Most leaders try to resolve conflict by increasing communication.
Or by scheduling more opportunities for connection.
It makes sense in theory.
But in practice, it’s not enough.
Consider a classic lesson from social psychology. In the 1950s, Muzafer Sherif’s Robbers Cave experiment brought two tight-knit groups together at a summer camp. The moment competition entered the picture, conflict erupted—name-calling, sabotage, fights. Attempts to calm things down with friendlier contact and better communication didn’t work.
What did? A shared problem that required both groups to solve it together.
When the camp’s water supply failed, the boys had to collaborate to restore it. When a truck got stuck, they had to pull it out as a team. Conflict dissolved quickly—not because they talked more, but because they built together.
That’s the core idea leaders miss:
Communication is a lubricant. Interdependence is the engine.
Why “More Communication” Doesn’t Cure Friction
- It treats symptoms, not structure. If work is organized so teams compete for resources, recognition, or control, you can’t workshop your way out of conflict with a few offsites or icebreakers.
- It optimizes the wrong layer. You can improve listening and empathy (good!), yet still leave intact a system where incentives and goals pull people apart.
- It ignores the power of shared constraints. When a goal is big and meaningful enough, people naturally reorient from “me vs. you” to “us vs. the problem.”
In other words, talk follows task. When the task requires us to depend on each other, the conversation changes on its own.
Design for Interdependence: Create a Superordinate Goal
A superordinate goal is a mission so important—and so complex—that no single person, team, or function can achieve it alone. It forces collaboration, clarifies trade-offs, and realigns incentives around one outcome.
Hallmarks of a Superordinate Goal
- Cross-functional by design. It needs engineering, product, sales, ops, and finance to succeed.
- Time-bounded and concrete. There’s a clock, a scoreboard, and a deliverable—not just “be more collaborative.”
- Meaningful and customer-anchored. The outcome clearly matters to users or the business (e.g., “Reduce onboarding time from 14 days to 48 hours” or “Ship reliability from 96.5% to 99.5% in Q4”).
The Playbook
1) Frame the Mission as “We,” Not “Me”
Language creates reality. Replace individual heroics with collective ownership.
- “We are building this together.”
- “Our success depends on everyone’s input.”
- “If it ships, we all ship it. If it slips, we all learn.”
2) Engineer Shared Wins (and Shared Constraints)
Tie rewards and recognition to the shared outcome, not local metrics. When the whole team benefits from success, the whole team works toward it. Use a single shared scoreboard visible to all.
3) Define Clear Roles, Not Silos
Interdependence needs clarity. Map who leads, who contributes, and who decides for each work stream. Overlap creates friction; gaps create blame. Use a simple RACI or DACI once—then keep it living in the project doc.
4) Shorten the Distance to Evidence
Nothing bonds a group like visible progress.
- Weekly demo or ship review (no slides, show the thing).
- A public metric that updates daily.
- Micro-milestones that take days, not months.
5) Make Collaboration the Default Path
Bake in touchpoints that are brief and purposeful:
- A 10-minute daily sync for blockers and dependencies.
- A weekly risk review where functions trade favors: “We’ll drop X if you cover Y.”
- A retrospective that captures system fixes, not just interpersonal tips.
A 30-Day Interdependence Sprint (Template)
Week 1 — Choose & Charter
- Select one high-stakes, cross-functional outcome.
- Define success, scope, and constraints in one page.
- Assign an overall owner and clarify decision rights.
Week 2 — Build the Backbone
- Create the single scoreboard (one metric that matters + 2–3 drivers).
- Map roles, interfaces, and decision points.
- Schedule the weekly demo and risk review—lock them.
Week 3 — Ship Small, Together
- Deliver the first visible slice (pilot, prototype, or process fix).
- Celebrate micro-wins that came from hand-offs or joint problem-solving.
- Capture one system improvement (e.g., a shared intake form, a kill switch, a test harness).
Week 4 — Prove It & Codify
- Demo progress to stakeholders; show the scoreboard moving.
- Run a frank retro: what friction was structural vs. personal?
- Turn the working patterns into a reusable play for the next mission.
Common Pitfalls (and How to Avoid Them)
- Vanity goals. If a single function can hit it alone, it’s not superordinate. Make the target cross-functional and customer-visible.
- Misaligned incentives. If local KPIs punish collaboration (e.g., “protect utilization at all costs”), escalate and rebalance.
- Endless meetings. Replace status theater with artifact-driven rituals (demos, scoreboards, checklists).
- Unclear authority. Decide who decides—once. Document it.
- Glacial timelines. Momentum dies without near-term wins. Ship something meaningful every week.
Bringing It Home: Map to PACE
To make this stick, connect the mission to four human levers that keep teams energized and aligned:
- Purpose: Why this matters now—for customers and the business.
- Autonomy: Clear roles and guardrails so people can act without bottlenecks.
- Connection: Lightweight rituals that keep dependencies visible and trust high.
- Evidence of Progress: Frequent, public signals that the team is winning.
When PACE is present, conflict doesn’t have much oxygen. Disagreements still happen—good ones do!—but they’re about the work, not each other.
The Bottom Line
Teams divided by friction can’t be fixed with better communication alone.
They need a problem so important and so interdependent that the only way forward is together.
Create a superordinate goal.
Design shared wins and shared constraints.
Shorten the distance to evidence.
The solution isn’t talking more.
It’s building together.
