Navigating tension between teams

Recently, I was working with an organization that had developed some interdepartmental tension. The people in both departments were exceptionally talented and deeply passionate about the mission of their company. As you might imagine, that level of talent and conviction often produces inevitable conflict.

What struck me most was how convincing each side’s perspective was. If you only listened to one department, you would be persuaded they were completely right. Yet if you heard the other department, you would also conclude their perspective was correct. That created a real dilemma. When strong leaders bring passion, ideas, and conviction to the table, it can be difficult to move forward.

In this situation, here is what we did to help the organization make progress.

First, we focused on the personal before the professional. The starting point was helping team members see each other as people first. This did not mean becoming close friends or attending family events. It meant taking a human-centered approach to collaboration. Simple conversations about interests, background or daily life helped break down barriers. As the groups built even a small sense of personal connection, the ice began to melt, and trust started to form.

Second, we created space for frustrations to be voiced. Over time, unspoken tensions had hardened into an “us versus them” mindset. That mindset was slowly eroding what had once been a high-performing culture. We gave the groups structured room to share concerns in a respectful way. This allowed long-standing frustrations to surface without damaging the work. It was a delicate process, but it helped reset relationships.

Third, we worked with the teams to establish rules of engagement. These were agreed-upon commitments that outlined how they would interact with one another going forward. Having these shared commitments provided guardrails for collaboration and helped protect the culture they were trying to rebuild. To reinforce accountability, we even created a scorecard to track whether the commitments were being honored.

Fourth, we helped the teams build a rhythm for reviewing progress and naming tensions. They agreed to hold quarterly meetings that focused on two things: reviewing the scorecard on rules of engagement and identifying the tensions between them. This step was critical because it taught the leaders to ask an essential question: Which tensions can actually be solved, and which tensions must simply be managed?

This distinction came to life in one of the discussions. Imagine two teams in a company that must share the same limited resources. One team wanted more resources allocated to speed up their projects, while the other needed those same resources to maintain quality. That tension will never fully disappear. If the teams tried to solve it once and for all, they would end up frustrated. Instead, they learned that this kind of tension must be managed on an ongoing basis. By contrast, another tension that surfaced involved duplicate approval steps in a workflow. That issue could be solved with the right adjustments, and the team worked together to eliminate the redundancy.

For business leaders, this distinction, knowing when to manage a tension versus when to solve it, is invaluable.

The leaders who thrive are those who can discern the difference, create space for honest dialogue, and build systems that protect both their culture and their performance.

In Northwest Arkansas, where fast growth and innovation often bring competing priorities, leaders who learn to distinguish between tensions to solve and tensions to manage will be the ones who protect their culture while sustaining their success.

Editor’s note: Erik Dees, Ph.D. is a partner with Milestone Leadership, whose mission is to “build leaders worth following.” The opinions expressed are those of the author.