260. Cohesion Inside, Courage Outside: Redefining Team Success with Mick Spiers

Ever wondered if your team's greatest strength could also be its biggest weakness? When expertise becomes tunnel vision, even the most talented teams can miss what matters most.

Drawing from my enlightening conversation with Professor Henrik Bresman of INSEAD, co-author of "X-Teams," this episode explores a counterintuitive truth: truly exceptional teams aren't defined by their internal cohesion alone, but by their courage to look outward. While most organizations celebrate alignment and efficient execution, Bresman's research reveals that external focus, deep listening, and genuine co-creation with stakeholders create the real competitive edge.

We dive into the "inward trap" that ensnares even the most brilliant teams, keeping them locked in internal debates while customers feel forgotten. You'll discover why presenting fully-baked solutions often backfires, transforming what should be partnerships into mere transactions. Through practical examples and actionable strategies, I'll walk you through the mindset shift from being expertise-driven to connection-focused.

The most powerful moment comes when we realize that listening itself is transformative. I share personal experiences where simply creating space for customers to express frustrations—even when those truths were uncomfortable—completely turned around soured relationships. That's because people don't just want solutions; they want to feel heard, valued, and involved in creating their future.

Ready to build an X-Team that leads rather than merely executes? This episode offers immediate steps you can take to audit your team's orientation, schedule genuine listening sessions with stakeholders, and move from problem-focused thinking to possibility-centered creation. Your expertise matters, but your ability to connect might matter even more.

Subscribe to The Leadership Project for more insights that challenge conventional wisdom and transform how you lead. How might your team's effectiveness change if you spent as much energy looking outward as you do looking inward?

Chapters

• 0:00 The Inward Trap vs Outward Focus
• 3:20 Deep Listening as Team Antidote
• 5:30 Co-Creation and Mindset Shifts
• 7:58 Practical Action Steps for X-Teams
• 10:40 Rebuilding Customer Relationships Through Listening
• 12:25 Episode Wrap-Up and Next Preview

