Two IT tribes – bridging the differences

This article applies Core Quality International's useful Core Quadrant model for personal growth to examine how teams interact.

Understanding Ofman’s core quadrants

Daniel Ofman’s Core Quadrant model[1] is a powerful tool for understanding personal and organizational dynamics. It helps explain how strengths (core qualities) can become weaknesses (pitfalls), how those weaknesses reveal missing qualities (challenges), and how people overreact to those missing qualities (allergies). This model is useful for analyzing tensions between different professional cultures.

Consider this example: a detail-oriented perfectionist vs. a big-picture visionary. The perfectionist’s core quality is precision, but their pitfall is over-controlling every detail. Their challenge is to embrace flexibility, but they may be allergic to what they perceive as the visionary’s chaotic and unstructured nature. Conversely, the visionary’s core quality is creativity, but their pitfall is lack of attention to detail. Their challenge is structure, yet they may be allergic to what they perceive as the perfectionist’s rigidity. Even if neither person is actually extreme, the expectation of conflict leads to real tension.

This model is very useful for personal growth but can also be applied at team level. Let’s apply the model to software product development (SPD) and IT service management (ITSM)—two organizational “tribes” often at odds. Other conflicting tribes are available.

Take two tribes: SPD versus ITSM in core quadrants

Software product development (SPD) is focused on building and evolving products quickly, experimenting, and pushing boundaries. Its core quality is innovation and speed, but the pitfall is chaos and unreliability when changes are made too hastily. The challenge is stability and reliability, but SPD teams often have an allergy to bureaucracy and rigidity.

IT service management (ITSM) feels responsible for ensuring continuity for the user organization. A core quality is therefore stability and risk control, but the pitfall is bureaucracy and inertia when processes become overly rigid. The challenge is adaptability and agility, but ITSM teams often have an allergy to chaos and unreliability.

This sets up a reciprocal allergy dynamic:

• SPD expects ITSM to slow them down with excessive process.
• ITSM expects SPD to disrupt stability with reckless changes.
• These expectations cause each group to retreat further into their own pitfalls, reinforcing the other’s worst fears.

How stereotypes create self-fulfilling tension

These tensions are often not based on actual behavior, but on stereotypes:

• SPD assumes ITSM is bureaucratic, so they bypass processes, leading to incidents that confirm ITSM’s fears.
• ITSM assumes SPD is reckless, so they tighten controls, leading to frustration that confirms SPD’s fears.
• This cycle repeats, deepening the divide.

Even when both groups are acting reasonably, the expectation of conflict can create real conflict. This is a classic case of tribalism, where differences in culture and mindset lead to distrust—even when the goals are compatible. It's a basic human desire for identity, which often means belonging to a tribe and therefore not wanting to be associated with other tribes.

Breaking the cycle: from tribes to trust

To break this cycle, organizations must acknowledge the pattern and actively bridge the gap:

1. Recognize the bias: Help teams see that their fears about the other group may be based on assumptions rather than reality.
2. Align on shared goals: Instead of “speed versus stability,” reframe the conversation around co-creating value securely and efficiently.
3. Encourage cross-team collaboration: Joint retrospectives where both sides discuss successes and failures. ITSM involvement early in development rather than at the end. SPD engagement in incident resolution to appreciate operational challenges.
4. Introduce shared metrics: Instead of separate KPIs (e.g., deployment speed for SPD versus uptime for ITSM), use DevOps-style metrics (e.g., change failure rate, mean time to recovery).
5. Cultural exchange programs: Rotate team members between SPD and ITSM. Get ITSM to work on (or at least observe first hand) new feature releases and SPD to handle service requests. Create shared communities of practice to reduce tribalism.

Conclusion

SPD and ITSM are not natural enemies—they are complementary forces that, when properly aligned, create resilient, high-performing organizations. But the expectation of conflict can generate real tension, reinforcing stereotypes and creating self-fulfilling prophecies. Ofman’s core quadrant model helps us understand these dynamics, identify blind spots, and implement strategies to foster collaboration rather than division.

When speed and stability work together, organizations achieve the best of both worlds: rapid innovation without chaos and operational reliability without rigidity. The key is breaking the cycle of tribalism and fostering trust through shared goals, communication, and cultural integration.

?[1] Core Quality International https://www.corequality.nl/?lang=en