How to hear the quiet chaos behind scaling teams, and what to do about it.

There is something almost electric about a team in growth mode.

New projects, new people, new possibilities. The energy is contagious, and for a while, that energy carries everyone forward. Each member of the team is working towards the same goal and is excited about it. 

But somewhere between the excitement of scaling up and the reality of daily operations, something seems to silently take away the drive and energy the team has. Decision flow slows down, and people step on each other’s toes. Some do too much because they’re not sure what they are supposed to do at all. And the leader (often the founder or the team manager) is somehow still doing everything, while managing everyone, and trying to keep the vision alive.

This is what we, at Centered People, call a lack of role clarity. And it is one of the most common and most underestimated reasons why teams struggle during scale-up.

What happens when roles are unclear

Let me introduce you to a composite character I see often in my work. Let’s call him Liam.

Liam is a team lead in a fast-growing company. He is talented, committed, and genuinely cares about his team. When the company was small, he did everything on his own (strategy, communication, emotional support for his colleagues, and administrative follow-up). He was good at it, and it worked so well that no one thought to have someone work alongside him. 

Then the team grew from five to fifteen people. Liam stayed the same, with the same habits and work patterns.

Now he is overwhelmed, doing work that his colleagues could do. His team is confused about who makes what decision. Two people with overlapping responsibilities are in quiet conflict because neither knows where one ends and the other begins. And Liam? He is running on adrenaline, telling himself this is temporary, that once things settle down, it will get better.

It will not get better on its own. It will either break Liam and land him in burnout, or he will eventually get fedup an dquit his job. Unless his leader takes responsibility and ownership and clearly defines Liam’s role.

Under the surface:

When roles are unclear, people default to survival strategies. Some overfunction – they take on more than they should because their sense of worth is tied to being needed.

 Others underfunction – they step back because they do not want to step on anyone’s toes, or because they have learned that their contributions are not valued.

Both patterns drain the team and exhaust the individual. And both patterns come from an unmet human need – the need for competence (to know what I am good at and where I contribute), belonging (to know I have a clear place in this team), and identity (to know who I am in this context, not just what I do).

When people do not know their role, they do not know their place in the organization, and that exhausts them. And when people do not know their place, they cannot give their best.

The six pillars we work with and what they tell us about role clarity

In the ALTERNATIVs Method, we look at the full human experience, which is beyond the job description. And when we look at team dysfunction through that lens, role confusion touches every single pillar.

Body Health 

When roles are unclear, everything becomes urgent, nothing has an owner, and stress quickly becomes chronic. You feel it in your body in tiredness that doesn’t go away with sleep anymore. You need more coffee than before, feel restless during meetings, and find your focus slipping with every passing month. A team without clear roles feels the stress collectively.

Mind 

Cognitive overload increases dramatically when people do not know where their responsibility ends. Decision fatigue sets in, and focus becomes impossible when every task feels equally yours and equally not yours. People spend more energy trying to understand what they should or should not do than actually doing it. In that process, there is little mental space left for what is required of them. Not to mention their family and private life, which, yes, is important that you care about that too, as their leader.

Emotions 

Resentment builds up when someone feels they are doing more than they signed up for. Insecurity creeps in when someone feels invisible. Emotions are neither considered nor acknowledged because, in most professional settings, we are not taught to speak about them. They simply show up as disengagement, conflict, or people leaving. Then we wonder why. Now you know. 

What to do about it? Sit with it! Create a culture in your organization where you regularly gather your people and talk about emotions. Ask them how they feel about the way your company works. Then listen without interrupting. After they finished, ask them what they need so they feel different. IF you have the courage to do this exercise monthly, you will build a culture of trust, in which people will tell you how they need to be led so they enjoy work and want to contribute to its growth.

Identity & Soul 

People need to know who they are in a team. Not just their title, but their actual contribution, role, and mandate. Their unique value, what they bring that no one else can. A lack of role clarity is, at its core, an identity crisis disguised as an operational problem. 

Have a conversation with your people. Take time to help them and yourself; discover what they bring to the table that no one else can, then let them exercise it. You will be amazed at how big a difference that makes in performance and organizational health.

Relationships 

Unclear roles create unclear expectations, unclear expectations create assumptions, assumptions create conflict, and conflict in teams leads to conflict. Conflict that looks like passive communication, avoiding conversations, and a lack of collaboration.

Work & Career 

Time and time again, we see that people cannot grow in a role they cannot clearly see themselves in. They cannot develop professionally if their responsibilities change every week, or if they spend their energy navigating grey areas instead of doing their work.

Work and career are a big part of an adult’s life, and having an ambiguous role or a job that makes us feel unstable, undervalued, or insecure (which often happens when one does not know what is expected of them) will drive people away.

What happens when roles in a company are clear

When we work with teams going through scale-up, one of the first things we do together is slow down before speeding up, to ensure the organization’s foundation is solid. If it is not, we work on that, and part of the foundation is to document the role of each employee based on their team.

We look at who each person actually is – their strengths, limitations, working style, what energizes them, and what drains them. We look at what the team needs, and with honesty and care, we start mapping roles that align people with their strongest contributions rather than just filling gaps with whoever is available.

The result is that people don’t do double work anymore because they trust that someone else has it covered. Leaders don’t micromanage anymore, because they have built a team where responsibility is shared with clarity. 

The introverted members of the team begin to speak up (or write emails to communicate) because they finally know that their voices are heard somewhere specific and what they have to say is seen as valuable. 

Conflict decreases, not because people agree more (we are not naive), but because expectations are clear enough that misunderstandings have fewer places to be present.

Performance improves because each member of each team is working in alignment with who they are, and what the vision and teh goals of the company are.

We believe that sustainable performance does not put more pressure on the team to perform, but rather comes from improved clarity in everyday tasks. 

What you can do this week

Practical starting points for you:

1. Have the honest conversation. 

Ask your team openly: Does everyone know what decisions they can make independently? Are there areas where two people think they own the same thing? Name the grey areas before they become grey areas with resentment attached.

2. Separate the role from the person filling it. 

First, design the role based on what the team needs. Then ask who on your team is best suited to grow into it. This order matters more than most leaders realize.

3. Build in a review system. 

Roles in scaling teams need to evolve. Schedule a quarterly conversation (not a performance review), a role clarity conversation. What is working? What has changed? Where do people feel stretched in a good way, and where do they feel overwhelmed in a way that is not sustainable?

Takeaway

You cannot scale a team by adding more people to existing chaos. Role clarity is not an HR formality, but an act of respect for every person who shows up to give their best work.

Growth is a gift, but it is also a test of the systems you have built, the culture you have shaped, and the clarity with which you lead.

The teams that scale well are rarely the ones that move the fastest. They are the ones who take time to make sure they move together. When every person on a team knows who they are, what they own, and why it matters, something extraordinary happens: performance improves, and people take pride in their work. Nothing beats that, because it comes from belonging to something that works because of you, not in spite of you.

If this resonates with where your team is right now, reach out. Centered People works with teams and organizations that are ready to grow, not just in numbers, but in depth and quality by placing their people at the center.

Follow along for more this month as we explore what it truly means to grow sustainably as a leader, as a team, and as a human being.

Some more articles on scale up and communication to stroll along: Advice For Leaders Who Want to Scale Up – Part 1 ; Advice For Leaders Who Want to Scale Up – Part 2 ; How to Improve Communication Across Generations

Until next time,

Cristina Popescu