A Nice Team Is Not Enough

One of the most dangerous things an executive team can say is: "We get along really well."

I like teams that like each other. Trust matters. Relationships matter. Psychological safety matters. But harmony is not the same thing as performance.

In my work with executive teams, I sometimes see groups that have become very good at being collegial and surprisingly bad at challenging one another.

They are respectful. They are supportive. They may even genuinely enjoy working together. But there are things everyone sees that no one says. Commitments are missed or decisions keep getting revisited.

Or one function protects its own priorities at the expense of the enterprise and instead of addressing it directly, everyone quietly waits for the CEO to handle it.

That is not a high performing team. That is a polite collection of executives.

There is an important distinction here from an I/O psychology perspective.

Psychological safety does not mean comfort.

Amy Edmondson's research at Harvard Business School has consistently emphasized that psychological safety is about creating an environment where people can speak candidly, raise concerns, admit mistakes, and challenge ideas without fear of humiliation or punishment. It is not about avoiding difficult conversations.

In fact, the healthiest executive teams combine two things that can initially feel contradictory: high psychological safety and high accountability.

Gartner research describes this intersection as the place where teams can engage in courageous exchange. Interestingly, its research found that only 12.9 percent of teams consistently operate there.

That number does not surprise me.

Holding a peer accountable is harder than holding a direct report accountable. Peers do not report to us so we cannot rely on authority. We must rely on trust, credibility, shared standards, and the willingness to tolerate a little discomfort for the sake of the business.

And that is exactly why executive team effectiveness requires practice.

A strong leadership team should be able to say: I think we are avoiding the real issue. You committed to this, and it has not happened. I disagree with your recommendation, and here is why. We made the decision. Now we need to support it as one team. I may be missing something. Help me understand your perspective.

None of those statements undermine trust. In fact, if handled well, they build it.

As executive teams move into Q4 planning and year-end conversations, I would encourage them to ask one uncomfortable question: Are we genuinely holding one another accountable, or have we delegated peer accountability to the CEO?

The strongest executive teams are not the ones with the least tension. They are the ones that have enough trust to work through tension and enough shared accountability to expect the best from one another.

That is when a group of executives begins to operate as a true leadership team.