On 16 October 2026, the German Institute for Adult Education (DIE) hosted its 6th DIALOG-Raum as part of its theme week. Under the title “Crisis-proof and capable of acting: strengthening the resilience of continuing education”, managers, programme planners, quality officers and educators met online to discuss what keeps institutions capable of acting under pressure.
CRISP led the practice forum “Handling conflict constructively”. Andreas Muckenfuß and Lea Strube presented the browser-based, AI-supported conflict simulator and played it through live with the 21 participants. A virtual coach accompanies the conversation, followed by feedback on strengths and areas for development. At a turning point, the plenary voted on how to continue. The majority chose to address the other person's feelings.
The anonymous live poll showed: participants rated their own confidence in escalating conversations at an average of 3.1 out of 5. They named conflicts with course participants as well as tensions within teams or with management. As the most important requirement for using such a training, they saw suitable scenarios, followed by time in everyday work and integration into professional development. They rated its transferability to their own institution at 3.0 out of 5.
In the subsequent panel, Andreas Muckenfuß joined Prof. Dr. Thomas Rigotti (Leibniz Institute for Resilience Research), Claudia Suhr (WBS TRAINING SE) and Andreas Knödler (Verein zur Förderung der Berufsbildung e.V.), moderated by Dr. Peter Brandt (DIE).
The conflict simulator is funded by the federal programme “Demokratie leben!”. As a next step, CRISP will develop further scenarios for adult and continuing education together with interested participants.
Would you like to contribute?
Take part in the test phase: https://survey-staff.ostfalia.de/index.php/237176?lang=de
