When teams sputter, conflicts can erupt. As the leader, you can insist that difficult personalities find a way to get along. Encourage diverse teams to look past their differences. Use these strategies to cure your team's negativity.

When leading teams, resist the urge to overdo it. Some facilitators jump in and play fixer as soon as the group hits a snag. But the team won’t grow if you intervene too soon—or too often.

Some teams struggle to work together. Personalities clash, disagreements intensify and meetings turn into protracted turf battles. When groups become polarized, shake up the status quo. Try these techniques to reverse a downhill spiral so that teams regain their footing.

The best meetings don’t happen by accident. For Al Pittampalli, author of Read This Before Our Next Meeting, the key to worthwhile meetings is to distribute relevant material to participants ahead of time, and hold them accountable for reading the content.

Even though Brad Smith, CEO of Intuit, oversees a workforce of about 8,000 people, he spurs innovation by getting out of the way. Rather than micromanage, he prods employees to think like entrepreneurs launching a business.