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Aikido’s lessons in conflict resolution
Published October 22, 2026 in Leadership • 10 min read • 
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When we face resistance, the instinct is to fight back. Chip Bond and Francesca-Giulia Mereu explain how aikido can help leaders turn pushback into collaboration.
Rapid read:
- Defending a proposal more forcefully can deepen resistance and damage working relationships.
- Aikido offers three lessons for leaders: begin with respect, approach resistance with curiosity, and redirect momentum toward shared goals.
- Acknowledging concerns and inviting colleagues to shape solutions can turn conflict into productive collaboration.
Picture the scene. You have stepped into a new role as vice president of marketing and immediately spot an opportunity. Marketing spend is spread across customer segments by customer type, but it’s missing out on revenue potential from a handful of accounts that generate the highest sales and deliver the most value to the business. Concentrating resources on those accounts could accelerate growth without increasing your budget. You take your analysis to Finance and Sales, who approve it. You review the proposal with the chief commercial officer and present the case to the executive team. The CEO is all in: “This is what we hired you for.”
You call a meeting with leaders whose businesses will be affected. Within minutes, things become contentious. Jane, the vice president of sales, complains that cutting investment in lower-priority segments will stifle opportunities. The head of product marketing, Ashraf, argues that every product line needs consistent support to stay competitive. Kim, the general manager of industrial products, says his division is being treated unfairly, and a newcomer isn’t qualified to recommend such a critical shift.
Your natural impulse is to defend yourself. But the more you argue for your proposal, the harder your colleagues push back. Positions become entrenched, attitudes harden. The discussion descends into an argument about who is right or wrong – regardless of what’s right for the business.
When our ideas are challenged, most of us are wired to respond in ways that can make things worse. We tend to push back, meeting the energy of our counterpart in ways that feel natural or even righteous, but that escalate tension and foreclose outcomes we were hoping to achieve. Conflict is often unpleasant, hard to resolve, and costly in terms of trust, collaboration, and energy. Yet in business and leadership, it is inevitable and needs to be managed.
How can we better navigate moments of conflict to achieve positive outcomes while ensuring the necessary buy-in and healthy relationships?
The Japanese martial art of aikido offers lessons for leaders, with its unique philosophy of defending the self from attack while protecting attackers from injury. It’s a practice rooted in redirecting aggression instead of ceding to it.
Drawing on our diverse experience in business leadership, aikido practice, and executive coaching, we have developed a framework based on three lessons from the contrarian martial art to support leaders in handling conflict and resistance to change within an organization. Each of these lessons is founded on the idea that conflict can be resolved, not to punish or win on points, but safely and positively for both parties.
Lesson one: enter with respect and gratitude
In aikido, everything begins with a bow. When you enter the dojo, you bow. When you step onto the mat, you bow. When an instructor corrects your technique, you bow. Bowing is not just etiquette. You bow in acknowledgment of the other person’s dignity and perspective – in recognition of their legitimacy before engaging with them. Bowing reinforces the humility and willingness to learn through training, mutual trust, and exchange, with care and safety. Aikido teaches us that respect and gratitude are not niceties; they are embedded in the mechanics of showing up.
Workplace conflict can be resolved, not to punish or win on points, but safely and positively for both parties.
Leaders sometimes confuse respect with approval, but they are not the same. You can hold your position while signaling that you appreciate the other person’s competence and that you hear their concern. We can show respect to dissenting colleagues in different ways:
- Acknowledge their expertise before presenting your position.
- Articulate their concern before offering your solution.
- Keep your tone even, your physical presence still and focused.
- Pause, process, and repeat what they have said before responding.
- Avoid remarks or gestures that undermine or belittle the other person.
- Express genuine gratitude by acknowledging why you value their time and perspective.
Now, let’s reimagine the scenario outlined above. As VP, you feel pressure from the top to move decisively and deliver value from day one. But instead of charging into the meeting to inform colleagues about your plan, you take time to prepare properly, reflecting on the perspectives and expertise others will contribute to the discussion. This changes how you receive and respond to their objections. As the meeting ends, you name what has shifted because of their input, acknowledging what they have brought to the meeting that you didn’t have before. Perhaps this time, instead of acrimony, you all agree to find a compromise that works for everyone.
In aikido, everything begins with a bow. That respect is not performative; it is a strategic commitment that opens channels to productive outcomes.
Lesson two: move toward the attack, not against or away from it
When someone charges at you, your instinct is to brace or retreat. Aikido teaches something counterintuitive: to move toward the attacker, but off the line of attack. Why does this work? Stepping aside in a balanced way does not stop the assault, but it prepares you to reach a position from which the next move becomes possible.
