Something's Not Working. Here's How to Figure Out What's Really Going On.

There is usually a point where a leader knows something is not working.

Decisions take too long.

People keep revisiting the same issues.

Teams are working hard, but the results are not improving.

The leadership team appears aligned in the meeting, then different messages travel through the organisation afterwards.

You may hear about a lack of accountability, workplace conflict, culture problems or team dysfunction. Those descriptions may be accurate. They may also be symptoms of something else.

The first diagnosis is not always the right one.

That matters because the response depends on what is really happening. If the problem is unclear ownership, another communication workshop may not help. If the issue is a leadership disagreement, a new process may simply hide it for a while. If the problem is poor decision rights, asking people to be more accountable may create more frustration.

Before deciding what to do, it helps to understand the friction.

What is actually getting in the way?

I use the word friction to describe the things that make it harder for people to work well together and deliver what the organisation needs.

Some friction is useful. It can slow down a risky decision or encourage people to test an assumption.

Some friction is not useful. It creates delay, confusion, rework and frustration without improving the quality of the result.

This is organisational friction.

It can appear in many forms:

• Leaders agree on the objective but disagree on the priorities.
• Teams receive different instructions from different people.
• Decisions move upwards because nobody is sure who has authority.
• People avoid difficult conversations and allow small issues to become larger ones.
• Responsibility is discussed, but ownership remains unclear.
• Two teams are measured on outcomes that work against each other.
• People follow the stated culture in public but respond to very different signals in practice.
• Meetings, approvals and reporting continue even when they no longer help the work.

The activity is visible. The result is uncertain.

A full calendar does not prove that the organisation is moving in the right direction. A completed plan does not prove that people understand what they are expected to do. A new structure does not prove that the old friction has gone away.

So what is really happening?

Is the obvious diagnosis the real one?

Leaders often use familiar labels because they need a way to describe what they are experiencing.

“We have an accountability problem.”

“Our people are resistant.”

“The culture is not where it needs to be.”

“The teams are not collaborating.”

“The leadership team is not aligned.”

These statements can point us in the right direction. They are not always complete explanations.

Consider a lack of accountability.

Is nobody taking responsibility, or are several people assuming they own the same decision? Do people have the authority to act, or are they expected to deliver outcomes controlled by someone else? Are priorities changing so often that people cannot tell which commitments still matter?

Consider workplace conflict.

Is the conflict personal, or has the organisation created competing goals? Are people avoiding a difficult conversation, or are they responding to a decision that has never been made clearly? Is the tension between individuals, or between roles that have been poorly defined?

Consider culture problems.

Are people ignoring the stated values, or are leaders rewarding behaviour that contradicts them? Do people lack commitment, or have they learned that speaking honestly creates risk? Is the issue a lack of trust, or a pattern of decisions that has given people good reason to be cautious?

The label is not the diagnosis.

We need to look at what people are being asked to do, what they are able to do, what they believe will happen if they speak up and how their performance is actually judged.

Where does the friction show up?

A useful place to start is with a specific situation rather than a broad statement about the organisation.

Which decision keeps getting delayed?

Which handover regularly breaks down?

Which conversation keeps being avoided?

Which commitment is repeatedly made and then missed?

Which team relationship is affecting customers, performance or delivery?

The answers often show where to look next.

Leadership alignment

Do leaders have the same view of the problem?

Do they agree on what needs to happen first?

Do they make consistent decisions when the trade-offs become difficult?

Leadership alignment is not simply agreement in a meeting. It is the consistency people experience afterwards.

The plan is clear. The outcome is not.

If leaders give different signals, teams are left to interpret the situation for themselves. That creates additional work, local decisions and often more conflict.

Ownership and accountability

For each important outcome, who owns it?

Who has the authority to make the decisions needed?

Who needs to be consulted?

Who only needs to be informed?

If these questions cannot be answered clearly, asking for greater accountability may not solve the issue. People may already be working hard. They may simply be working within unclear boundaries.

Accountability requires more than a name beside an action. It requires a clear outcome, reasonable authority and a shared understanding of what good looks like.

