How not to be the one who brings a “gloomy smell of problems” into the team

Be the one who turns lemons into lemonade — even when everything is falling apart.

Sometimes everything in the team goes awry — deals fall through, people argue, and everyone’s nerves are on edge.

And this is where leadership is tested: not by job title, but by the ability to hold your head high and see a way out where others see a dead end.

Think it through — and take a step toward the positive.

Want some examples? Here they are:

The contract with the client company was almost ready to be signed, but the client’s decision-maker changed; instead of Dmitry, whom we knew well, a new procurement director came in. Everything stalled.

Our project manager Sergey didn’t start complaining. Step one: he wrote to a former colleague, learned the context, updated the proposal and — whoosh — step two: carefully approached the new decision-maker. Magic! Three days later the contract came back to life. Connections matter — but only when they’re backed by trust and “calm down, just stay calm,” as Carlson says.

In the marketing team of a certain well-known “yellow” bank, two strong specialists – Ilya, a designer, and Darina, a brand manager – stopped talking to each other.

Their manager, Olga, didn’t start “sorting it out” with orders. She invited both of them for coffee and opened the conversation with the phrase:

“It looks like we have two talents, but only one deadline.”

They laughed. Twenty minutes later, they were already sketching out an idea for a new promo together. The conflict turned into synergy.

It occurred to me that sometimes this also works:

A true leader doesn’t just put out fires — they turn them into energy for the team. Even when they go into conflict, they do it openly and with a smile, and they pull out a result. Sometimes that result is a bit overcooked in the fire of conflict 😉

So, who would you call the “favorite conflictologist” on your team? Or have you already become that person yourself? Share in the comments on the Telegram post!