Crafting Conflict Volume 1
Managing Saboteur Patterns in High-Performing Teams
Fewer blowups. Faster decisions. Quieter backchannels. This field manual gives engineering managers and SRE leads a Quick Start: 90 Minute Crisis Triage, six saboteur patterns with straight containment plays, word for word scripts for live moments, and post-conflict repair that holds under pressure. 150 pages with printable worksheets and pocket cards. Start now. If it doesn’t help, use the 60-day refund.
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About
About the Book
A tactical field manual for engineering managers and technical leaders.
You're not here to keep everyone comfortable. You're here to lead a team that can handle conflict without fracturing.
This manual gives you:
- Six saboteur patterns that quietly erode team health (Cynic, Ghost, Hero-Martyr, Passive Burnout, Underminer, False Compliant)
- Diagnostic frameworks to spot drift before it becomes crisis
- Word-for-word intervention scripts for live situations
- Post-conflict repair tools that rebuild trust
- Clear escalation protocols so you know when to involve HR
No personality typing. No HR-speak. No conflict avoidance disguised as empathy.
Just behavior-first patterns, identity-safe interventions, and tools that work when tension is high and minutes matter.
150 pages. Printable tools included. Built for managers who need to act now, not read theory later.
What you get: PDF with full manual, printable worksheets, and pocket reference cards.
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Author
About the Author
Paul LaPosta writes for technical leaders responsible for systems, decisions, and teams under pressure. His work examines what happens when AI accelerates delivery faster than organizations can preserve understanding, accountability, and control.
He is Director of Cloud Infrastructure and Operations at Amwell and founder of Forged Culture, an independent practice within Heron Group LLC. His experience spans regulated healthcare, cloud platforms, reliability, software delivery, and AI governance.
The Illegibility Crisis: Instrumentation for AI-Era Leadership gives senior leaders practical ways to trace consequential decisions, identify ownership, and recover control of AI-touched systems. Crafting Conflict Volume 1: Managing Saboteur Patterns in High-Performing Teams gives engineering leaders tools for understanding recurring conflict, making decisions, and repairing trust without reducing people to labels.
His research appears in the AAAI Symposium Series, including Echo Systems and the Consequence Boundary and the extended abstract Conflict as Telemetry for Illegible AI. He created the Delegated Authority Standard (DAS-1) and the open-source Legibility Field Kit. His LeadDev articles address AI adoption, organizational understanding, and senior-leadership accountability.
Explore his books below, practical tools at Forged Culture, and ongoing essays at Forge Signals. For workshops, speaking, or organizational engagements: info@forgedculture.com.
This work is published independently through Heron Group LLC and does not represent any employer, past or present.
Contents
Table of Contents
- Introduction (p. 1)
- Section 0: Quick Start - 90 Minute Crisis Triage (p. 10)
- Section 1: The Six Saboteur Patterns (p. 14)
- Section 2: Diagnosis Framework (p. 33)
- Section 3: Forged Response Templates (p. 46)
- Section 4: Post-Conflict Recovery (p. 70)
- Section 5: Loop Protection & Culture Hardening (p. 79)
- Section 6: The Escalation Decision (p. 86)
- Section 7: Field Notes & Application Scenarios (p. 97)
- Section 8: Final Hammer Strike (p. 122)
- Manager Metrics (p. 125)
- Glossary (p. 125)
- Appendix A: Printable Tools (p. 127)
- Appendix B: Printable Pocket Cards (p. 138)
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