From the Coach: Finding Your Team's Racing Line
The greatest challenge for leaders today isn’t navigating a complicated world—it's leading through a complex one. Complicated is a tangled fishing line; with enough patience, you can follow a clear path back to the beginning. Complex is an ecosystem; pull one thread, and the entire web shifts in unpredictable ways. Too many organizations are still trying to untangle complexity as if it were a simple knot.
We assemble powerful engines of individual talent, yet wonder why we can't win the race. The truth is, a collection of high-performance parts doesn't automatically create a winning car. As General Stanley McChrystal discovered in Iraq, an "awesome machine" built for ruthless efficiency can still lose when its environment demands constant adaptation. This week, we'll explore how to upgrade your team from a collection of parts into a truly adaptable system.
Your Weekly Performance Upgrade: Three Actions to Build Momentum
This section is your pit stop—three immediately actionable upgrades to build momentum across the core domains of performance. We'll look at your internal state (The Mind), your team dynamics (The Machine), and your operational framework (The System).
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The Mind (Performance Psychology)
Problem: High-stakes leadership roles generate intense pressure, and many leaders incorrectly view nervousness as a sign of weakness or a signal to retreat.
Solution: Reframe your psychological response to pressure. Feeling nervous isn't a flaw; it's a clear signal that you're engaged in work that is deeply meaningful to you. As Formula 1 driver Carlos Sainz explained recently at the Atlassian team’25 Europe conference in Barcelona, he welcomes nerves because "it means that maybe it...does matter a lot to me to perform."
Action: The next time you feel that pressure mounting, don't fight the feeling—channel it. Use a simple relaxation technique to regain control. As Sainz practices, "breathing techniques" can calm your stress levels, lower your heart rate, and bring your focus back to the task at hand..
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The Machine (Integrated Physiology)
Problem: Most teams are simply collections of talented individuals operating in parallel. They complete their individual tasks efficiently but fail to integrate into a cohesive unit that can adapt to unexpected challenges.
Solution: Acknowledge that interpersonal dynamics are not a "soft skill" but a core component of high-performance machinery. Just as an engine's power is useless without a transmission, a team's potential is unlocked through the strength of its internal connections. As academic research confirms, "team members build strong communication skills and bonds to benefit from team performance."
Action: Institute a simple, recurring ritual to foster connection. Start a 10-minute weekly huddle where the only agenda item is for each person to share one specific challenge they're facing. This practice actively builds the "team acquaintance" identified in sports literature as crucial for creating the trust required for fluid, adaptive teamwork.
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The System (AI & Productivity)
Problem: In most organizations, critical knowledge is fragmented across different departments, tools, and individuals. This creates dangerous information gaps—what General McChrystal calls "blinks"—that slow down collaboration and cripple decision-making.
Solution: Invest in a modern "system of work" that makes organizational knowledge universally accessible. Imagine a system that connects every project, document, and decision, creating what Atlassian calls the "teamwork graph" that brings "the power of your organization's entire memory to where you work." This eliminates the friction of searching for information and allows teams to move faster.
Action: Start small. Challenge your team to identify one critical piece of information they frequently have to ask for (e.g., a project status, a client contact, a key metric). This week, take one concrete step to make that single piece of information centrally and instantly accessible to everyone, creating a micro "teamwork graph" and eliminating your first blink.
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These small upgrades create the foundation for the larger strategic shifts required to thrive in a complex world.
From Silos to Synergy: Building Your Team of Teams
In today’s volatile environment, the difference between success and failure is no longer about who has the most efficient process. Sustained success now hinges on a team's capacity for constant, fluid adaptation. The strategic models that created predictability and scale in the twentieth century are the very things that create rigidity and fragility today. To win, we must move beyond the command-and-control hierarchy and build a new model: a Team of Teams.
🎙️ Prefer to listen? Here's a short, AI-generated audio summary of the main topic in this issue:
The need for this transformation was powerfully articulated by General Stanley McChrystal in Team of Teams. He described how his elite U.S. Task Force, an "awesome machine" comprised of the "best of the best," was consistently being outmaneuvered by a decentralized, agile, and networked adversary. In F1 terms, they had the world's best engine, the most advanced aerodynamics, and a brilliant chassis—but these world-class components were disconnected, operating in their own silos. They weren't a race car; they were a collection of parts in a garage, losing to a less powerful but fully integrated competitor. To win, McChrystal had to re-engineer his entire organization around two transformative pillars.
The first pillar is Shared Consciousness. This is a radical commitment to transparency, where information flows freely across the entire organization. The goal is to give every member a holistic, system-level understanding of the operating environment. Think of an F1 pit crew. Their ability to perform a sub-two-second tire change isn't just about individual speed; it's about extreme transparency and shared awareness that allows for perfectly synchronized, instinctive execution. This stands in stark contrast to the traditional, inefficient "need-to-know" culture, which creates dangerous "blinks" between teams and slows everything down.
The second pillar is Empowered Execution. This involves decentralizing decision-making authority, pushing it down to the individuals and teams who are closest to the information. On the track, the F1 driver has the ultimate real-time context of grip, tire wear, and competitor positioning. The team must empower that driver to make critical strategic decisions—like when to push or when to conserve fuel—without waiting for micromanagement from the pit wall. This requires leaders to fundamentally shift their role from being "chess masters," who control every move, to being "gardeners," who cultivate the environment and trust the team to execute.
These two pillars are inextricably linked. Shared consciousness creates the essential context and trust that makes empowered execution possible. This fusion is what transforms a rigid hierarchy into a fluid and adaptable "team of teams." It’s the ultimate leadership secret, echoed by leaders from the battlefield to the F1 paddock: success comes from getting "talented people to work together."
This transformation does not happen by accident. It is the direct result of a conscious and deliberate leadership choice. Your role as a leader is not to perfect the machine of the past, but to courageously cultivate the ecosystem of the future. The gardener does not command the garden to grow; they create the conditions for growth. They tend the soil, remove the weeds, and ensure access to light. This is the new work of leadership: to actively, relentlessly, and courageously create an environment of trust, transparency, and shared purpose. Build this, and you will build a team that can not only compete, but win—no matter how the race evolves.
Go Deeper: Watch & Listen
In this week's short video, listen to Peter Kenyon’s inspring take on teamwork – live from the Atlassian team’25 in Barcelona:
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