When fixing the team doesn’t fix the problem

You’ve overcome each obstacle in turn: updated your tools, adjusted roles, redefined your expectations, even brought in new talent. Yet, no matter how many changes you implement, something’s still not working.

Instead, the energy’s flat. Deadlines lapse. The team isn’t jiving. Despite putting the expected managerial approaches to use, you’re not achieving lasting results.

I’d like to suggest that your focus has been in the wrong place. After all, the most conspicuous issue is rarely its own root cause.

Organizational distress, like bodily pain, often appears in places disconnected from its origin.

Leadership means seeing the whole, not just your part.

I first noticed a nagging pain in my knee. I’d already had injections from the orthopedist, so I tried heat, ice, stretching. Nothing worked, and no doctor could figure out why it was hurting. Then, I brought my concerns to Kurt, a holistic healer and bodyworker I’ve visited for decades.

Within minutes, he said, “This isn’t about your knee.”

He was right. My iliopsoas (the muscles that connect your spine to your leg) had tightened and tangled, pulling on my hip flexors, then my knee. Kurt spent two painful sessions releasing tension in my pelvis and calf, providing relief where medical remedies had fallen short.

As the pain subsided, I was reminded of something my mother, a physical therapist, used to say: “Healing requires seeing the full picture.”

Leaders can be prone to diagnosing isolated problems rather than interrogating larger structures. You zero in on an underperforming department or a frustrated manager without examining the conditions that shaped their behavior.

Was the poor performer miscast in a role that doesn’t match their strengths? Is a micromanaging leader driving the very frustration they’re trying to contain? Did a missed target stem from laziness or low morale?

You can prescribe a reorg, a new KPI, or a round of coaching, but if the real issue goes unexamined, nothing truly improves.

This is how dysfunction becomes the norm. When no one steps back to look at the relationships between components, companies get trapped in a cycle of surface-level solutions and underlying erosion.

Organizations have over-specialized their workforces. People work hard, but in their own lanes. They’re efficient, even excellent, but siloed from the broader system. When things go wrong, the pain gets passed around. You treat one area, only for the headache to pop up somewhere else.

And, that raises a critical question: Who’s responsible for how the specialties come together?

Just like in mending the body, conscious leaders must learn to intervene at the source.

How to begin to spot root causes

When you lead holistically, you stop reacting just to symptoms and instead start to pinpoint where they’re coming from.

Pay special attention to these three critical inflection points:

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​1. Find where challenges persist

Start with the conflicts you’ve addressed that still return.

• Is there a larger system or assumption driving this pattern?
• For example: Is high turnover about compensation, or leadership? Is below-standard output a skill gap, or a structure problem? Is the silence in the room about the project, or about something no one wants to say?

Recurring setbacks indicate that you’re responding to effects rather than their causes.
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2. Choose the right leaders

Think about what you’re really evaluating when you promote someone. Leaders are commonly selected for their past performance, but that alone doesn’t confer vision, contextual awareness, or the ability to develop others.

• Are you choosing leaders based on what they’ve done or how they think?
• Do your leaders know how to support people, or just complete tasks?
• Can these leaders appreciate how their decisions affect other departments?

Technical expertise without leadership competence undermines well-designed roles.
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3. Trace how the work actually gets done

You can't optimize separate departments and expect the organization to function seamlessly as a collective. Even your highest-achieving teams will struggle when they operate with competing priorities instead of shared accountability for outcomes. Understanding how work actually flows between people and departments reveals your opportunities for improvement.

• Where does information get stuck?
• Who’s included in decision-making, and who’s left out?
• Have you rewarded individual contributions at the cost of collaboration?

How your organization operates reveals the priorities you've actually established.

If nothing’s changing, it’s time to look again.

Pain always signals a problem, but if you only put a band-aid on it, you ignore the deeper wound and hinder your hopes of progress.

Slow down, step back. Resist hasty shortcuts, and commit to genuine discovery. Chances are, you already know where your attention belongs.

This marks the difference between management and true leadership.

As always, sending love and light,

Ginny