate not only their own experience but also what the other person may be feeling, fearing, or trying to achieve. This does not require agreement. It requires understanding.
Repair also involves naming the rupture without accusation. Research by John Gottman and Robert Levenson demonstrates that relationships deteriorate most rapidly when blame replaces responsibility [3]. Coaching helps leaders frame brutal truths in ways that promote clarity rather than defensiveness. Statements shift from “You disrespected me” to “When that meeting unfolded, here is how I interpreted your response, and here is why it affected me.” Leaders learn to focus on impact, not intent, so the other person can engage without feeling attacked.
Finally, repair often requires rebuilding credibility through consistent behavior. Trust is restored not through apology alone but through reliable follow-through. A coach helps the client identify specific commitments that demonstrate seriousness, such as scheduling regular check-ins, clarifying expectations, or sharing information more proactively. Each act signals an olive branch extended not in submission but in good faith.
Building the Skill to Have Necessary but Difficult Conversations
Difficult conversations are not simply about conflict. They include performance feedback, boundary setting, declining requests, and addressing behaviors that undermine team health. Many leaders delay these conversations because they fear emotional reactions, relational strain, or the possibility of being misunderstood. Yet research by Harvard’s Sheila Heen and Douglas Stone shows that delayed conversations create more tension, not less, because unspoken concerns accumulate silently while both parties make assumptions about the other [4].
Coaching equips leaders with the internal footing required to initiate difficult conversations. The work begins with intention. Leaders must be clear about what outcome they seek. Are they clarifying expectations? Protecting a boundary? Offering developmental feedback? Repairing trust? Coaching helps sharpen the purpose, which anchors the conversation and prevents it from drifting into emotional reactivity.
Next, coaching reinforces the discipline of grounded communication. Research in the Academy of Management Journal highlights that leaders who communicate early, directly, and respectfully reduce the emotional volatility associated with difficult conversations and strengthen psychological safety on their teams [5]. A coach helps clients prepare language that is both honest and measured. Instead of softening the message to avoid discomfort or sharpening it to force compliance, leaders learn to speak with clarity and steadiness.
Finally, coaching encourages leaders to listen well. Difficult conversations are rarely one-directional. Leaders must be willing to hear the other person’s perspective and adjust their understanding accordingly. Listening signals good faith. It also uncovers information that might otherwise be lost. The dove symbolizes this reciprocal nature of peace. It enters the tension without aggression, offering clarity while remaining open to what it receives.
Recovering Credibility or Trust After a Breakdown
Trust breakdowns occur even among strong leaders. They may stem from missed commitments, poor communication, or poorly executed decisions. Recovering trust requires humility, consistency, and a willingness to face the discomfort of repair. Coaching supports this by helping leaders confront both the consequences of their actions and the patterns that produced them.
Academic research on trust repair, particularly the work of Roy Lewicki and Barbara Bunker, highlights three essential components: acknowledgment, apology, and behavioral alignment over time [6]. Coaching uses these components to guide leaders through a structured process. Acknowledgment requires clarity about what went wrong, how it was perceived, and why it matters. An apology involves sincerity and specificity. Behavioral alignment requires demonstrating reliability in small, consistent ways long after the initial conversation.
Trust is not restored through words alone. It is restored through repeated actions that signal the leader’s renewed commitment. Coaches help clients identify these actions, track them, and reflect on progress. They also help leaders address the internal narratives that interfere with trust repair, such as perfectionism, defensiveness, or fear of vulnerability.
Trust recovery resembles the dove with the olive branch: a return to peace that is neither passive nor simplistic. It is a disciplined act of leadership.
Conclusion
Conflict navigation is not the absence of difficulty. It is the presence of clarity, steadiness, and principled action. The dove in heraldry symbolizes peace offered with intention, not demanded by authority. Coaching serves this exact purpose. It supports leaders as they learn to approach conflict with discernment, repair what is strained, speak honestly when it matters, and restore trust when it has been damaged.
Leaders who develop these skills do not eliminate conflict. They transform it into an opportunity for alignment, learning, and stronger relationships. And like the dove, they carry themselves with calm readiness, grounded purpose, and the confidence that clarity can prevail even in tense moments.
References
[4] Stone, D., Patton, B., & Heen, S. (2010). Difficult Conversations. Penguin Books.
[6] Lewicki, Roy & Bunker, Barbara. (1996). Developing and Maintaining Trust in Working Relations.