Fixing the Friction: How to Turn Dysfunctional Teams Into Collaborative Powerhouses
I’ve Seen Friction And I’ve Fixed It
If I’m honest, I’ve walked into more than my share of teams where energy is flat, communication is strained, and results lag behind potential. Those are dysfunctional teams—but the good news is, dysfunction isn’t permanent. With the right structure, trust, and coaching, any team can evolve into a collaborative powerhouse.
At Loeb Leadership, I’ve had the privilege of helping teams rediscover alignment, connection, and purpose. In this post, I’ll share how to diagnose dysfunction, rebuild trust, and create conditions where people thrive together.
Spotting the Warning Signs of Team Dysfunction
Before a team can grow, it must recognize what’s broken. Harvard Business Review notes that friction often stems from unclear goals, competing priorities, or a lack of psychological safety—conditions that erode collaboration and trust.
When I work with teams, the same patterns emerge again and again:
People avoid difficult conversations or over-rely on email instead of direct dialogue.
Decisions happen in silos, followed by misalignment and rework.Accountability fades as frustration grows.
Meetings become more about defending ideas than building them together.
These aren’t personality problems. They’re systemic issues that leaders can solve.
Understanding Why Teams Struggle
In my experience, dysfunction rarely comes from bad intent. It comes from leadership habits, unclear expectations, or cultural misalignment.
McKinsey’s research on high-performing teams shows that three factors consistently predict success: psychological safety, role clarity, and strong team purpose. When even one of these is missing, collaboration suffers.
At Loeb Leadership, our Leadership Assessments reveal these gaps early. For example, we often see talented teams with low trust scores, unclear boundaries, or unspoken conflict—all of which can be rebuilt with the right development plan.
My Playbook for Repairing Dysfunctional Teams
1. Start with Trust
Without trust, nothing else matters. Team members need to feel safe admitting mistakes, sharing uncertainty, and asking for help.
In coaching sessions, I guide leaders to model vulnerability first. When a leader says, “I could have communicated that better,” it sends a powerful message that honesty is valued over perfection. Research from McKinsey confirms that psychological safety is the foundation of innovation and adaptability.
We use exercises and dialogue to surface misunderstandings, align expectations, and establish trust-building behaviors that stick.
2. Encourage Healthy Conflict
I often remind teams: the opposite of harmony isn’t conflict, it’s silence. Disagreement, when done respectfully, fuels innovation.
Harvard Business Review notes that teams who can debate ideas openly and respectfully make better decisions and strengthen long-term collaboration. I create conditions for structured dialogue, clarifying that conflict is about issues, not people.
We establish norms like:
“Disagree in the meeting, unite after the decision.”
“Assume positive intent.”
“Challenge ideas, not individuals.”
When leaders invite dissent, commitment follows.
3. Build Commitment Through Clarity
Unclear goals breed inconsistent effort. One of the most common problems I see is misaligned expectations, everyone is working hard, but not necessarily together.
In our Executive Coaching engagements, we help leaders set SMART goals (specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound) for both the team and the individual. We ensure each person knows how their work contributes to shared outcomes.
As clarity rises, so does accountability. People begin to hold themselves and one another responsible for delivering results, not because they have to, but because they want to.
4. Refocus on Collective Results
A truly collaborative team measures success by team outcomes, not individual wins. That mindset shift requires recognition systems and conversations that celebrate shared progress.
McKinsey research shows that teams aligned on purpose outperform peers by more than 40% in engagement and output.
We help leaders redesign performance conversations to spotlight collaboration:
What worked because of teamwork?
What did we learn together?
How can we make our interdependencies stronger next quarter?
It’s remarkable how motivation shifts when success feels shared.
5. Sustain the Change
Repairing dysfunction isn’t a one-time event—it’s an ongoing discipline. After an engagement, I encourage teams to continue their growth through regular check-ins, ongoing feedback loops, and reflective practice.
Our Organizational Development Consulting helps teams integrate new behaviors into daily rhythms—team charters, meeting structures, and communication norms that make collaboration habitual, not episodic.
Leaders who keep this commitment model what healthy culture looks like in action.
What Success Looks Like
When the friction fades, the change is unmistakable. Meetings shift from draining to energizing. People listen more, assume less, and solve faster. The same individuals who once avoided collaboration become advocates for it.
That’s the power of leadership development—it’s not just about coaching individuals, but transforming how teams think, behave, and trust each other every day.
If your team is struggling with alignment or communication, it’s not a failure—it’s an invitation to reset. Let’s fix the friction together and build a team that collaborates with purpose, passion, and results.
Explore how we help leaders build high-performing, emotionally intelligent teams:
Follow Natalie Loeb on LinkedIn for more insights on intentional leadership, corporate strategy, wellness and well-being in the workplace, and more.