Imagine this: you lead a multidisciplinary team and the first project you delivered was a failure. Everyone in the team remembers that. So does the executive. But no one talks about it anymore. Here’s a label for that phenomenon—it’s a ghost and a ghost can linger on, at work in shaping how you think, and how team members perceive, act, and collaborate with each other.
Traditional leadership often views time as linear—the past is gone; the future is yet to come. However, organisational research reveals that multi-temporality is more accurate: past, present, and future constantly interact in organisations (Maclean et al., 2024). In multidisciplinary teams, this temporal interplay becomes particularly complex, as different professions bring their own histories, norms, and ways of working that can either clash or align.
Recent research into organisational “ghosts”—absent presences that continue to shape current actions and decisions—offers valuable insights for leaders navigating these invisible, but impactful, pressures. Understanding how the past influences present performance can help leaders create healthier, more future-focused teams whilst managing the reputational legacies that inevitably follow multidisciplinary work.
Maclean et al. (2024) define organisational ghosts as “absent members whose continuing presence is consequential to the actions of living members” (p. 3402). These are not merely memories but interactive forces that make demands, offer advice, or provide warnings. Importantly, ghosts are “talked into being” through both internal dialogue—“what would our predecessors have done?”—and external dialogue where past teams or leaders are frequently invoked in meetings and planning conversations.
In multidisciplinary teams, these ghostly influences manifest in several distinct ways. Different professional backgrounds carry their own histories and established practices. A multidisciplinary team in a law firm, for instance, may operate within traditional legal frameworks whilst simultaneously trying to incorporate new approaches from other disciplines, creating tension as two distinct sets of norms coexist. This example is discussed in greater detail in this conversation with Jack Stoneman, who alludes to the cultural and philosophical differences that exist between legal professionals and developers, or the law and ‘coding’.
The research identifies three primary manifestations of the ghostly that are particularly relevant for multidisciplinary team leaders: spirit, ghost, and spectre. Each represents a different temporal focus and offers distinct opportunities for leadership intervention.
The spirit represents the foundational elements of organisational culture—the founders, cultural values, and professional traditions that shape expectations. In multidisciplinary contexts, this often involves managing competing spirits from different professional domains.
For multidisciplinary team leaders, the spirit manifestation presents both opportunities and challenges. On one hand, it can build stability, belonging, and psychological safety by drawing on the best traditions from each discipline. On the other hand, it requires conscious effort to let go of outdated practices that may conflict with the team’s integrated mission.
Leaders must balance respect for professional heritage with the courage to evolve team identity for the future. This might involve explicitly acknowledging the valuable traditions that each discipline brings, whilst clearly articulating which practices serve the team’s current objectives and which may need to be adapted or abandoned.
The ghost manifestation involves past lessons or unresolved issues that “speak” when decisions are made, sometimes constraining present actions. Maclean et al. (2024) emphasise that ghosts are “active and dialogical, communicating ‘from beyond’” and represent “interactions that never happened, which do not comprise memories, but which are taking place in the present” (p. 3406).
For multidisciplinary teams, this presents a critical leadership opportunity around language and communication. Past failures or successes in multidisciplinary collaboration often live on through repeated phrases and narratives. Expressions like “we’ve always done it this way” or “the last time we tried that approach” can keep limiting ghosts alive and prevent teams from achieving their potential.
Leaders must be deliberate about introducing new narratives and future-oriented language to shift team mindset and dynamics. Clear, intentional communication can allow old ghosts to “depart,” enabling genuine transformation. This might involve reframing past challenges as learning opportunities rather than permanent constraints, or explicitly challenging outdated assumptions about what multidisciplinary collaboration can achieve.
The spectre represents warnings about future risks or opportunities based on past actions, directly shaping strategic decision-making. In multidisciplinary contexts, spectres often relate to concerns about professional integrity, client outcomes, or the long-term viability of integrated approaches.
This manifestation offers perhaps the greatest strategic opportunity for multidisciplinary team leaders. Whether they are part of the executive team or building credibility to join it, leaders can influence organisational strategy by consistently demonstrating tangible value. The research shows how effective leaders transform their teams “from cost centres to high-demand, high-revenue contributors” (author’s outline), as seen in many evolving professional service models.
Spectres require leaders to think beyond immediate project deliverables to consider how current decisions will shape future opportunities for multidisciplinary work. This long-term perspective can help teams build sustainable practices that enhance rather than compromise professional standards across all represented disciplines.
Off the back of this research, there are several ways leaders can actively work with organisational ghosts rather than being unconsciously influenced by them.