Difficult conversations

What is known but not being said?

Where are people being polite in the meeting and frustrated afterwards?

Which issue is being discussed indirectly because the direct conversation feels too difficult?

Avoiding a difficult conversation does not remove the problem. It usually moves the problem into another part of the organisation. It may appear as missed deadlines, quiet resistance, poor decisions or escalating workplace conflict.

The conversation may not need to be dramatic. It does need to be clear.

Team relationships

Are teams working towards the same result?

Are they sharing information early enough?

Do they trust each other to follow through?

Team dysfunction is sometimes treated as a personality issue. Sometimes it is. Often, the relationship is being affected by a system around the team.

Competing targets, unclear roles, repeated leadership changes and poor decision processes can make reasonable people look uncooperative.

The people are visible. The conditions are less visible.

Culture in practice

What behaviour is actually rewarded?

What behaviour is tolerated?

What happens when someone raises a concern?

What happens when a senior person misses a commitment?

Culture is not only what is written in a set of values. It is what people experience when priorities compete, decisions are difficult and mistakes are visible.

If an organisation says it values collaboration but rewards individual protection, people will notice. If it says people should speak up but responds poorly to challenge, people will adjust their behaviour.

This is not necessarily a sign that people do not care. It may be a sign that they are responding rationally to the environment around them.

How do you find the real problem?

I find it useful to work through a simple sequence.

1. Describe what is happening

Avoid starting with a judgement.

Instead of saying, “The team is not accountable,” describe the pattern.

“For the last three months, decisions about customer pricing have been escalated to the executive team, even when the relevant information sits within the commercial team.”

That gives us something to examine.

2. Identify the impact

What is the issue affecting?

Is it slowing delivery, increasing cost, creating risk or damaging trust?

Who is experiencing the impact?

What is the consequence if nothing changes?

This separates an inconvenience from a material business problem.

3. Test the first explanation

If the issue is described as a lack of accountability, what else could explain it?

If the issue is described as resistance, what may people be concerned about?

If the issue is described as poor communication, where exactly is the message being lost?

Good diagnosis does not dismiss the first explanation. It tests it.

4. Look for patterns

Is this one isolated situation, or does the same pattern appear elsewhere?

Does the issue happen across teams?

Does it happen only under certain leaders?

Does it appear when priorities change?

Does it occur at a particular handover or decision point?

Patterns tell us whether we are looking at an individual issue, a team issue or a broader organisational condition.

5. Decide what response fits

The problem should determine the response.

Sometimes the right response is a clear decision.

Sometimes it is a difficult conversation.

Sometimes it is a change to roles, measures, governance or process.

Sometimes the organisation needs to stop doing something.

Sometimes leaders need to spend more time understanding the issue before choosing an intervention.

There is no value in selecting a familiar solution before the problem is clear.

What does “Where’s the friction?” mean?

“Where’s the friction?” is a simple question, but it opens up a useful conversation.

Where does work slow down?

Where do people receive mixed signals?

Where does ownership become unclear?

Where do leaders disagree?

Where are decisions avoided?

Where does the stated culture differ from the experienced culture?

Where is the organisation asking people to deliver something without giving them the clarity, authority or support to do it?

The question helps move the conversation away from blame.

It does not assume the answer is a person, a team, a process or a system. It creates space to understand what is happening before deciding what to change.

That is important because not every problem needs a large intervention. Some issues can be resolved with a decision or a direct conversation. Other issues are more established and require a broader response.

The problem should determine the response.

Where should you start?

Start with the situation that matters most.

What is the issue affecting?

What have you already tried?

What still does not make sense?

Who sees the problem differently?

What would become possible if the source of the friction were clearer?

You do not need a finished diagnosis before starting the conversation. You may only know that something is not working and that the obvious explanation does not quite fit.

That is enough.

I help leaders make sense of people and organisational problems, then work out what to do next. The starting point is usually a clear look at what is happening, what matters and where the friction sits.

Talk to me. We can start there.