What's your team?

Understanding the Importance of dual team membership

As you move up the corporate ladder, the team you belong to becomes more important than the team you lead.

Why It Matters: Most executives allocate more time to their direct reports than to their peers, contributing to more siloed organizations and prioritizing their functional vision over the wider organizational vision.

The Big Picture: Every executive has dual membership in the team they belong to and the team they lead.

When asked, “What’s your team?” everyone replied with the team they led.

This is natural, as their role, identity, and sense of self-worth are tied to their leadership position.

However, the crux of the issue is that an organization's true value doesn't come from isolated departments but from holistic, integrated, and interdependent collaboration across the entire enterprise.

Commitment to the first team starts at the top:

I once observed a senior staff meeting running through their agenda. When the CEO talked about growth, he turned to the CRO; when he asked about products, he turned to the CTO; and when the conversation shifted to the growth margin, all eyes were on the CFO.

This team wasn't aware they were working in their functional silos. The executives represented their 'first team,' be it sales, marketing, products, or finance.

By prioritizing their department, they viewed issues through a narrow functional lens rather than an organizational ecosystemic lens.

To shift this paradigm, every member of the leadership team should prioritize their broader team—the one they belong to—as their "first team."

In coaching sessions, I encourage team members to declare, "I am committed to making this team my first team." This pledge helps ensure accountability and fosters a sense of allegiance to the collective goal.

Middle Management Conundrum:

The issue of silos isn’t as apparent in middle management because these leaders typically report within the same functional area. However, when I conducted group coaching for cross-functional middle-tier leaders at global companies, I noticed significant gaps in their understanding of interdependence.

Many were surprised by how interconnected they were—and how much more effective that interconnection made them. It's not their fault; traditional organizational structures often impose boundaries that limit cross-departmental collaboration.

Fortunately, when the top leadership commits to their "first team," it creates a ripple effect. This commitment fosters interdependence and connectivity, breaking down silos across the organization.