Every multidisciplinary team operates in the shadow of previous attempts at cross-disciplinary collaboration. Some teams inherit the pressure of following “all-star” predecessors, whilst others must overcome the legacy of failed pilots or problematic implementations.
Effective leaders will acknowledge these pressures explicitly rather than pretending they don’t exist. This might involve conducting team discussions about what previous multidisciplinary efforts achieved and what lessons can be applied to current work. The goal is not to dismiss past experiences but to reframe stories in ways that create space for new team identities to emerge.
Maclean et al. (2024) note that “organisational ghosts may not always be wanted by the organizations they leave behind” and “can sometimes refuse to stay silent” (p. 3406). Leaders must be prepared to address unwelcome ghosts—such as past conflicts between disciplines or failed integration attempts—rather than hoping they will fade away on their own.
The performative power of language has a critical role to play in shaping organisational reality. In multidisciplinary contexts, this becomes particularly important because team members often default to discipline-specific terminology and frameworks that can create barriers to integration.
Leaders can intentionally shift narratives to replace unhelpful ghosts with empowering ones. This might involve establishing new vocabulary that reflects the team’s integrated identity rather than its component disciplines, or creating new success metrics that value collaborative outcomes alongside traditional professional benchmarks.
The goal is not to eliminate professional identity but to supplement it with a shared multidisciplinary identity that allows team members to draw on their expertise whilst working toward common objectives.
Multidisciplinary teams can sometimes struggle with questions of legitimacy and value within larger organisational structures. The spectre manifestation offers guidance for addressing these challenges through consistent demonstration of measurable value.
Leaders must show how multidisciplinary approaches add value that cannot be achieved through traditional single-discipline methods. This requires careful attention to metrics and outcomes, as well as effective communication about the unique benefits of integrated approaches.
The research suggests that teams which successfully demonstrate their value can influence broader organisational strategy, ensuring that multidisciplinary approaches become embedded in organisational priorities rather than remaining peripheral experiments.
The ghostly framework highlights the importance of creating environments where team members feel safe to experiment with new approaches and discuss past failures openly. Maclean et al. (2024) note that ghosts can “question policy decisions and courses of action, encouraging managers to pause and reflect” (p. 3406).
For multidisciplinary teams, this reflection capability is essential. Team members must feel comfortable acknowledging when disciplinary approaches conflict and work together to develop integrated solutions. Leaders must protect teams from reputational harm for trying new approaches whilst maintaining accountability for results.
This involves creating explicit norms around experimentation, learning from failure, and adapting practices based on evidence rather than tradition alone.
The research reveals that when history is treated as a living resource rather than a fixed constraint, teams can balance stability, change, and future vision more effectively. For multidisciplinary team leaders, this multi-temporal perspective offers distinct advantages.
Understanding how past experiences continue to influence present dynamics allows leaders to work with these forces rather than against them. Instead of dismissing past concerns or attempting to start with a completely clean slate, effective leaders acknowledge legitimate lessons from previous experiences whilst creating space for new possibilities.
This approach recognises that multidisciplinary collaboration builds on the strengths of individual disciplines rather than replacing them. The goal is not to eliminate professional identity but to create new forms of value that leverage the unique combination of expertise within the team.
Every multidisciplinary team works in the company of ghosts; the absent presences of past attempts, professional traditions, and anticipated futures. The best leaders don’t chase these ghosts away; they learn how to engage with them constructively, rewrite limiting stories, and build futures worth creating. Sometimes, they figure out how to let them go too.
The research demonstrates that organisational ghosts are unavoidable parts of organisational life, but leaders can choose whether to ignore them and let them unconsciously influence decisions, or acknowledge them, reshape them, and learn from them. When leaders develop this multi-temporal awareness, they gain access to a broader range of resources for building effective teams and delivering exceptional results.
For multidisciplinary teams specifically, this approach offers a path toward sustainable integration that honours professional heritage whilst creating new possibilities for collaboration. Rather than viewing disciplinary differences as barriers to overcome, leaders can frame them as complementary strengths that, when properly orchestrated, create value that no single discipline could achieve alone.
The temporal interplay of past, present, and future provides multidisciplinary leaders with powerful tools for managing change, building team identity, and demonstrating value. Understanding and working with organisational ghosts transforms leadership from a purely rational exercise into a more nuanced practice that acknowledges the full complexity of human organisations and the enduring influence of shared experience.
Maclean, M., Harvey, C., Suddaby, R., & Coraiola, D. M. (2024). Multi-temporality and the ghostly: how communing with times past informs organizational futures. Journal of management studies, 61(8), 3401-3431. https://doi.Org/10.1111/joms.13022