Hidden Energy Patterns That Derail Teams

What holds teams back isn’t a lack of skill—it’s energy. Beneath every missed follow-up, vague commitment, or strained conversation lies an unseen emotional exchange that quietly drains trust and momentum. These recurring “energy patterns” are what I call control dramas—the invisible scripts that cause even the most capable professionals to repeat the same frustrations despite their best intentions.

Over the past several decades of coaching financial advisory team leaders and associate advisors across Canada and the United States, I’ve seen how these dynamics quietly shape performance, communication, and culture. After years of helping leaders recognize and dissolve them, I distilled my observations into a four-part blog series—Is Mystification the Hidden Force Behind Repeated Mistakes in Your Team, Why Your Associate Advisor Might Be Doing Less Than Expected—and How to Fix It, The Leadership Transition: Evolving from Salesperson to Consultant, to CEO, to Successor, and How Leaders Can Keep Their Teams Focused on What Matters—each exploring a different facet of the same underlying issue.

Together, these articles revealed something deeper than leadership mechanics or management strategy. They pointed to the psychology of energy exchange—how people unconsciously seek validation, power, or reassurance when their deeper emotional needs go unmet. Those unspoken exchanges are what I call control dramas: the unseen forces that cause capable professionals to repeat the same conflicts and communication breakdowns, despite their best intentions.

That exploration led to the creation of my newest resource, Healing Your Control Dramas — A Master Workbook for Leaders and Teams, which translates decades of field experience into a practical framework for transforming reactive patterns into self-awareness, balance, and genuine collaboration.

Why Teams Repeat the Same Problems

When I meet with a financial advisor or agency owner, I often hear some version of the same frustration:

“I’ve explained it clearly. I’ve trained them. They nod, agree—and then do something completely different.”

It’s easy to assume the issue is motivation or competence. In truth, it’s usually neither.

What’s repeating is not a performance gap—it’s a pattern gap.

Behind every missed follow-up or inconsistent result is a hidden emotional dynamic: a need to feel safe, valued, or in control. When that need goes unrecognized, the nervous system drives behavior that looks irrational but is actually protective.

In the Healing Your Control Dramas workbook, I outline how these patterns begin early in life as survival strategies and eventually show up in professional settings. A senior advisor might tighten control when anxious, while an associate might withdraw to avoid disapproval. Both think they’re solving a problem, yet both are feeding the same energetic loop.

Until that loop is named and understood, no amount of training, scripting, or accountability systems will break it.

The Five Control Dramas in Action

Every person—and every team—contains traces of these familiar dramas:

1. The Intimidator – Gains energy through dominance or urgency.
2. The Interrogator – Feeds on questioning and fault-finding to feel secure.
3. The Aloof – Withdraws or stays vague to draw others’ attention and energy.
4. The Poor Me – Gains support through helplessness or complaint.
5. The Passive-Aggressor – Appears agreeable while subtly resisting direction.

Each is driven by a combination of unmet needs and negative beliefs such as “I’m not safe,” “I’m not enough,” or “I’ll lose control if I don’t push harder.”

In leadership, these dramas can look deceptively professional—over-functioning, rescuing, micromanaging, or taking on too much emotional responsibility for the team. In associates, they appear as vagueness, procrastination, or fragile confidence. The behaviors differ, but the root cause is the same: an attempt to secure energy externally instead of generating it internally.

From Awareness to Application

One of the key lessons leaders learn through this work is that awareness must be paired with structure.

It’s not enough to know why a pattern exists—you have to design an environment that interrupts it.

That’s why every section of the workbook includes both a reflection exercise and a leadership application.

For example, when a team member repeatedly misses deadlines, the instinct might be to correct or discipline. But through the control-drama lens, you pause and ask:

“Is this avoidance—or mystification, a hesitation rooted in self-doubt?”

Instead of lecturing, you reframe:

“I notice this follow-up has slipped a few times. Let’s get clear on what completion looks like by Friday at 3 p.m.”

Clarity dissolves confusion. Specificity replaces emotional charge. The interaction moves from force to flow.

Leadership as an Energy Exchange

At its core, leadership is an exchange of energy—how clearly, calmly, and consistently you give and receive attention, direction, and trust.

When that exchange is imbalanced, one side inevitably feels drained. Leaders who over-function take on everyone else’s emotion. Associates who under-function seek reassurance instead of responsibility. Both deplete the system.

The workbook includes a reflection I call the Energy Exchange and Boundaries Exercise, which helps leaders identify where they over-give, where they rely on others for motivation, and how to restore balance through clear agreements. When leaders correct these energetic leaks, accountability becomes collaborative rather than punitive, and empathy naturally replaces frustration.

Building Immunity to Drama

You can’t eliminate triggers—but you can become immune to them. Immunity begins the moment you notice yourself slipping into reaction and choose awareness instead.

This six step process outlined in the workbook guides leaders through that moment:

1. I’m Upset – Name what triggered you.
2. It’s About Me – Recognize the pattern as your own.
3. Feel the Feeling – Let the emotion surface without judgment.
4. Remember When – Trace it back to its earliest memory.
5. Identify the Belief – Find the story that’s been running the show.
6. Embrace the Truth – Replace it with a grounded, values-based belief such as “I can lead with calm clarity.”

Each repetition of this sequence rewires the nervous system to respond with awareness rather than defense. Over time, the control dramas lose their power—and relationships regain flow.

From Force to Flow

Every advisor who grows into leadership learns that control is an illusion. You can’t motivate others through pressure for long. What endures is presence—the ability to stay centered amid uncertainty and to model clarity under stress.

This is the essence of what I call Regenerative Leadership: leading from contribution instead of control, awareness instead of anxiety, and purpose instead of pressure. It’s the same transformation I explored in The Leadership Transition and How Leaders Can Keep Their Teams Focused on What Matters—moving from reacting to circumstances to regenerating energy and trust within the team.

When a leader embodies this shift, meetings become lighter, accountability feels shared, and results accelerate naturally. The team begins to operate in what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi described as flow—a state of alignment where purpose, clarity, and creativity merge.

Why This Work Matters Now

Across both Canada and the United States, financial advisory firms are facing unprecedented change—succession pressures, compliance complexity, generational turnover, and the constant pace of technology. In that environment, it’s easy for emotional undercurrents to derail progress.

Firms that endure will be those whose leaders recognize that mindset and energy management are as critical as strategy and process. By addressing control dramas directly, leaders create the emotional infrastructure for every other system—marketing, client experience, compliance—to perform at its best.

A Closing Reflection and Invitation

Writing Healing Your Control Dramas — A Master Workbook for Leaders and Teams has been the culmination of decades of observation, coaching, and compassion. It distills what I’ve learned from hundreds of leaders who were ready to replace frustration with awareness and rebuild their teams from the inside out.

If you sense that your firm’s challenges go deeper than training—that you’re seeing patterns of avoidance, over-control, or emotional fatigue that repeat despite your best efforts—this work will help you see what’s really happening beneath the surface.

Together, we can identify where energy is leaking, strengthen your leadership presence, and restore the clarity that allows your business—and your people—to thrive.

👉 Click here to schedule a complimentary conversation: https://leadingadvisor.as.me/callwithsimonreilly