Vol. 9 No. No. 2 (2025): INVESTIGATING THE USE OF CONFLICT MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUES TO ENHANCE THE PERFORMANCE OF SMALL BUSINESSES IN BORNO STATE, NIGERIA

Conflict is the expression of perceived differences in the opinions of people, groups,
organisations, states or nations. It expresses the occurrences of divergent opinions in the
mindset of the people in a social setting. Divergences in social phenomenon could
assume different dimensions at given time or the other. In conflict situations, the means
of livelihood (businesses) of the people are affect in a way or the other. Therefore,
conflict management is a human necessity that requires concerted effort in managing it.
There are many conflicts management techniques available to small business operators
and the choice of a techniques or combination of techniques largely depends on the
scope of knowledge, skills, experience and the environment of the conflicts. The focal
point of this paper is to investigate whether or not the commonly reported conflict
management techniques in the available literature are being utilised by small business
operators in the central axis of the Borno state, Nigeria.