The 5 dysfunctions of a leadership team, in the Spanish SME

A management committee can be made up of brilliant professionals and still work badly as a team. It happens all the time. Everyone defends their own area, meetings are correct and polite, and the important decisions never get made.

Patrick Lencioni explained it in a 2002 book that has become a classic: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team. His idea is that teams fail because of five problems that build on one another, like a pyramid.

The pyramid, from the bottom up

1. Absence of trust. Nobody wants to look vulnerable: admit a mistake, ask for help or say “I don’t know”.
2. Fear of conflict. Since there’s no trust, real debate is avoided. There’s artificial harmony.
3. Lack of commitment. Since there’s been no real debate, nobody feels the decisions are theirs.
4. Avoidance of accountability. Since nobody has committed, nobody holds a colleague to account when they don’t deliver.
5. Inattention to results. Everyone looks at their own area, status or ego, not at the result of the whole.

The key is the order. You can’t fix the top floor if the one below is broken.

The two I see most in SMEs

In the leadership teams of Spanish SMEs, the two dysfunctions I come across most are fear of conflict and avoidance of accountability.

Fear of conflict has a lot to do with our Mediterranean character. We love giving good news and we find it hard to say “I don’t agree” while looking someone in the eye. The result is pleasant meetings where everyone nods, and corridors where people say what they really think.

And that has a direct cost: if it isn’t argued out in the meeting, it gets argued out during execution. Which is far more expensive.

Avoidance of accountability is the logical consequence. In many SMEs, the leadership team are people who have worked together for many years, sometimes with friendships or family ties. Holding a colleague to account for not delivering feels like a betrayal. So nobody does it, except the managing director. And the managing director ends up being the only one who demands, the only one who monitors and the only one who decides.

How to unblock a committee where nobody says what they think

There are no magic formulas, but there are things that work:

• The leader goes first. If the managing director admits one of their own mistakes out loud, the others start to feel able to do the same.
• Disagreement is asked for explicitly. “Before we decide, I want each of you to tell me what risk you see.” When conflict is invited, it stops being disrespectful.
• Every meeting ends with written decisions. What, who, when and how. What’s written down can be reviewed; what isn’t gets forgotten.
• Commitments are reviewed by everyone. Not just the boss. When follow-up belongs to the team, accountability stops being personal.
• Everyone looks at the same numbers. A shared dashboard, reviewed every month, where everyone sees how the company is doing, not just their own area.

What I’d add to the model

I think Lencioni’s model is spot on. But I’d add two things from my own experience.

First: the numbers. Lencioni talks about paying attention to results, but in many SMEs the problem comes earlier: there are no results to look at, because they aren’t measured. If the committee doesn’t have a clear dashboard, the fifth dysfunction is guaranteed. Without data, everyone defends their opinion, and whoever talks loudest wins.

Second: the method. Trust and healthy debate aren’t built on good intentions alone. They’re built with a way of working: meetings with an agenda, decisions in writing, weekly follow-up. The method protects the team from its own habits.

The ON 90-day plan helps you turn the committee’s objectives into commitments with an owner, a date and an indicator.

Reference: Patrick Lencioni, “The Five Dysfunctions of a Team” (2002).