This is when the need to maintain an air of inflexibility among the people we lead becomes excessive. This hampers our ability to build trust among our people. Employees want to see their leaders as human beings, so that they can be comfortable being human. If the leader tries to show he/she is never wrong and never weak, employees emulate that behavior. The result is a never-ending posturing exercise, where real dialogue and decision-making die. The remedy for this complexity is to develop trust.

This is when leaders try excessively to ensure that their decisions are accurate, precise, and correct. This creates paralysis in companies when leaders wait until they have enough information to be sure about their decisions. Employees lose heart. Executives lose confidence. All because someone was afraid to make a tough call in the face of imperfect information. The remedy for this complexity is to develop simplicity.

This is the tendency of many leaders to maintain a fake sense of peace in their team by avoiding involving employees with strong conflicting opinions in the same discussion. This is done at the expense of productive conversations, passionate ideological discussions and healthy arguments around the issues which every company must face. This also results in ineffective decision making and poor creativity. Employees with strong opinions often care most about the good of the organization, and they should be encouraged to share their opinions with one another to ensure that all ideas are mined, and it creates buy-in among employees who had their say in a particular matter. The remedy for this complexity is to develop respect.

This is the dangerous need to be admired by the people whom we lead.
This is problematic because it makes us hesitate when it is time to hold someone responsible for their behavior or accountable for their failure to deliver results. Fearing that they will hurt the feelings of their staff members, too many leaders avoid giving them the feedback they need in order to improve. This ultimately hurts individual’s development and the organization's ability to produce results. The remedy for this complexity is to develop responsibility.   

This complexity is the natural but dangerous tendency to use the power and status that accompanies our roles as leaders, to make autocratic decisions or influence team members to make decisions preferred by the leader, and attempt to get such decisions implemented through fear and intimidation. The other problem with enjoying power and status is that it inevitably distances leaders from their team members who implement decisions, and the customers who play a key role in delivering revenue. The remedy for this complexity is to develop engagement.