Building Teams and Families That Thrive

In an ordinary home in practically any city, a family sits down for their meal. The atmosphere is warm, filled with laughter and clinking plates, but an unspoken tension lingers. At the head of the table sits the family’s patriarch — or sometimes its matriarch — whose authority is rarely questioned. Their word carries weight, shaped by decades of experience, and is treated as sacrosanct.

As the meal progresses, the topic of raising the children subtly plays out in real-time. The parents, advocating for structure and discipline, insist their child eat their vegetables, believing it teaches healthy habits and the importance of following rules. The grandparents, however, take a gentler approach, offering the child a sweet apple crumble instead, eager to keep the peace and avoid tears. Tension builds as the child, sensing the divide, exploits the situation by refusing the vegetables altogether. The parents — competent, middle-aged professionals — hesitate to challenge the grandparents, fearing it might appear disrespectful or disrupt family harmony. This culture of deference prioritises peace and appearances over addressing real issues, leaving underlying conflicts unresolved.

Over time, the grandchildren pick up on this divide, becoming increasingly defiant and exploiting the lack of a united front. The natural rebelliousness of adolescence, compounded by mixed messages, creates a volatile dynamic. The parents, frustrated and stifled, find their authority undermined. Meanwhile, the elder, though well-meaning, remains oblivious to the long-term harm their unchecked authority and lack of alignment are causing.

Avoiding Conflict: The Silent Threat

This family dynamic is a cautionary tale: avoiding conflict doesn’t preserve harmony — it creates dysfunction. By failing to address underlying issues, the family fosters an environment where confusion and resentment thrive:

• For the grandchildren: Mixed messages create inconsistencies, leaving them unclear about values, boundaries, and consequences.
• For the parents: Their inability to enforce boundaries leads to frustration, resentment, and a loss of authority.
• For the elder: Their unchecked authority blinds them to the harm they are causing, undermining unity and stability.

Similar dynamics often play out in organisations, where leadership’s reluctance to foster healthy conflict leads to disjointed efforts, misalignment, and frustration. Consider these examples:

Example 1: The CEO Who Creates Chaos

In a small digital transformation company, the CEO champions the implementation of a compliance framework to address rising regulatory demands. While recognising the importance of collaboration to achieve this goal, the CEO needs to communicate clear priorities to their team. This lack of direction leads to teams working at cross-purposes, with conflicting efforts and misaligned agendas. Some team members focus on technical implementation, while others concentrate on policy documentation, unaware of how their tasks interconnect.

The dysfunction deepens as the CEO consistently withholds budget approvals critical for making necessary changes and investments. For instance, proposals to acquire updated compliance software or hire subject matter experts are repeatedly delayed or outright denied. Foundational decisions — such as restructuring workflows to address systemic gaps crucial for enabling compliance — are avoided, leaving teams stuck with inefficient processes.

To make matters worse, the organisational culture revolves around the CEO’s voice. Top-down directives dominate meetings, and dissenting opinions or alternative perspectives are routinely dismissed. Employees learn to stay silent, knowing their input will not be valued or acted upon. This stifles creativity, innovation, and team cohesion.

Despite these obstacles, the CEO remains critical of the team’s lack of progress, publicly questioning their competence and commitment. However, the blame lies squarely with unclear priorities, withheld resources, and absent leadership.

The Impact of the CEO’s Actions

This leadership approach creates significant challenges within the organisation:

1. Disjointed Efforts: Teams operate in silos, pursuing conflicting goals that fail to move the compliance initiative forward. For example, one department drafts compliance policies without consulting the tech team, leading to misaligned expectations and inefficiencies.
2. Frustration and Demotivation: Employees feel unsupported and undervalued, as a lack of alignment, collaboration, and resources hinders their efforts. Some seek opportunities elsewhere, citing a toxic culture and lack of empowerment.
3. Increased Risk Exposure: The company falls further behind in achieving compliance, leaving it vulnerable to regulatory penalties and reputational damage. For instance, a missed compliance deadline results in fines that strain the organisation’s tight budget.

Example 2: The Preoccupied CTO and the Pet Projects

In another small tech company, the CTO—a brilliant visionary—spends too much time immersed in personal pet projects. While innovative and intellectually stimulating, these side ventures have little to do with the organisation’s strategic priorities. For example, the CTO dedicates resources to developing a prototype for a future product while critical issues in the existing infrastructure remain unresolved.

Meanwhile, the CTO office needs help aligning engineering teams or ensuring the smooth execution of critical projects. Communication breakdowns are common as priorities are unclear, and team leaders are left guessing which tasks should take precedence. Engineering backlogs pile up, delaying key deliverables and frustrating clients.

