Every team has them - the personal spreadsheet system, the color-coded calendar, the clever Excel macro that only one person understands. These workarounds feel productive. They feel efficient. But when it comes to team outcomes, they often create more problems than they solve.
Because what works for one person can quietly break the flow for everyone else.
In finance teams, where precision and timing are everything, even small misalignments create big headaches:
These aren’t signs of bad intent - they’re signs of a system optimized for individuals, not teams.
Team efficiency doesn’t come from the most advanced personal system - it comes from shared systems. The kind where:
This doesn’t mean every detail has to be standardized. It means the basics should be predictable. A shared language of how things get done.
People sometimes fear that standardization kills autonomy. But the best teams strike a balance: structure where it matters, freedom where it counts.
That looks like:
In a high-performing finance team, the goal isn’t to force everyone to work the same way - it’s to make sure work moves the same way.
Clean handoffs. Clear ownership. No decoding required.
Because when “it works for me” becomes “it works for us,” the whole team gets faster, calmer, and stronger.
/ Filip Ullsten @WorkTiles
