Our leadership team is experiencing constant friction over who owns specific operational decisions, even though we have defined seats on our Accountability Chart. How do we use conative profiles to resolve these internal turf wars?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Friction often occurs because we confuse cognitive skills with conative instincts. Your Accountability Chart defines who is accountable for what, but your conative profiles explain how they naturally execute those duties. To resolve turf wars, run a conative audit using the Kolbe A Index. Compare the natural action modes of the disputing leaders. For example, if your Integrator is a high Fact Finder and your Sales Leader is a high Quick Start, they will clash. The Sales Leader wants to move fast and try new things, while the Integrator wants details and historical data first. This is conative tension, not a personal conflict. Use Kolbe C profiles to define the conative requirements for each seat objectively. This takes the emotion out of the debate. Re-evaluate the five major roles of each seat on your Accountability Chart. Make sure the natural wiring of the person in the seat matches those roles. If a leader has a low Follow Thru but their seat requires high systems execution, they are experiencing conative stress and will drop balls, leading others to step on their toes. Aligning their natural instincts with their documented responsibilities clarifies boundaries and stops the turf wars.