Though aware of the issue, the CEO avoids addressing it. Fear of alienating the CTO or creating friction prevents the CEO from engaging in open dialogue. Instead, the CEO turns a blind eye, assuming the CTO’s brilliance will eventually steer the company back on track. This lack of intervention exacerbates the problem.

The Impact of the CTO’s Actions

This unchecked behaviour results in:

1. Lack of Progress: Strategic initiatives stagnate as resources and attention are diverted to less impactful projects. For instance, while the CTO’s pet prototype nears completion, core infrastructure upgrades are repeatedly delayed, creating bottlenecks that affect the entire organisation.
2. Demoralised Teams: Employees become disengaged and frustrated as they need clear direction to prioritise tasks. Team leaders feel unsupported, and engineers question the company’s commitment to its goals.
3. Erosion of Trust: Confidence in leadership diminishes as teams flounder without guidance or support. Some employees lose faith in the CTO, viewing their pet projects as self-serving distractions rather than valuable contributions to the company’s success.

The Value of Healthy Conflict

Avoiding conflict in families or organisations leads to misalignment, inefficiency, and disengagement. Silence allows dysfunction to persist, undermining trust, progress, and long-term success.

Healthy conflict is not about confrontation for its own sake; it’s about creating an environment where differing ideas and perspectives are openly shared, debated, and refined. This dynamic enables:

1. Clarity: Open discussions bring hidden issues to the surface, aligning everyone’s understanding of values, goals, and priorities.
2. Trust: Respectful conflict demonstrates a commitment to shared success, strengthening relationships and fostering psychological safety.
3. Alignment: Constructive debate ensures that the best solutions emerge, uniting teams behind a common vision and purpose.
4. Innovation: Engaging in healthy conflict helps to challenge assumptions, uncover blind spots, and spark creative problem-solving.

In The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, Patrick Lencioni identifies healthy conflict as the cornerstone of high-performing teams. Without it, decision-making, creativity, and organisational progress will stagnate, leaving teams stuck in cycles of inefficiency and disengagement.

The TKI Framework

The Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument (TKI) provides a practical framework for understanding how individuals and teams handle conflict. It identifies five conflict-handling modes, each with its strengths and situational relevance:

• Competing: Assertive and uncooperative, prioritising personal goals over relationships.
• Collaborating: Both assertive and cooperative, aiming for win-win solutions that satisfy all parties.
• Compromising: Moderately assertive and cooperative, seeking middle-ground solutions.
• Avoiding: Unassertive and uncooperative, evading the conflict entirely.
• Accommodating: Unassertive but cooperative, prioritising relationships over personal goals.

Leaders can create healthier, more productive interactions by understanding their default conflict modes and adapting them to specific situations.

Applying TKI to the Scenarios

The CEO Who Creates Chaos
In this case, although he is ultra-assertive, he defaults to a competing mode, preventing collaboration. Shifting to a Collaborative mode would allow the CEO to align his teams, address budgetary needs, and empower progress. Alternatively, Compromising in some areas could help balance the urgency of compliance with the resource limitations, ensuring incremental progress.

The Preoccupied CTO
Again, the CEO could adopt a Collaborating mode to redirect the CTO’s energy toward projects that align with organisational goals while maintaining creative freedom. Compromising could also work, where the CTO can pursue a limited number of passion projects alongside critical initiatives that move the company forward.

In both cases, enabling open dialogue and balancing assertiveness with cooperation could resolve conflicts and drive better results.

How to Break the Cycle

Breaking the cycle of conflict avoidance requires courage, trust, and a shared commitment to improvement. Here’s how families and teams can begin:

1. Build a Foundation of Trust: Create an environment where all voices can be heard without fear of judgment or repercussion.

• For families, this may involve structured conversations that give space to each member.
• Fostering psychological safety for teams encourages members to challenge ideas constructively. If a CEO or leader publicly berates team members, it encourages them to remain silent in the future.

2. Align on Shared Values: Define what truly matters — discipline, unity, or growth — and let those principles guide decisions.

3. Critique Ideas, Not People: Focus on questioning strategies, processes, or decisions without attacking individuals. This avoids defensiveness and keeps discussions productive.

4. Normalise Open Dialogue: Establish open conversations as the norm.

• Families might discuss the long-term implications of indulgence versus discipline.
• Teams should openly debate new initiatives or challenge decisions in constructive forums.

5. Commit to Change: Once decisions are made, everyone must align behind them. Commitment doesn’t require universal agreement, but it does require trust in the process.

Shape Your Tomorrow

Whether in families or organisations, avoiding conflict is a short-term strategy with long-term consequences. The family, the CEO, and the CTO examples all highlight one truth: conflict isn’t inherently negative — it’s a catalyst for growth, alignment, and progress when approached healthily.

Shape your tomorrow by embracing the power of conflict and leveraging frameworks like TKI to drive meaningful change. Share your thoughts in the comments below — and take the first step toward transformation.