Summary

Top leadership teams often aren’t “teams” in the Belbin sense: they’re too large, too homogenous, too siloed, and often don't reflect a balanced behavioural mix.
Typical leadership interventions don’t work: retreats and team-building feel artificial or self-conscious, and executives often lack time or willingness for them.
Belbin’s behavioural approach is uniquely effective at this level: it uses peer feedback to map each leader’s strengths and weaknesses, making discussions more concrete and less personal.
Using Belbin builds lasting capacity, not just short-term trust: teams can reflect, adapt, and institutionalise role awareness, then cascade this across the organisation.

Why most teambuilding initiatives won’t cut it for the top team

Many leadership teams are called "teams", but they don't behave like real teams.

Traditional team-building activities (such as retreats or exercises) often miss the mark – senior leaders either don't have the time, or they don't see the value in artificial bonding exercises.

And yet it's leadership teams who often need interventions.

DDI’s 2021 Leadership Report reveals that only one in three CEOs rate their organization’s frontline leadership as ‘very good’ or ‘excellent’. And what’s more, they tend to drop their rating of their top team’s effectiveness year on year during their first five years of tenure.

Why? Because leadership teams are often not structured like high-performance teams. Here's how they're different.

So, what does teamwork at the top look like?

There are a number of key differences between the characteristics Belbin identifies for high-performing teams and so-called ‘teamwork’ in leadership teams.

Size

High-performing Belbin teams are usually 4-6 people, to allow for genuine interaction and shared ownership. When numbers are higher, the team becomes a group and behaviours change.
Leadership team size is defined by organisational structure and job titles, rather than by what is optimal for teamwork.

Balance

A high-performing Belbin team is balanced in Team Role composition, so that strengths are used and weaknesses managed.
The leadership team is often behaviourally homogenous. Leaders are often promoted for similar strengths, reducing behavioural diversity and limiting the possibility of capitalising on complementary working styles.

Objective

High-performing Belbin teams work towards a common objective. There is collective accountability, with members taking responsibility for the team's overall performance, not just their own individual tasks.
The leadership team can be silo-driven. Individuals are rewarded for departmental success, so collective responsibility can be unclear or inconsistent. When it comes to addressing the broader issues, executives may nod along with the CEO whilst disagreeing on objectives or how to implement them. This can result in inconsistency and scepticism lower down the ranks.

Communication

High-performing Belbin teams communicate candidly, welcoming (and depersonalising) constructive conflict. Psychological safety makes it possible to challenge, debate and build on ideas.
Leadership teams operates often don't work together day-to-day and face immense time pressures, so can struggle to communicate. Meetings focus on updates and decisions, rather than reflecting on how the team works together.

Awareness

High-performing Belbin teams have role clarity – they understand their Team Role contributions and how their strengths support the team's objectives. They are able to assess their own performance and understand what individual members can contribute.
Leadership teams often contain implicit or competing roles. Owing to the amount of time spent managing down, leaders may struggle to adapt their approach to accommodate peers, or to recognise others’ strengths. They may also lack the time to assess their performance regularly, or acknowledge the link between team cohesion and performance.

"Structured self-discovery and reflection must be combined with decision making and action in the real world; the constant interplay among these elements over time is what creates lasting change."

McKinsey, 'Teamwork at the top'

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What senior teams need in order to perform

Research highlights three interlinked priorities that top teams must develop at the same time:

Common direction – clear agreement on strategy, values, and what working as a leadership team actually means.
Interaction – high-quality communication, challenge, and collaboration that draw on the full range of expertise around the table.
Renewal – the ability to bring in fresh thinking, question assumptions, and adapt as circumstances change.

Weakness in any one of these areas tends to undermine the others.

Why typical interventions don’t work

Traditional team-building activities often feel artificial or irrelevant at senior level.

Leaders are short on time, accustomed to scrutiny, and may be wary of exercises that feel contrived or overly personal.

Trust and cohesion cannot be forced – they emerge when colleagues work together on real issues in ways that reveal their different strengths and limitations.

Effective development for leadership teams must therefore be grounded in real work and support the team in understanding how each member contributes, communicates, and makes decisions.

How Belbin helps leadership teams develop collective strength

Management teams are in Belbin’s DNA. The original research that led to the Belbin Team Roles model was conducted with managers, observing how their behavioural strengths – and the gaps between them – affected collective performance. This foundation means our approach is rooted in real organisational dynamics, not abstract theory.

Belbin provides leadership teams with a practical, behaviour-focused framework that helps them understand how they function as a group and how to improve.

Behavioural insight through 360° evidence
Belbin reports draw on both self-perception and observer feedback from peers, giving senior leaders a clear, grounded picture of how their behaviour is experienced by others.
A shared, non-personal language for tough conversations
Team Role language allows leaders to address issues constructively. Instead of criticising individuals, the team can discuss behavioural gaps, overlaps, or imbalances that are affecting decision-making, collaboration, or delivery.
Clarity on strengths and missing contributions
Team reports reveal the behavioural coverage of the leadership team — where it is strong, where it is over-reliant on a particular style, and where crucial roles may be missing. This supports smarter delegation, better meeting dynamics, and more effective use of expertise.
A framework for reflection and continuous improvement
With a shared understanding of behavioural strengths, leadership teams can revisit how they work together over time — reviewing progress, reshaping contributions, and adapting to new challenges.

A model that cascades effectively

When the top team uses Belbin well, it sets the tone. Other teams across the organisation adopt the same language and approach, reinforcing a culture of clarity, self-awareness, and constructive collaboration.

Rooted in decades of observing top teams in action, Belbin offers leadership groups a proven route to understanding how their behaviours combine — and how to turn that insight into stronger, more aligned and more effective collective performance.

Fine tuning: high performance Belbin teams at the top level

Top teams face unique problems. But they are also uniquely placed to find solutions:

To develop better strategies that increase stakeholder confidence;
To perform more consistently, and
To set the example of a high-performing team for the rest of the organisation.

The result

When leadership teams understand themselves through the lens of behaviour – and work with their real strengths and shortcomings – they become more aligned, more effective, and better able to support the organisation as a whole.

Belbin offers a practical route to achieving this: grounded in evidence, focused on what people do, and easily applied to the real work leaders need to deliver.

Belbin is quick to understand and apply. It is practical and accessible to all, whilst having the depth and nuance to deal with issues at the top level.

What are the challenges facing your leaders? Is your top team a Belbin team? Our team of experienced consultants and facilitators can help.

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