Seeing the Team as a System
When we were putting this blog series together, I had a walkie-talkie with Liz, a long-standing friend who is a coach and consultant with Oasis. We worked together on ‘What’s Going On?’ a year long process for internal OD practitioners post Covid. Liz was an inspiration in ensuring that one blog spoke to the nature of team as system – and in my experience, Liz is worth listening to … so here it is.
In my early practice with Oasis one of the rules of thumb when exploring what level to work at was the 3Ps – Problem, Person, Process. Most of us experience teams through relationships—who talks, who listens, where decisions get made, where tensions build. But step back, and you can see something bigger: a team is a system. It’s more than the sum of its parts. It has its own process - its patterns, feedback loops, unwritten rules, and emotional undercurrents. It breathes, reacts, and evolves.
Seeing a team this way shifts everything. Instead of simply asking, “What’s the problem” or “Who’s the problem?” we ask, “What’s the process?” Instead of fixing the immediate problem, or individuals, we explore patterns and dynamics: power, trust, belonging, boundaries, voice. The focus moves from a potential arena of blame to curiosity. From “stuckness” to possibility.
Some key ingredients help bring this systemic view to life:
1. Purpose as anchor – A clear, shared sense of why the team exists keeps the system oriented. It helps members navigate tension, make decisions, and stay connected through change.
2. Roles and boundaries – Knowing who is doing what, and why, creates freedom. It reduces duplication and confusion, and stops energy leaking into unspoken frustration.
3. Patterns and dynamics – Every team has its habits. Who speaks most? Who holds emotion? What gets avoided? Naming these patterns is the first step toward shifting them.
4. Feedback and reflection – Systems learn when they can see themselves. Creating time to reflect together—on how the team is working, not just what it’s doing—builds awareness and resilience.
5. Wholeness – In a healthy team system, people bring more of themselves. Emotions, tensions, possibilities, difference, vulnerability—all are welcome and navigated with care.
A Story: From Fragmented to Flow
One leadership team in a mid-sized organisation was stuck. Meetings felt performative. Decisions were slow. Tensions simmered beneath the surface. Senior leaders talked about “poor communication,” everything was non-specific and no one felt safe naming what was really going on.
Working systemically, we started not with content, but with how the team worked. Through coaching, the team began to surface unspoken dynamics: the over-reliance on one dominant voice, the avoidance of conflict, the different rules for different people, the confusion about roles. They explored their shared purpose, renewed their membership based on purpose and the contributions needed, clarified authorities, and built new agreements around behaviours, including how to apply honest, respectful challenge.
The impact was subtle but powerful. Conversations shifted from guarded to generative. Meetings became faster and more focused. Decisions landed and stuck. Relationships deepened. Over time, this created ripple effects with other groups they were connected to - more trust, more accountability, and a renewed sense of direction.
Why It Matters
When we stop seeing teams as collections of individuals and start seeing them as living systems, we unlock a new kind of intelligence—one that holds complexity, invites growth, and fuels real change.
The magic isn’t in fixing today’s problem or the people. It’s in shifting the system they’re part of.
Nick Ellerby is a coach and Co-Director at Oasis Human Relations, one of a group of thirty plus practitioners working in partnerships across sectors as coaches, hosts, convenors, speaking partners, facilitators, researchers and changemakers.
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