| Course | MT340 Conflict Management and Team Dynamics |
|---|---|
| Unit | Unit 2 |
| Paper type | Conflict classification exercise |
| Length | About 870 words, 6 pages double-spaced |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Purdue University Global |
| Program | BS in Business Administration |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for MT340 Unit 2
Task, Relationship or Process: An MT340 Unit 2 Classification Exercise on Six Milestone Disputes at a Game Studio
[Student Name]
Purdue University Global
MT340: Conflict Management and Team Dynamics
Unit 2 Conflict Classification Exercise
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
The studio, disputes and quoted lines are composite; the typology and research cited are real.
The Three Types
Jehn (1995) separated conflict about the work itself, task conflict, from conflict between people, relationship conflict. Jehn and Mannix (2001) added a third kind, process conflict, which concerns roles, procedures and who controls which resources. For this exercise each type is tied to a cue a reader could spot in a message or meeting. Task conflict names the work: a feature, a number, a design choice. Relationship conflict names a trait or a motive: someone is careless, territorial or out of their depth. Process conflict names a role, a resource or a procedure: who approves, who decides, whose time it is.
Six Episodes
The first episode was a color palette dispute. The art director and the lead designer disagreed about whether the new desert palette was readable for colorblind players. Quoted line: "In the deuteranopia simulation, the enemy outlines vanish against the sand." The cue is a specific property of the work, so this is task conflict. It stayed task conflict and was settled by a colorblind playtest.
The second episode began with a code-review comment. An engineer reviewing a designer's script wrote, "Who approved this going into main?" The cue is approval, a matter of role, so this is process conflict. The designer replied that the engineer "just likes blocking people," which names a motive. This episode drifted into relationship conflict.
The third episode was a severity argument. The QA lead marked a save-file bug as blocking; the producer downgraded it to major so the build could ship to the publisher. Quoted line: "Blocking means it stops a player, and this stops a player." The cue is the definition of a category and who applies it, so this is process conflict.
The fourth episode was a credit dispute. Two environment artists disagreed about who should be credited for the cathedral in a publisher trailer. Quoted line: "I built the nave; she textured it." The cue is ownership of the work, which is closest to process conflict about recognition, though both artists were careful to stay on what each had done. It stayed process conflict and was settled by listing both.
The fifth episode was a cutscene length dispute. The writer wanted a ninety-second opening cutscene; the designer wanted thirty. Quoted line: "Players skip anything over forty seconds in our telemetry." This is task conflict, settled by a fifty-second cut.
The sixth episode was a schedule dispute. The animator said the combat team kept assigning her tasks without asking the art director, her manager. Quoted line: "My time isn't on your board." The cue is a resource and a reporting line, so this is process conflict. It drifted when a combat engineer replied, "Then maybe stop disappearing into trailer work," which names a behavior pattern as a fault.
Both disputes that turned personal started as arguments about who decides, not about the work.
Commentary on the Two Drifts
The code-review episode and the schedule episode both began as process conflict and drifted into relationship conflict. In each case the drift happened at the same point: when one person's frustration about a role was answered with a remark about the other person's character. Jehn and Mannix (2001) found that teams whose process conflict stayed low late in a project, and whose relationship conflict stayed low throughout, performed better. Here process conflict did not stay low, and it seeded relationship conflict.
The two task conflicts, by contrast, stayed task conflicts. Both had something concrete to test, a colorblind simulation and telemetry on skipped scenes, which gave the disputants evidence to argue about instead of each other. That supports the idea from Unit 1 that shared data helps hold a disagreement on the work.
What Each Drift Cost
The code-review drift delayed the designer's script by four days, because the designer stopped submitting work to that reviewer and waited for another. The schedule drift was more expensive. The animator stopped attending combat stand-ups for a week, and three animation tasks slipped into the next sprint. Neither cost appeared in any report as conflict; both appeared as missed tasks.
What the Pattern Suggests
The studio has no written answer to who approves code from designers, or whose priorities govern a shared animator's time. Each time those questions come up, they are argued from scratch, and two of the six times the argument became personal. De Dreu and Weingart (2003) found that relationship conflict is consistently harmful to team performance and satisfaction. Settling the process questions in advance would remove the place where drift began.
Limits
The quoted lines come from messages and meeting notes and are paraphrased where needed to protect people. Classification involves judgment, especially for the credit dispute, which could be read as relationship conflict by someone who knew the artists' history. Six episodes are too few to show a reliable pattern, though the two drifts point the same way.