Moving toward the attack to connect from a new angle is a constructive way to resolve workplace conflict. An effective response depends on the nature of the attack or resistance. In the workplace and executive coaching, we typically face either silence, reaction, or deflection. Each can be resolved by moving toward the energy rather than away from it. This means asking the right kind of questions, depending on the scenario.
- Silence: “I notice you have gone quiet. Could you share why that is?”
- Reaction: “I can see that this means a lot to you. Can you help me understand what is driving that?”
- Deflection: “We seem to keep arriving at the same place. What would it take to move things forward?”
In our reimagined scenario, instead of defending your position, you lean in with genuine curiosity, knowing they have expertise and useful information that you do not. You let the silence breathe instead of filling it. You ask open questions and wait. When a colleague continues to deflect, you test the pattern without accusation: “I’ve noticed that we keep coming back to the issue of lost opportunities. Can you help me understand what you’re seeing that isn’t reflected in our analysis? What would we have to build into this plan for you to support it?”
Stepping off the line of attack isn’t hesitation or retreat. It signals respect and intentional curiosity, and it makes different outcomes possible.
As a leader, the harder you push, the more people tend to resist.
Lesson three: flow and follow, then redirect and guide momentum
The most elegant moments in aikido resemble the movement of a dance. The practitioner flows (nagare) without friction or pause, follows (awase) and matches the attacker’s momentum, then redirects and guides them to a place where a mutually positive resolution is possible. Flowing, following, redirecting, and guiding are foundational principles in aikido that speak to a universal truth: humans dislike being pushed and pulled, but we are open to being led.
As a leader, the harder you push, the more people tend to resist. We also see this in the exploratory work of executive coaching. When you seek to understand different perspectives and work with others’ energy, progress can begin. In practice:
- Flowing with the momentum means listening to what really matters to the other person – beneath their surface objection.
- Following means acknowledging their concern before you advocate your own position.
- Redirecting and guiding mean reiterating and refocusing on the objective you share and inviting the other person to help design the solution.
In our imagined scenario, you resist the instinctive urge to defend your proposal. You ask focused questions and listen carefully to what your colleagues tell you: If they were in your position, what would they need to see before making a decision? What are their concerns about possible negative outcomes? Once you have heard what they have to say, try this framing: “It sounds like we’re all trying to achieve the same thing: sustainable growth without putting existing customer relations at risk. Given that, how could we adapt this approach to address the issues you have raised while still focusing investment where it creates most value?”
In aikido, you do not overcome resistance by stopping it in its tracks. You move with it, exploring and learning about its direction and intent, and guide it toward an outcome that works for everyone.
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A path forward
When the aikido practitioner bows, it represents and communicates a conscious decision: to prioritize respect over ego, curiosity over obstinacy, and connection over confrontation. When they move toward and flow with their attacker, they are seeking understanding and a place where new moves become possible. When they follow, redirect, and guide momentum, they are exploring options for and realizing shared value.
Like the seasoned aikido practitioner, an effective leader understands that influence does not emerge from a battle of wills, but from harnessing the energy and expertise in the room to reframe the conversation.
Conflict is an inevitable and vital part of management and leadership. Through the contrarian lens of aikido, it can be transformed into a valuable exchange – a means of testing assumptions, surfacing problems, empowering others, and forging a path to better solutions.
A martial art built on harmony
Morihei Ueshiba developed aikido in Japan around a century ago. The practice is rooted in the principles of harmony: ai (harmony), ki (energy or spirit), do (way or path). In aikido, harmony is less a state than an act – the ongoing work of connecting different and sometimes opposing dynamics so they can move forward together without canceling each other out. It is not about making friends, giving in, or arriving at a comfortable compromise. It is about ensuring that when the conversation ends, both parties and their connection remain intact. Harmony is not peace. It is the discipline of staying in contact with someone whose energy is moving differently from yours, long enough to find where your directions might align.
Unlike most martial arts, aikido’s purpose is not to defeat an opponent but to neutralize a threat while protecting both parties. The practitioner does not meet force with direct force – they reposition, engage, and redirect. Aikido demands presence, precise positioning, and confident intention, but the objective is always resolution, not domination.
Today, aikido is practiced across more than 140 countries, but it has resonated beyond the dojo into leadership development programs, conflict resolution training, and executive education. The principles Ueshiba formalized on the mat – redirect rather than resist, guide rather than overpower, and protect both parties – have found an audience among people navigating complex organizations, high-stakes negotiations, and the daily friction of leading teams.
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