Team Dynamics

You only see it once you get it.

A high-performing team is next level. It pushes you beyond what you thought you were capable of and helps you tap into talents you never even knew you had. A team like that feels like coming home. Like being among friends. There’s energy, there’s laughter, and together you achieve results you could never have reached alone.

But not every team is high-performing.

Often, a team is ‘just’ a group of people. With clashing personalities, competing interests, hidden frustrations and plenty of drama. As we all remember from the school playground, people in groups consciously or unconsciously pull all kinds of tricks to protect their position. They gossip. They label each other. They leave people out. It’s not pretty. But it is human.

And yet organisations expect a lot from teams. They don’t just need to deliver results; they need to do it together. They need to coordinate. Give feedback. Keep learning. And somehow, they’re still supposed to enjoy working together.

And you? As the leader, it’s your job to turn this group of people into a team. A team where people trust each other and speak up. Where they take responsibility and contribute to the bigger picture.

Perhaps you already have a team like that. Lucky you! But more often than not, it takes a lot of hard work. That’s why this article is about something you first need to learn to see, and then need every day: how to read the undercurrent.

You’ll learn how to:

• recognise which stage your team is in;

• spot the patterns and pitfalls at play;

• intervene deliberately as a leader, rather than simply react.

Every team grows… or gets stuck

A team doesn’t become high-performing just like that. It falters, stumbles, clashes and learns. Just like people, teams develop step by step: from dependence, through adolescence, into adulthood and eventually wisdom. Sometimes it happens quickly. More often, it takes time. Sometimes it happens naturally. Usually, it doesn’t.

And just like human development, the developmental stages of a team are unavoidable. Try to skip one as a leader, and it will come back to bite you. The growing pains simply get swept under the carpet.

Still, we often treat teams as though they’re already fully formed. We throw them in at the deep end. Set a KPI for collaboration. Send them on feedback training when nobody feels safe enough to be honest. Or sit them in a circle and ask everyone to ‘be vulnerable’ for a moment. We expect mature behaviour from a group that hasn’t even worked out who or what it is yet.

It helps to know where your team is in its development. That allows you to meet the team where it is and respond accordingly. To be patient when patience is needed and give it a push when the time is right.

The four stages of team development

Most team development models describe four recognisable stages. We use Bruce Tuckman’s classic model as our foundation, enriched by Susan Wheelan’s psychological depth and Jobbeke de Jong’s practical application.

Every team moves through these four stages to some extent:

• Forming – caution, alignment and dependence.

• Storming – conflict, power struggles and positioning.

• Norming – agreements, trust and working towards a shared goal.

• Performing – maturity, ownership and results.

Teams rarely move through these stages in a straight line. Some never make it past Forming. Others think they reached Performing long ago, only to fall straight back into Storming at the first sign of trouble. This can happen when pressure increases, for example, or when the team’s composition changes.

One thing is certain: once you know which stage your team is in, it becomes much easier to find the right tone and choose the right intervention. Sometimes that means doing absolutely nothing and sitting on your hands. At other times, it means stepping in, even when the idea secretly terrifies you.

Let’s look at each stage in turn.

Forming: the dependence stage

At this stage, team members operate as separate islands. Everyone focuses on their own work, checks in with you one-to-one and mainly hopes to avoid causing any trouble. It isn’t a team yet. It’s a group of colleagues with individual tasks.

Meetings are mostly a series of separate opinions, without any real conversation or shared goal. The undercurrent is there, but it remains out of sight. Frustrations are denied, doubts are swallowed and tensions are laughed off.

Team members are looking for safety and stability. They look to you for direction and clarity. They are polite and friendly to one another, mainly because nobody wants to disturb the atmosphere.

Reflection is difficult. Everything feels personal and uncomfortable. Giving feedback feels risky, so people would rather avoid it. You hear comments such as: “I’d better keep quiet.” “That’s not my responsibility.” “The manager should sort this out.”

Many teams remain stuck in this stage. Sometimes because it works well enough: the work is straightforward, the atmosphere is fine and nothing is going seriously wrong.

Typical behaviour in Forming:

• Everyone mainly talks about their own tasks.

• Difficult topics disappear into one-to-one conversations.

• It feels socially safe, but nobody talks about what really matters.

• Everyone speaks from their own perspective, and nobody makes a decision.

• The elephant in the room? It’s hanging out by the coffee machine.

Your role as a leader: Provide structure, clarity and safety. Set clear expectations and be predictable.

Your pitfall: Putting on your rose-tinted glasses. “Tra-la-la, everything is running so smoothly. Everyone is positive. Not a problem in sight.” There is definitely something going on, but as long as people don’t truly need one another, they’ll keep their cards close to their chest.

Real teamwork only begins when people need one another to achieve a shared result. And that is where the next stage begins.

Storming: the conflict stage

As soon as team members genuinely need one another, friction begins. The atmosphere shifts from polite to heated, and from cautious to combative. Welcome to the storm: the team’s teenage years, complete with mood swings, power struggles and gossip.