Transcript

Mick Spiers: 0:01

What if the greatest threat to your team success isn't poor communication, lack of alignment or even burnout, but tunnel vision. What if the very expertise that made your team great is also what's holding you back? And what would happen if we stopped building teams to execute and started building them to lead in today's episode, I'm sharing my reflections on the recent conversation with Professor Henrik bresman of INSEAD, the co author of a book called X teams. Henrik challenged us to reimagine how we build and lead teams, and one idea stood out. The most successful teams are just cohesive inside the room. They're courageous outside of it. Welcome back to The Leadership Project. I'm your host, Mick Spiers, and today we're reflecting on the amazing conversation with Henrik Bresman of INSEAD, challenging us to think as to whether we're always inwardly focused, instead of looking at the outside world, starting with that quote that we just spoke about, the most successful teams aren't just cohesive inside the room, they're courageous outside of it. That simple insight packs a punch, and it got me thinking, how many of us lead teams that are so focused on internal cohesion, alignment and delivery, that were forgotten to look outward? Let's unpack that with several ideas, starting with number one, the inward trap, when expertise becomes a barrier. Henrik shared that X teams succeed because they are not just internally strong, they are externally focused, agile and connected to their broader environment. And it struck me so how many teams, especially expert teams, become inwardly focus. We double down on internal meetings, debate solutions in a vacuum and then proudly present a finished product to the customer, expecting applause. But here's what really happens. We forget that our customers and stakeholders are people too, just like us. They want to feel seen, they want to feel heard, they want to feel valued. They want to feel that they're part of the solution. They want to know that they matter. And when we present something fully baked, something they didn't help shape, they don't feel like collaborators. They feel like outsiders. They feel forgotten. The result is we come across as being combative, contractual, commercial, and it becomes transactional, or even worse, if it goes off the rails, it might even become personal, and that's a problem. So number two, what's the antidote here? Listening, listen then listen again. Deep listening, not the kind where you're waiting to talk and show how smart you are, the kind where you create a safe space for people to truly open up, where you stop interrupting with your expertise and instead invite their full story into the room. Here's something I see all the time. Teams second. Guess what the customer wants. We make assumptions. We try to predict what they'll push back on. We think we're being clever or considerate, but the truth is, we're often just avoiding the uncomfortable work of asking them. We need the courage to ask the customer, so what's really going on here, and what do you actually need from us? What's the real challenge here? And why is this important? Because the real challenge is often deeper than the surface request. It might not be about the product specs at all. It might be that they promised their boss something by a certain date, and they're under pressure, and if you don't know that, you're solving the wrong problem, one of my favorite practices here is to keep on asking those Is there anything else or what would you say is the real challenge here? So that you really allow them to open up, then once they have paraphrase it back to them, because nothing builds trust faster than demonstrating that you get them. If you can articulate their problem better than they can, they'll naturally assume you have the answer, and that's when trust begins. Henriks research showed that x teams spend time mapping their external ecosystem, not just to gather data, but to build relationships, to hear unspoken concerns and adapt in real time. That's the kind of team. I want to lead, and the kind I want to be part of. Idea three is then co creation over imposition, once we've deeply listened, the next step is co creation. It's tempting as experts to leap to solutions. We're the expert. We know our craft, but if you design with the customer, rather than for them, everything changes. Sometimes it's not about offering the perfect solution. It's about drawing it out from them, helping them to arrive at the plan so it feels like it's theirs, that their fingerprints are over it, that sense of ownership is powerful. It transforms how they view us. We're no longer seen as vendors. We're now their partners. We're not anymore seen as the ones that think they know better, the arrogant ones. We're now collaborators and trusted advisors. That's where true influence lies. Idea four is this also requires, sometimes a mindset shift, a mindset shift from being a victim mindset to a creator mindset. So a victim mindset is always looking for what's wrong, why things can't be done, and the challenges that are ahead. But here's the kicker, when we stop obsessing over what can't be done and start focusing on what can we move into a creator mindset, even if the customer is stuck, even if the constraints are real, even if the situation is dire, we can ask, well, what can we do? What can we do with what we've got from where we are, and what would progress look like from here? And how do we turn constraints into creativity? That's when magic happens. When you make your customer successful, they will make you successful, particularly in those dire moments. If you can get the best possible solution from the current situation, they will love you. They will fight for you. They'll call you for the next opportunity, and they'll see you as essential. There's going to be times where you need them as well, and that's where they will go out of their way to help you, if you've been the one that helped them, particularly when they were in a pickle. So here's some calls to action, some baby steps that will build momentum. Let's land this episode with the practical things that you can do today. You can do this start with auditing your team's orientation. Ask how much of our energy is focused inward versus outward? How much time are we spending on internal meetings versus actually going and taking a meeting with our customer, where we deeply listen to them? Where are we disconnected from stakeholders, where do we re need to rebuild those bridges. Schedule listening sessions. Don't go to your next customer meeting to pitch them something. Go into learn something. Ask the questions. Ask what else, at least twice in your next stakeholder meeting, ask them, what does this really mean, and why is this important? Why does this matter to you? Paraphrase before you solve. Show them that you heard them use their language when they say, Yeah, that's exactly it. Then you can start solutioning. Then co create, bring them into the design phase. Draw ideas out of them, not just not just into them. Don't have all the ideas yourself. Let them take some ownership here and lead with possibility. Be the voice in the room that says, here's what we can do, not what we can't do. Invite collaboration even when the problem seems messy, and have this creative mindset of what can we do with what we've got from where we are? So here's the final thought, the most effective teams aren't built to execute someone else's vision. They're built to lead the next one. That's the call Henrik gave us, and I believe it's one worth answering. Let's move towards cohesion. Let's look outwards. Let's listen deeply, and let's co create. Let's build X teams, ones that aren't just focused on their own internal BS, but they're truly focused on the external world, the problems that they solve, the customers that they serve, the stakeholders that they support. Start today, get out there and have a really good deep listening session with your customer. Try to make sure that you draw out what the real challenge is, not just what you think. It is. It may not be what you think it is. And if you don't hold that space and ask the right questions, you're solving the wrong problem, and the customer is going to get very frustrated with you. They're going to feel that you're arrogant, that you think you know better, but you'd miss the point so deeply listen and CO create with them. And the final thought I'll leave with you is this approach can really turn around situations where the customer relationship may have soured. I've had situations where I've gone into customer relationships and given them a good, deep listening to let them just get everything off their chest for 90 minutes, and I got to tell you, some of the things I heard were not nice. They were quite ugly truths about what they thought about our team. The very fact of doing the listening session turned the relationship around, because they then felt heard. They finally felt like someone was listening to them, and they'd felt like for a long time that no one was listening to them. So the very fact of listening is going to start turning a sour relationship around. And then what's most important is what you do next is to show that you understood the problem, that you understood their business and that you are ready to co create with them, to collaborate with them and to find solution you can turn around even the most dire of customer relationships if you deeply listen to your customer and your stakeholders. If this idea has really resonated with you. I'd love to hear your thoughts. Please comment or share or send us a note. What's one baby step your team could take this week to be more outwardly focused, to more deeply listen to your customers and stakeholders, so that you can become an X team. So that's it for today. In the next episode, we're going to be joined by Dan Johnson, the chief consultant and founder of next level not non profits us, and he's going to be sharing with us authenticity and impact in non profit leadership. Thank you for listening to The Leadership Project mickspiers.com a huge call out to Faris Sedek for his video editing of all of our video content and to all of the team at TLP. Joan Gozon, Gerald Calibo and my amazing wife Sei Spiers, I could not do this show without you. Don't forget to subscribe to The Leadership Project YouTube channel where we bring you interesting videos each and every week, and you can follow us on social, particularly on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram. Now, in the meantime, please do take care, look out for each other and join us on this journey as we learn together and lead together.