It’s late in the quarter; you’ve been pushing hard and your team has delivered for the most part. But something feels…off. Projects that should have clicked are taking longer. Meetings that should produce decisions drag on. Goals that you thought you could definitely reach by the end of year aren’t going to happen. The team is full of competent, smart, capable people…but some small, nagging patterns keep slowing things down.
Your team definitely isn’t failing, but they’re underperforming relative to their potential. And you can feel it. You just can’t put your finger on what’s getting in the way.
What really defines workplace culture? It isn’t posters or slogans or what’s in the employee handbook. Culture is the way things truly happen behind the scenes. When decisions stall because no one wants to step on anyone’s toes. When feedback goes through you instead of directly to the person it’s about. When two or three people dominate most of the meetings. That’s where you find the heart of a team’s culture. And you are either enabling it or tolerating it.
Often, invisible behaviors - like blame-shifting, rescuing, avoiding feedback, and accepting recurring problems - quietly shape your team’s culture. When ignored, these habits waste time and energy, fuel frustration and disengagement, and trap your team behind the same invisible silent barriers year after year.
Culture isn’t abstract. It’s living in every choice your team makes about how to show up, solve problems, and interact. Spotting it, naming it, and deciding what patterns you want to interrupt and which ones you want to reinforce is the lever that actually changes performance.
New year, new team - here are a few strategies to help shift those culture patterns so the team feels different next year:
Call it what it is when you see it: rescuing, sidestepping feedback, polite silence, blame-shifting. For example:
Naming normalizes awareness and gives your team permission to shift.
Take the time to build intentional alignment for the year ahead - yes, even when the to-do list is crushing. This is counterintuitive: stepping away from the everyday work, zooming out, and getting aligned can actually accelerate performance once you’re back in the flow. A 1-day offsite with quarterly follow-ups lets your team see patterns, course-correct, and reinforce the behaviors that help you thrive.
Not sure where to start? Our free guide walks you through the process of designing a practical alignment session. Or, if you want hands-on facilitation and insight into your team’s unique patterns, we can help you plan and run the day so it drives real change.
We tend to get into question ruts, which rarely give us the information we are looking for. Instead of asking “How’s it going?” try a juicier question:
These questions make invisible behaviors visible and create openings for real change.
When someone challenges a process, gives direct feedback, or speaks up in a meeting, affirm it:
Immediate reinforcement signals that new patterns are safe and valued.
Spotting, naming, and shifting these behaviors now gives your team a clean runway for next year. They’ve been costing energy, time, trust, and momentum. In the coming year, the team will make faster decisions, collaborate more effectively, and reach the next level of performance you know they’re capable of.