Clients often come to us because something in a team has started to feel wrong. Tension between colleagues, meetings that go round in circles, the silos, a leadership team that never seems happy. They sense it but can’t identify the cause.
It’s a bit like going to the doctors. You feel dreadful and your temperature’s up, but that’s not the problem; something else is going on underneath.
Difficult teams are the same. Conflict, defensiveness and firefighting are symptoms, not causes. More often than not, what sits beneath them is a form of anxiety.
Everyone is carrying something, at every level
Anxiety is a word that makes people uncomfortable, so let’s be clear. It exists in every organisation, because there will always be uncertainty, pressure, accountability and risk. It’s normal; the issue is what people do with it. Is it recognised and managed, or left to simmer and influence behaviour unchecked?
We’ve worked with one leadership team where this is clearly evident. The founder built the business from nothing, so beneath the confidence sits a silent worry about what failure could mean. The chief executive answers to a board and reaches for speed. The newer senior leaders gave up secure jobs and want to prove themselves. The finance lead carries the weight of the numbers.
It’d be a mistake to think this stops at the boardroom door. The manager squeezed from above and below is carrying something too, as is the long-serving employee bracing for another restructure, the new starter desperate to impress, and the specialist keeping everything running who wonders if anyone would notice until they stopped.
These are all human worries, and everyone carrying them helps shape the workplace climate.
Anxiety spreads, and leaders set the temperature
Anxiety is contagious.
One person’s unease changes how others behave, travelling through the organisation’s culture. Worry moves faster than calm and is harder to shift. Before long a team is making reactive decisions, firing off emails at all hours and falling out over small things.
When leaders look at that, they see dysfunction. What they’re really looking at is anxiety, expressed through behaviour.
This is where leaders have more influence than they realise. When the temperature rises, instead of calming things, we match the wound-up energy and add to it. If our instinct is to fix, we have to learn to pause rather than be swept along.
That pause is critical. The most effective leaders notice their reactions, recognise the urgency for what it is, and measure their response rather than firing off on autopilot.
The aim is not to dismiss emotion from leadership, but to notice it before it takes over.
You can start with a few simple habits:
- Pause before reacting, giving yourself a moment to choose rather than simply react.
- Name what you’re feeling, even to yourself. A word like “I’m rushed” or “I’m frustrated” takes the heat out of it.
- Settle your breath: four counts in, hold, four counts out, hold. A few rounds lower the temperature and clear your head.
None of these will fix a struggling team, but they keep your leadership steady.
It’s tempting to tackle the dysfunction head on: the conflict, the silos, the missed deadlines. But that’s like holding the lid on a pan that keeps boiling over. Sooner or later, you have to turn down the heat underneath.
Before you reach for the fix, ask: “What anxiety is sitting under this, and who in the team is carrying it?”
If any of this sounds like your own team and you want help looking under the surface, get in touch.