Helping leaders motivate their people to a higher level of performance through strong human relations, team building and GOLA GV. This is the seven Minute Leadership Podcast with your host Paul fella Aledo.
Hello everyone, and welcome to the seven Minute Leadership Podcast. It's episode six point twenty seven. Let's talk about something that every leader eventually faces. That's broken alliances. Not open warfare, not screaming matches and conference rooms. I'm talking about the quiet fracture, the cold shoulder, the shift in tone, the
meeting after the meeting. Two managers who used to collaborate now barely speak, a deputy who feels sidelined, a senior employee who once had your back and now operates in silence. In emergency services, when two units stop communicating, someone gets hurt. In business, when two leaders stop trusting each other, the damage spreads slower, but it spreads deeper. Broken alliances are
rarely about one explosive moment. They are about accumulation. A comment that landed wrong, a decision made without consultation, a promotion that felt political, a perceived lack of loyalty. And here's the problem. Most leaders ignore it. They hope time will fix it. Time does not fix fractures, It only widens them. I've seen this on the ambulance floor. I've seen it in boardrooms. I've seen it inside organizations that
thought they were healthy. When alliances break, performance drops, information slow, those people pick sides, energy shifts from mission to ego protection. So how do you repair it? Step one? Own your lane. You cannot repair an alliance while pretending you played no part in its decline, even if you believe you were right, even if you believe the other person overreacted. Leadership is not about being technically correct. It is about preserving alignment.
Where alignment matters, ask yourself one question, did I contribute even five percent to this fracture? If the answer is yes, that is your entry point. Step two. Go direct, not by email, not by text, not by sending someone else face to face or at a minimum, voice to voice. Say this and say it clean. I feel like something shitted between us. I value our working relationship. I want to fix it. No speeches, no defending, no rewriting history in your favor. When I was training in aviation, one
of the first lessons I learned was about checklists. When something feels off in the cockpit, You do not guess. You verify, you talk through it. You identify the failure point. Broken alliances are no different. If you do not identify the failure point, you will fly crooked for months and blame the wind. Step three listen longer than you want to. This is where most leaders fail. They approach the conversation ready to explain themselves, ready to justify, ready to defend.
Repair requires restraint. Let them talk, let them vent, let them describe how they experience the situation. You are not there to win, You are there to restore function. There is a big difference. Step four re establish shared mission. This is critical. Alliances are rarely restored through emotional bonding. They are restored through clarity of purpose. You might not agree on everything, you might not be best friends again,
that's fine, but you must realign around the mission. At my ambulance service, when tension rises between leaders, I bring it back to one question. What serves the patient, What protects the crew? What advances the organization. Mission has a way of shrinking ego. When both parties remember what they are actually responsible for, the drama loses oxygen. Step five set behavioral agreement. Repair is not just emotional. It is operational. Agree on how you will communicate moving forward, Agree on
how decisions will be shared. Agree on what transparency looks like. Broken alliances often rebreak because nothing changes structurally. This is red key leadership territory, high consequence moment. If you repair it halfway, you create a fragile truce. If you repair it completely, you create strength. Now let me say something very important. Not every alliance is meant to be repaired. If the fracture is rooted in integrity issues, manipulation, or
repeated disrespect, your responsibility may not be repair. It may be separation. Leadership is not about keeping everyone comfortab It is about protecting culture. You do not repair alliances that compromise standards. You repair alliances that strengthen the mission. There is another layer here. Sometimes the broken alliance is between you and someone above you, a board member, a CEO, a regional director. The principles do not change clarity, direct communication,
mission focus, behavioral agreements. You might not control their response, you control your professionalism. And here's the truth. When leaders repair alliances publicly and maturely, the entire organization watches. They see accountability in action, They see humility, They see courage. That is cultural building. I have seen leaders ignore fractures and watch their organization spit split quietly into two. I've
also seen leaders into discomfort and walk out stronger. Broken alliances are not a sign you failed as a leader. Ignoring them is you are not managing friendships. You are managing alignment, and alignment requires maintenance. Seven minutes a day of intentional leadership might mean one uncomfortable conversation that saves six months of dysfunction, and to me, I think that is a good trade. So if there is someone in your workplace right now where something feels off, do not wait,
Do not let silence turn into narrative. Reach out, own your part, listen longer than you want to bring it back to the mission, set the agreement, and repair it the right way. Your credibility grows when you fix what is actually fractured. This has been the seven minute Leadership Podcast, and I thank you for listening.
For more Paul Fell of Alito Podcasts, visit paulfellowalito dot com