A UK manufacturing company’s senior leadership team sought our help after a restructuring left them fractured.  Internal divisions and low trust had turned routine conversations tense, stalling effective collaboration. Despite their intentions, communication had broken down, leaving the CEO struggling to lead without falling into a cycle of blame.

The result was a team caught in conflict and frustration, unable to move forward together.

Our Collaboration

1.Contracting with the Whole Team
Moving past the assignment of blame, mediation, or capability building, we contracted with the team and CEO to work systemically and explore a different question:
“What wants to be seen through the tension that this team holds so you can move forward?” And where else in the system do we see the same pattern emerging?

2. Systemic Leadership Reflection We led a two-day session for the team and CEO using Structural Constellations and Systemic Leadership theory.  Early in the process, it became clear that each member was holding an essential part of the system, carrying unspoken emotions, unfinished decisions, and loyalties from the past that continued to shape how the team related to each other in the present. 

This experiential process allowed them to see their system from a wider and deeper perspective, revealing what was unacknowledged and what needed attention, what needed alignment, for a collective movement to occur.

With further dialogue and reflection, the team began to share, listen, and see that what was showing up between them was not just interpersonal, but systemic, and that these patterns were also mirrored in other parts of their organisation. Once these were understood, their energy, capability, and knowledge could begin aligning around a common goal, an essential step toward genuine collaboration.

3. Ongoing Team Coaching
The team coaching journey continued over five months through monthly four/five -hour sessions, structured around Peter Hawkins’ Five Disciplines of Systemic Team Coaching:

-Commissioning: Reconnecting with purpose and aligning with stakeholder expectations.

-Clarifying: Defining the team’s collective goals, roles, and success measures.

-Co-creating: Building trust, communication, and reflective collective practice for feedback and anchoring of priorities.

-Connecting: Supporting the team with their wider ecosystem and key relationships.

-Core Learning: Challenging their current expectations on their capabilities in readiness for their collective challenges.

Key Learnings

When teams face difficulties and the capacity of the wider system has reached its limit, attempting to make them go further faster can end in conflict or chaos. By embracing systemic listening, this team learned to have more open and honest conversations about what was really happening amongst themselves, the team and the wider system. This approach helped the team rebuild trust, move beyond blame, fully embrace their responsibilities, and address collective challenges with curiosity, laying the groundwork for a clearer, shared purpose for their future.