“The bee and the flower were made for each other”
Last week, this blog highlighted findings from our research on how collective cohesion forms the foundation of organisational resilience. A deeper exploration into how each of us has a role to play in this illustrates what nature has always taught us: it is interdependence – not just togetherness – that creates thriving systems. A first look at the patterns (and yes, we know, the numbers are far too few to make sweeping conclusions which is why we need you!), reveals that team resilience emerges through the interplay of diverse roles and capabilities.
Darwin’s observation that “those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed” is clearly reflected in the emerging patterns. This powerful truth applies in modern organisations, where resilience comes not just from working together, but through leveraging our differences. The guiding questions of this fourth phase of research have included:
Though as yet we have only a small group of professionals, the relationship between Team Roles (measured by Belbin Team Role assessments) and resilience across dimensions, reflects patterns that challenge conventional wisdom about how different roles contribute to collective resilience. Remarkable – though probably systemically understandable – we found that certain role combinations – particularly partnerships between analytical and interpersonal capabilities – create remarkably resilient teams.
The Belbin Team Role framework identifies three distinct categories of roles. Each of these contributes to team effectiveness. Within each category are three more specific roles, each with its own preferred behaviour and unique contributions:
Notwithstanding the small sample size (n=40 so far so) the distribution provided insights across all roles (we need more critical voices if you are a Monitor Evaluator especially). Here’s how roles were represented (thank you Teamworkers!):
Perhaps our most striking finding challenges conventional wisdom about technical roles and social connection. Thinking roles demonstrated surprisingly high overall resilience, with significantly higher organisational cohesion compared to other roles (though thinking roles scored highly on all resilience domain measures, not just organisational connection). This challenges traditional assumptions about technical roles being less connected to collective (organisational) fabric.
A fascinating pattern emerged when examining creative roles. Plants emerge as resilience champions, scoring high across all dimensions. In contrast, Resource Investigators, despite their networking prowess, showed unexpectedly lower levels in organisational cohesion scores. This suggests that networking ability alone doesn’t guarantee strong organisational connection.
Analysis revealed statistically significant differences in resilience across role combinations suggesting that pairing capabilities can enhance the resilience of team relationships. Of course, again, to emphasise, we cannot extrapolate with such a small sample, but these are interesting patterns and call for deeper research. Please help us explore this more definitively by taking the survey.
Intriguing findings emerged in the resilience patterns of the ‘doers’ of the organisation – those roles focused on turning ideas into reality. Completer Finishers report lower confidence in their personal resilience but demonstrate remarkably high levels of social confidence and strong organisational connection. Think of them as organisational anchors. Though they might doubt their individual capacity to weather storms, they seem to maintain steady relationships and deep institutional roots that help stabilise their teams.
The surprise came with Implementers. Despite their practical focus and ability to get things done, they consistently showed lower resilience across all measures. This challenges a common assumption that practical capability naturally translates into resilience (reflected also in the lower scores of ‘action-action’ roles illustrated above). Pairing action-focused roles might create efficient execution teams but could create blind spots in response to disruption.
To understand how different roles experience their organisational environment, we used Gareth Morgan’s classic “Images of Organisation” framework. This approach asked participants to select metaphors that best described their organisation: Machine, Organism, Cultural System, Brain, Political System, Psychic Prison, Flux and Transformation, or Instrument of Domination.
The patterns tell a fascinating story about how different roles “see” their organisational world. Creative and exploratory roles – Plants and Resource Investigators – consistently viewed their organisations as living, evolving entities. They saw organisations as either “Cultural Systems” where shared meaning drives behaviour, or as “Organisms” adapting to their environment. These perspectives correlate strongly with higher resilience scores.
In contrast, action roles tended to see their organisations through a more mechanical lens. Implementers and Completer Finishers predominantly chose the “Machine” metaphor, viewing their organisations as systems of interlocking parts with defined processes. This mechanistic view showed significant correlation with lower resilience scores.
But the story becomes more nuanced when we look at role combinations. Teams mixing different perspectives – particularly pairing analytical with people-oriented roles – showed higher resilience than those sharing similar views. This suggests that resilience might emerge not just from how we see our organisation, but from our ability to understand and work with different perspectives.
Perhaps most importantly, these patterns remained consistent across different organisational types and sectors, suggesting they reflect something fundamental about how different roles engage with their environment rather than specific workplace characteristics.
These early findings hint at something profound about how we might build more resilient organisations. The surprising strength of thinking-people combinations (82.7% average resilience scores), the unexpected organisational connection of technical roles, and the distinct ways different roles “see” their organisational world – all suggest that diversity in team composition isn’t just beneficial, it’s essential for resilience.
But we need to be thoughtful about what these patterns tell us. While they challenge common assumptions about role effectiveness and team design, our sample size (n=40) means we’re just beginning to understand these dynamics. We need to explore so many more questions:
This is where you come in. If you have completed a Belbin Team Role assessment, you can contribute to this growing understanding. Your participation in our 10–12-minute survey will help validate these early patterns while potentially revealing new insights about how different roles build collective resilience.
In return, you’ll receive:
If you have any questions, email us or Victoria Brown at Belbin® – The Team Role Company And, even if you don’t have a Belbin Team Role, you can still participate and expand the overall understanding of collective resilience and how it can be fostered in our organisations and society as a whole. Together, we might discover something transformative about how different roles combine to create truly resilient organisations.
ICYMI this study adopts a nuanced understanding of resilience as “the capacity of individuals and systems to engage in continuous collective transformation through both perseverance and purposeful withdrawal.” This definition positions resilience not as a fixed trait but as an evolving process where strength manifests through:
– Adaptation and endurance
– Wisdom to recognise when to yield or redirect.
– Ability to reimagine and transform approaches.
– Creative and collaborative practice
This understanding also seeks to acknowledge (but might not yet!) that resilience, while often viewed positively, isn’t inherently good in all situations.
PLEASE do disagree, refine, comment or expand on this by sharing your own insight, lived experience, reflections or research!
Resilience Revisited is an occasional blog series reflecting on the need for a deeper understanding of the concept of resilience, one that inspires an exploration of its complexities and a conscious, intentional shift towards achieving strong resilience – and sustainability – individually and collectively.