References
De Dreu, C. K. W., & Weingart, L. R. (2003). Task versus relationship conflict, team performance, and team member satisfaction: A meta-analysis. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88(4), 741-749. https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.88.4.741
Jehn, K. A. (1995). A multimethod examination of the benefits and detriments of intragroup conflict. Administrative Science Quarterly, 40(2), 256-282. https://doi.org/10.2307/2393638
Jehn, K. A., & Mannix, E. A. (2001). The dynamic nature of conflict: A longitudinal study of intragroup conflict and group performance. Academy of Management Journal, 44(2), 238-251. https://doi.org/10.5465/3069453
What the MT340 Unit 2 assignment asks for
This exercise asks students to sort several real disputes into the conflict types from the reading and to justify each choice. Definitions should be short and practical, ideally linked to a cue a reader could find in what people actually said. Each episode needs a brief description, a quoted or paraphrased line, the assigned type and the reason for it. Instructors are especially interested in episodes that changed type partway through, since drift is where conflict becomes costly. A commentary section should explain when and why the drift happened and what it cost. Borderline cases should be acknowledged rather than forced into a category. Episodes should come from one team or period so that patterns can emerge.
How this MT340 Unit 2 example is built
The sample defines task, relationship and process conflict with a cue for each. Six episodes follow in prose: a palette dispute settled by a colorblind playtest, a code-review exchange that turned on a remark about blocking people, a severity argument between QA and the producer, a credit dispute over a trailer, a cutscene length dispute settled by telemetry and an animator's complaint about tasks assigned without her manager. The highlighted line notes that both personal disputes began as arguments about who decides. Commentary traces the two drifts, citing Jehn and Mannix. A section prices each drift in delayed tasks. A pattern section points to unwritten process rules, citing De Dreu and Weingart, and limits close the exercise.
Where the points sit in the MT340 Unit 2 rubric
Markers of a classification exercise look for consistent definitions, a defensible reason for every label and insight into how disputes moved between types. Quoted lines make the reasoning checkable. Recognizing drift, and saying exactly where it began, shows understanding beyond labeling. Costs attached to each drift connect the exercise to the business. Patterns across episodes, such as process conflict seeding personal friction, show analysis. Borderline cases should be flagged honestly. The typology's sources belong in APA 7. Exercises that label every episode with no cue or reason, or that treat all heated disagreement as relationship conflict, tend to earn less, because the unit is testing whether the student can tell the types apart in real messages.
MT340 Unit 2 help from the desk
Classification papers often assign types by how angry people sounded rather than by what they were arguing about. Another common slip is ignoring process conflict altogether, though disputes over roles and approvals are common at work. Drift is frequently missed because students classify only the start of an exchange. Before drafting, collect the actual messages or meeting notes for each dispute and mark the first line that names the work, a person or a role. If an exchange contains more than one kind, note where the change happened. That marked line is usually the evidence a classification needs, and it keeps the analysis tied to what was said.
Get an MT340 Unit 2 example written to your instructions
Collect four to six disagreements from a group you work in, a line or two each on what was said, and include the Unit 2 instructions and marking criteria. The custom exercise codes them by type, quotes the evidence and follows any that drifted. Your first sample is free, delivered within 24-48h. The paper above is an original model document written by our desk, not a submitted student paper and not an official Purdue University Global document.
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MT340 Unit 2 questions, answered
Is process conflict part of the Unit 2 exercise?
Many sections work with task and relationship conflict only, and some add process conflict from Jehn's later studies. The instructions normally say which set applies. Where only two types are required, process disputes are typically coded as task conflict with a note, since arguments over roles and schedules concern the arrangements of the work rather than the people doing it.
How many episodes should the table include?
Instructions commonly ask for four to eight. Fewer than four rarely shows a pattern, and more than eight leaves too little room for commentary on the hard cases. The strongest tables include at least one mixed episode and one that changed type partway, since those are the cases where the classification shows judgment.
Can episodes come from outside work?
Some sections allow family, volunteer or classroom disputes. Workplace episodes tend to fit the course better because roles and deadlines make process conflict visible. Whatever the source, the writer needs to have been present, since classification depends on the exact words used and the order in which the disagreement developed.
Where can I find a free MT340 Unit 2 sample paper?
This page holds the complete MT340 Unit 2 exercise, coding six game studio disputes by conflict type with quoted evidence.
Where did drift begin in the MT340 Unit 2 sample?
In both cases, a process dispute about approval or time turned personal when someone answered with a remark about the other person's character.