Colleague and recognizable? and colleague work
You come home, sighing. “Another one of those meetings where no one really said what they thought.” Collegial collaboration is essential here.
And yet you nodded in agreement, smiled politely at your colleague, pretended everything was going fine.
Welcome to the gray area between collaboration and acting. Teams in the Netherlands encounter these kinds of situations surprisingly often. The atmosphere is "friendly," communication seems smooth, but beneath the surface, frustrations, misunderstandings, and reluctance simmer.
Why Artificial Harmony Is Killing Team Success
What happens when no one speaks their mind? Trust evaporates. Team members hold back, afraid to deviate or lose ground. Conflicts are carefully avoided. Better to swallow than to make a big deal about something. And decisions? They're dutifully accepted, but no one feels truly responsible for them.
What you are left with is stagnation, loss of energy and sometimes the departure of precisely that colleague who could have made the difference.
The solution? Have a real conversation
What do I see as a trainer in Dutch organizations? The teams that truly progress are those where people have the courage to have honest conversations. Without judgment. With curiosity. And with clear agreements.
Lencioni's pyramid provides guidance in this regard:
- confidence
- constructive conflicts
- involvement
- responsibility and ultimately: results.
When people feel safe to express their doubts and frustrations, something beautiful happens. Trust grows. Ownership emerges. And collaboration becomes energizing again, instead of draining.
How is it with you?
Are there truly honest conversations in your team? Or is there such a cautious peace that no one dares to poke any more? Are you, as a manager or colleague, stuck in patterns of avoidance, agreement, and grumbling afterward? Perhaps it's time to break that pattern. And perhaps you'll be the one to have the first conversation.
Kenneth Smit helps teams get that movement going. Curious how? Contact us.
Not listened yet?
In my video podcast, I talk about hidden opportunities in teams. In this episode of De Beste Sales Podcast, I speak with Cesar van der Linden about something I often see in practice: teams with enormous potential that stall due to unspoken tensions. Think of simmering irritations, vague expectations, or that one team member everyone gets annoyed with… but about whom no one ever says anything.
Why we avoid conflicts
The fear of engaging in conflict is deeply human. We want to belong, be appreciated, and maintain harmony. But that false harmony comes at a price. Unspoken frustrations pile up, trust slowly erodes, and ultimately the entire team pays the price in the form of poor collaboration and missed results.
Patrick Lencioni describes this aptly in his model of the five frustrations of teamwork. A lack of trust lies at the root. When team members do not feel safe enough to be vulnerable, a pattern of avoidance emerges. No one voices the real problem, and therefore it is never solved.
How do you break this pattern?
It starts with the leader. If you, as a manager, lead by example by being honest about your own doubts and mistakes, you give your team permission to do the same. That requires courage, but the effect is immediately noticeable. Teams in which the leader shows vulnerability consistently score higher on trust and collaboration.
A practical step is to introduce regular team meetings that explicitly provide space for discussing mutual collaboration. Not as a formality, but as a sincere invitation to say what is on your mind. Ask questions such as: “What are we struggling with as a team?” or “What do we need to work together better?”
At Kenneth Smit, we guide teams and managers in building trust and improving mutual communication. Our Effective Communication training offers concrete tools to conduct difficult conversations in a way that strengthens the relationship rather than damages it.
Read also
You can find more background information about Collegial Work on Collegial Work (Wikipedia).
