“We meet every week. We have a strategy. We are a leadership team.” But is that really the case? Far too many leadership teams don’t truly function as teams. They fail to move from a superficial alliance to generating genuine collective momentum. Here’s our recipe for a strong leadership team. Article published in Mandag Morgen, 28 May 2025
Is Your Leadership Team Just a Facade of Siloed Individualists?
Many leadership teams don’t actually operate as teams. On paper, they share responsibility for strategy, priorities, and leadership. In practice, they’re trapped in silos, status meetings, and silent conflicts. They function as a collection of individualists running in parallel. The result? The strategy withers, momentum stagnates, and the organisation stumbles.
This doesn’t mean the leaders don’t want to collaborate. It means the framework, culture, and shared practices aren’t designed to make collaboration truly work.
All too often, we end up with what we call a facade alliance: where we speak politely and nod at the strategy – but never truly embed joint progress into the everyday. We spend our energy balancing considerations, positions, and processes – while losing sight of the core purpose.
The transformation from a leadership team on paper to a team with pulse and shared power doesn’t start with more slides or another seminar. It starts with a mindset shift. A shift from coordination to co-creation. From updating to ownership. From polite meetings to genuine commitment.
It’s not about more coaching or teambuilding. It’s about taking your collective responsibility as the organisation’s primary decision-making engine seriously.
Three Myths That Sabotage Leadership Teams
- “We’re a team because we meet regularly”
Weekly meetings with status updates don’t make you a team. They make you a coordination group. A team shares goals and joint responsibility. - “We’re leaders – of course we know how to collaborate”
Many senior leaders are highly trained individualists. This makes them excellent leaders, but not necessarily good team players. Strong leadership teams know that progress lies in rhythm – not in isolated high performances. - “As long as we’re strategic, we’ll be fine”
Strategy without action and relationships becomes attractive slides with no impact. It’s collaboration, courage, and ownership that drive real results.
Strong leadership teams understand that it is in the rhythm – not in isolated peak performances – that real progress is created.
Myths about leadership teams don’t exist in a vacuum. They shape behaviours, influence decision-making cultures, and directly affect team performance. When we assume we’re a team simply because we meet – or that collaboration comes naturally to leaders – we unknowingly build a structure that works against us.
These aren’t just misunderstandings. They become patterns. And those patterns are visible in six recurring challenges we see in leadership teams across sectors.
We Witnessed This First-Hand in a Danish Organisation
The leadership team of a large Danish company consisted of talented, experienced professionals, yet they struggled to generate momentum. Departments went their own way, decisions were made in hallways, and frustrations grew. During a joint development process, we helped them identify how they could take more – and share more – responsibility as a team.
We asked each of them to describe a specific situation where collaboration had gone off track. It quickly became clear: they all experienced the same barriers, but never spoke about them openly. Only when they dared to voice their patterns and adjust the team’s “ground rules” did things begin to shift.
They changed their meeting format, reduced status updates, and increased focus on shared progress. They began challenging each other – respectfully – and taking collective ownership of what had previously been “someone else’s problem.”
The result? Faster decisions, better cross-functional collaboration – and an organisation that could finally feel the leadership team pulling in the same direction.
Five Critical Questions
It all starts with five simple yet powerful questions:
- What is our mandate and purpose as a leadership team – and whom do we ultimately serve?
- Are we clear on which strategic goals we must deliver together – and how we track progress?
- How do we co-create solutions rather than splitting tasks into silos?
- How do we represent the organisation externally – and create alignment with key stakeholders?
- How do we learn together – and turn experience into better collaboration and action?
The leadership teams that truly succeed do just that. They have the conversations. They take ownership. And they choose direction – together.
Leadership is a Team Sport
A high-performing leadership team isn’t a collection of stars, but a team that knows how to make each other shine. As in team sports, individual brilliance isn’t enough. It’s about playing each other better.
This demands a new discipline: Team Leadership as Practice. It’s not about soft values, but about hardcore execution – together.
So how do you get started? Here are five down-to-earth moves that work in practice:
- Spend ten minutes at the start of each meeting on the team’s shared priorities
- Speak as the voice of the organisation, not as silo representatives
- Hold a 1:1 with the colleague you collaborate with the least
- Acknowledge behaviour that strengthens the leadership team – not just individual results
- End meetings by asking: “Did this give the team more energy – or less?”
The CEO’s Role: Trust and Consequence
The top leadership – especially the CEO – sets the tone for the entire organisational culture. If the leadership team is to operate as a real team rather than a group of individualists, it requires a visible and clear CEO who embodies the values the rest of the organisation should live by.
A strong CEO is not just a visionary strategist; they are also first among equals, creating space for trust, setting the framework for openness, and demonstrating through actions what collective responsibility really means. When a CEO consistently supports collective decisions, insists on shared learning, and steps into difficult conversations, it sends a powerful signal through the organisation: Here, we stand together – even when it’s tough.
Trust isn’t built through intentions or value posters on the wall. It grows over time through small and large acts that show leadership is serious. And when trust is combined with consequence – meaning that behaviour which undermines the collective is clearly addressed – a culture emerges where responsibility, courage, and collaboration become natural foundations.
A CEO who dares to confront silo thinking, celebrates collective success over individual achievement, and actively builds bridges across functions and teams sends ripples far beyond the top team. From there, an organisation grows that can stand united – even under pressure.
Six Challenges That Block Leadership Team Momentum
- Lack of direction – Everyone works hard, but in different directions
- Low trust – Difficult conversations are avoided
- Control over collaboration – Focus is on personal power rather than collective strength
- Everything is important at once – Nothing gets prioritised, and momentum stalls
- Unclear strategic narrative – The organisation doesn’t understand the direction
- No reflection – Mistakes are repeated, and learning is lost
Book Coming Soon on Strong Leadership Teams
In autumn 2025, Janus Kleemann and Nanna Seidelin will publish a book that explores the six key barriers to momentum in leadership teams. The book is grounded in real-world practice, hands-on tools, and case studies from leadership teams across Danish and international organisations. It’s written for those who want to take leadership to the next level – not just as individuals, but as leadership teams.
Momentum Requires Rhythm
Momentum in leadership teams isn’t about running faster. It’s about moving in sync. About creating a rhythm where shared direction, decision-making, and follow-up become a natural part of daily work – not something reserved for annual strategy sessions.
Strong leadership teams understand that progress is created in rhythm – not through isolated heroics. They work deliberately to keep each other aligned, make ongoing adjustments, and learn from the bumps they encounter. They distinguish between what’s urgent and what’s important – and they prioritise continuously to direct energy effectively.
A team with rhythm can set clear decision points, make them quickly, and follow up systematically. They know that unfinished discussions, postponed decisions, and too many unanswered questions kill momentum. So it’s not just about deciding – it’s about building a culture where decisions translate into action and learning.
True transformation happens when the team shifts from individual intelligence (IQ) to collective execution power (WeQ). IQ thinks. WeQ executes.
Rhythm is built by repeating a simple pattern: Decide, execute, follow up – repeat. It takes discipline, awareness, and a strong collective commitment. But once rhythm becomes embedded in the team’s DNA, momentum is no longer something you chase – it’s something you naturally build and strengthen week by week.
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