Boundaries are tested. Team members push back against one another and against you as their leader. Just like on the school playground, it’s all about position, status and influence. Who makes the rules? Who gets the final say? Who belongs, and who doesn’t?

The biggest pitfall at this stage is blaming the tension on individuals: “It’s him.” “She’s always so bossy.” As a leader, it can be difficult to take a step back and recognise that almost all of this behaviour makes sense at this stage. In fact, some of it is necessary for the team to move forward.

The challenge is not to smooth over these differences, but to learn to tolerate them. Differences are part of the deal. They need to be allowed and given a place. That requires something we naturally prefer to avoid: discomfort and confrontation. But no friction, no polish. This stage is uncomfortable and essential.

Typical behaviour in Storming:

• Clear subgroups or camps emerge: the ‘old guard’ versus the ‘newbies’, the big names versus the lesser mortals.

• Differences are made personal instead of being recognised as team patterns.

• People fall back on stereotypes and assign each other roles: the rescuer, the complainer, the one who always agrees.

• Resistance becomes non-verbal: knowing looks, sighs, cynicism and checking out.

• There is plenty of debate, but very little real listening.

• The leader is met with all sorts: admiration, contempt, but rarely support.

Your role as a leader: Recognise the patterns beneath the behaviour. Stay with the tension. Be firm and available. Set boundaries and listen.

Your pitfall: Trying to shut down the conflict. Speaking to people separately, calming things down and smoothing things over. The conflict may disappear from view, but it doesn’t disappear from the system. Worse still, the team never learns how to face conflict and work through it together.

Norming: the collaboration stage

Once the team has learned to handle tension without tearing each other down, calm begins to emerge. The rough edges soften. There is room for genuine connection and collaboration.

This transition towards the promised land of High Performance often comes as a relief. Roles and responsibilities are clear. Expectations are spoken aloud. Team members take initiative, give each other feedback and dare to speak up. The energy starts flowing towards the shared goal. People take ownership, not only of their own part, but of the whole.

There is room to reflect. To learn. To talk about the how, not just the what. Team members trust one another—and show it. Slowly, a shared understanding begins to grow: “This is how we do things. This is what works for us.”

Typical behaviour in Norming:

• Team members actively seek each other out.

• Agreements are made and honoured.

• Feedback is shared with the intention of helping each other grow.

• Ownership and mutual support begin to develop.

• Things feel lighter and more serious at the same time.

Your role as a leader: Let go wherever you can. Encourage ownership and direct coordination between team members.

Your pitfall: Thinking you still need to carry and solve everything for the team. At this stage, you can take more of a back seat while keeping an eye on the overall direction.

Performing: the maturity stage

At this stage, the team is connected to itself and to the bigger picture. People are aware of the wider context: the organisation, its stakeholders, its customers and society. There is less need for ego-driven behaviour. Team members no longer feel the need to prove themselves and instead focus on setting one another up for success. The team has, in a sense, become wiser.

The team reflects on what it does and how it does it. Everyone takes responsibility for the team and for themselves, even when things get difficult. They focus on what is needed. Being right barely matters anymore.

There are still conflicts, of course. But they are seen as part of the process, rather than a sign that something has gone wrong.

There is room for experimentation, feedback and shared leadership. Hierarchy begins to fade. The leader is no longer the person who decides everything, but the person who inspires, connects and provides direction.

Typical behaviour in Performing:

• The team moves smoothly between getting the work done and tending to relationships.

• Everyone contributes roughly equally, creating a sense of flow.

• Tensions are discussed without unnecessary drama.

• Team members share responsibility.

• There is room for reflection and experimentation.

• The leader facilitates meaning and direction.

Your role as a leader: Reflect back what you see. Challenge the team. Help it keep raising its game while staying connected to its direction.

Your pitfall: Thinking you are no longer needed. In a mature team, your leadership may be subtle, but it is still essential. It is less about doing and more about being present.

No team is ever truly ‘finished’. There is no neat bow to tie around it and no point at which you can say, “Nothing more to do here.” Circumstances change. The team’s composition changes. New behaviour can trigger old reflexes. That is why it is so valuable to focus not on creating a perfect end result, but on development. On building a shared understanding of where the team is now. And on taking the next step.

Where movement begins

Now that you’ve read this article, you’ve probably already started looking. At your own team. At yesterday’s meeting. At that conversation that never quite got off the ground. At the undercurrent you can suddenly see bubbling up.

Seeing is where change begins.

Because once you start recognising patterns instead of simply reacting to behaviour, something shifts. You become less irritated by “all that drama again”. You listen differently. You ask different questions. You respond with curiosity instead of acting on autopilot.

And other people notice. Teams can tell instantly whether someone is really paying attention. Whether you are looking to understand or looking to judge. Whether you want to see what is happening first or jump straight into fix-it mode.

That is where leadership begins: daring to see what is really there.

Whatever is happening between all of you, right here and right now: that is where you’ll find it. In the pauses between words. In the looks people exchange. In the energy that is flowing, or isn’t.

So look. Really look. Don’t look at the bush, look through the bush.

Because that exact moment of recognition is where the opening to the next stage appears.