Why You’re smart Alone but Slow as a Team
Have you ever walked into a meeting — maybe a cross-department one — prepared, but with a slight edge of defensiveness?
Not full-on tension.
Just a quiet “I’m not totally sure how this is going to go.”
A sense that if things drift, or if priorities clash, you might need to:
protect your team
defend your work
make sure your perspective doesn’t get flattened
I see this pattern most clearly in capable teams. The kind that look great on paper.
Teams full of smart, thoughtful, committed people.
But when they come together — the group somehow feels less effective.
This is often blamed on communication styles, personalities, or “too many opinions.”
In my experience, it isn’t that.
It’s usually a team of smart individuals who are missing a shared way of thinking together.
When everyone makes sense on their own — but not yet together
What’s happening in these meetings isn’t a clash of egos.
It’s simpler — and harder to see.
Each person is operating from their own internal way of making sense of things:
how they like to think a problem through
what they pay attention to first
how they evaluate options
what “good enough” looks like to them
when they feel ready to decide
when they think it’s time to move on
That’s not stubbornness. That’s competence.
That’s why they were hired.
Internally, these ways of working are trusted and familiar.
In a group, if a shared “our way of doing things” isn’t agreed on, individuals don’t trust it.
So instead of building something together, individuals unconsciously are holding onto their own versions of “what makes sense” — trying to make sure their logic doesn’t get lost.
The meeting turns into overlapping bubbles.
Close.
Touching.
Occasionally colliding.
But never quite forming something solid that everyone can rely on. And unlikely to be ‘efficient’ or ‘fast’ or ‘easy’.
Why pushing for speed usually backfires
If you’ve ever tried to “just move” a team like this, you’ve probably seen fire, disengagement or more unexpected delays.
Because smart people who have thought a problem through don’t just let their input be dismissed — they disengage, resist, or slow things down later. Maybe not in the room itself, but it will show up somewhere else.
It may look like this.
Someone pushes for a decision.
Or one person steps in and decides to break the deadlock.
Or the leader moves forward assuming alignment that isn’t fully there.
And then the rest of the group might :
nod, but not commit
raise issues later, one-on-one
slow things down in execution
or withdraw from future discussions altogether
That’s when:
decisions feel fragile
follow-up takes longer than it should
and a few people trying to move forward end up carrying more of the load
Healthy speed in this kind of team doesn’t come from force.
Speed comes from people being willing to merge into the group, because they understand what’s happening and know they won’t get flattened in the process.
Until that happens, people will keep doing their best individually — while the group keeps moving more slowly than anyone wants.
Speed will appear once the thinking becomes shared
Teams like these that move faster aren’t faster because they agree more or because they just have ‘better / more talented people”.
They’re faster because they’re explicitly clear about what’s happening together.
They know:
what kind of decision they’re making
when the conversation is meant to close
what will happen after
and how disagreement will be handled along the way
Once that’s clear, something shifts.
People relax.
They stop holding everything on their own.
They start building on each other instead of trying to make sure that their points are made or heard.
A shared way of working makes speed feel safe, and with repetition, that speed turns into momentum.
If this feels familiar, this is exactly the kind of moment I work in ay H&CO — helping teams make their thinking shared so movement becomes possible again.
