Thomas Lim is the Dean for Centre for Systems Leadership at SIM Academy. He is a Systems Thinking Coach and author of Think.Coach.Thrive!
When leaders talk about collaboration, they often imagine it as a matter of attitude, goodwill or team-building exercises. Yet in my experience, collaboration usually breaks down not because people are unwilling but because mental models are misaligned. Incentives and KPIs pull teams in conflicting directions, intent remains hidden and structures reinforce silos. This is why some promising organizations fall into recurring dysfunction even while employing talented individuals.
To address this, leaders need more than motivational slogans; they need systems thinking.
Why Collaboration Breaks Down
Collaboration struggles rarely start at the surface level. They are rooted in deeper forces. The inertia of familiar patterns keeps people locked into old routines. Invisible power dynamics shape conversations long before words are spoken. Fragmented mental models mean teams interpret current reality differently and then act at cross-purposes. Add delayed reciprocity and misaligned incentives, and even well-meaning teams slide into mistrust.
One striking example comes from a mobile phone distributor client of mine that introduced a minimum order policy without consulting retail teams. On paper, the policy seemed efficient. In practice, it alienated the small retailers who made up the bulk of their customer base. Sales collapsed, relationships soured and internal blame escalated.
Systems thinking revealed that sales incentives were rewarding gross margin without considering the true cost of processing small orders. A local optimization in one part of the business had undermined the system as a whole. In my experience, this is the hidden root of many collaboration failures: teams optimize their corner of the system without seeing how their actions erode the collective purpose.
The maxim is simple: When you optimize at the sub-system level, you are bound to sub-optimize at the systems level.
Categorizing Problems Differently
Systems thinking provides leaders with a different lens. It invites them to classify problems not as “difficult” or “easy” but as simple, complicated, complex or chaotic, as set out in the Cynefin model. In simple domains, best practices suffice. In complicated contexts, experts can analyze and resolve. But in complex situations, such as collaboration across silos or national policy integration, outcomes cannot be predicted in advance. Patterns emerge only over time, so experimentation and sense-making become critical.
Equally important is recognizing feedback loops. Reinforcing loops create virtuous or vicious cycles. Balancing loops stabilize a system but can also constrain growth. Without mapping these interdependencies, leaders misinterpret signals and end up applying quick fixes that worsen the situation.
Client Cases In Point
In one of my client engagements, a regional IT service provider strengthened its leadership capacity by reframing and mapping service offerings post-merger and integrating functional roles. They recognized that these were complex systems requiring sense-making and experimentation. Instead of imposing quick fixes, they identified reinforcing loops that could accelerate collaboration and balancing loops that limited growth. By doing so, they cultivated cross-silo integration, enabling patterns of shared practices and cultural alignment to emerge organically.
For a Singapore public-sector agency, the same systems lens helped navigate the transformation of the built environment. In this case, multiple stakeholders—including developers, contractors, regulators and communities—interacted in ways that were inherently complex. Rather than relying solely on top-down directives or technical fixes, the agency recast its workplans using system models to identify reinforcing loops that drive industry-wide innovation, such as digital adoption and sustainability, while also recognizing balancing loops like regulatory constraints and resource limits. This approach allowed it to align diverse players around shared goals.
Tools For Collaborative Intelligence
Several tools within systems thinking help leaders transform collaboration. I’ve written about these tools before so I’ll link to these articles for further reading.
The Iceberg Model, for example, encourages teams to move beyond surface events (missed deadlines, disengaged staff) to recurring patterns, underlying structures and the mental models driving behavior. By doing so, you can avoid the trap of reacting only to symptoms.
Using Causal Loop Diagrams to make visible the theories that shape organizational performance can allow teams to see how one department’s decisions ripple across the whole.
In addition, the Creative Tension model may be employed to illustrate the gap between current reality and desired future, turning collaboration from a vague value into a tangible process of alignment.
These tools are not abstract frameworks but practical devices for making invisible dynamics visible. When used with discipline, they allow diverse stakeholders to see the system together, which is the first step to collaborating within it.
The Cultural Dimension
Culture amplifies or constrains collaboration. Southwest Airlines offers a corporate case example where their systemic approach shaped culture into a competitive advantage. Their leaders recognized that employee empowerment, operational efficiency and customer trust were not separate goals but reinforcing elements. Investing in staff well-being created loyalty and engagement. Efficient scheduling reinforced customer satisfaction. Transparent pricing fostered trust. The system was designed to reinforce itself, producing both profitability and collaboration.
This cultural loop illustrates a key lesson: Collaboration is not merely interpersonal. It is embedded in structures, incentives and stories that shape how people see their role in the whole. Systems thinking allows leaders to make these loops intentional rather than accidental.
The Future Of Collaboration
In an era defined by complexity, leaders can no longer rely on linear problem solving. Systems leadership is about having the capacity to bridge silos, align diverse perspectives and design structures that reinforce collaboration rather than undermine it. It provides a common language that cuts across disciplines and levels, allowing a CEO, a policymaker and a frontline employee to see the same system from different vantage points whilst maintaining line-of-sight and focus to the common desired future reality.
The future of collaboration will not be built on charisma or command. It will be built on systems literacy. Leaders who can diagnose feedback loops, surface mental models and align vision with structure will turn collaboration from aspiration into execution.
The paradox is that collaboration feels like a human challenge but behaves like a system. Systems thinking resolves this paradox by revealing how the personal and the structural intertwine. It is only when organizations see both that they can escape the cycles of mistrust and build innovation at scale.
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