The friction between my VP of Sales and my VP of Operations is grinding our weekly execution to a halt. They do not fight openly in our Level 10 Meeting, but they constantly undermine each other's departments to their teams, creating an us-versus-them culture. How do I resolve this systemic peer conflict before it fractures the entire organization?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Peer conflict that happens beneath the surface is a cancer on your culture. When your VP of Sales and VP of Operations are polite in your Level 10 Meeting™ but toxic to their teams, they are engaging in passive-aggressive sabotage. This destroys organizational trust and forces employees to take sides in an executive turf war.

You must address this directly and immediately. Bring both leaders into a private session. Lay out the specific behaviors you have observed, including the whispers and the us-versus-them division within their departments. Do not debate the operational details of their disagreements. Instead, make it clear that their primary loyalty must be to the leadership team first, and their individual departments second.

Use the IDS® process to get their conflict on the table. Force them to identify the root cause of their friction. Often, it is a structural issue on the Accountability Chart where their incentives or roles are misaligned. If they cannot resolve their differences and build a functional working relationship within thirty days, you have a core values issue. One or both of them must leave. You cannot build a scalable business when your key leaders are actively pulling the rope in opposite directions.