When remote work first took centre stage, it promised flexibility, efficiency, and a better balance between work and life. Across Nigeria, many organisations embraced hybrid models as a progressive step forward. Yet beneath this new normal, a quieter dysfunction has emerged, reshaping how teams connect, collaborate, and deliver. As workforces spread out, many leaders have grown increasingly territorial, and cross-department collaboration has begun to erode.
In several Nigerian organisations, this is not a failure of skill or technology but a crisis of proximity. The informal interactions that once built trust in physical offices, such as brief hallway discussions, shared problem-solving, and spontaneous mentoring, have disappeared. In their place, some leaders now guard their teams’ focus, information, and recognition. What was once healthy autonomy has evolved into organisational isolation, where units work in silos rather than as part of a collective whole.
Recent data underscores the structural impact of remote and hybrid work on collaboration. A Microsoft-backed study published in Nature Human Behaviour found that the shift to remote work reduced the share of collaboration time spent on cross-group connections by about 25%, indicating a significant rise in organisational silos.
Although Nigeria-specific data on interdepartmental collaboration in hybrid workplaces is scarce, broader workforce research highlights challenges shaping employee experience. Jobberman’s national labour studies (2024) show that Nigerian workers, particularly in underserved sectors, face structural barriers such as limited digital skills, uneven access to work-enabling technologies, and fragmented work environments, which collectively hinder productivity and team connectivity.
The result is subtle but damaging. Teams meet their immediate targets but lose the synergy that drives innovation and institutional learning. Projects requiring collaboration across functions drag on longer than they should. Employees seeking mentorship or exposure outside their unit find fewer opportunities. Productivity, while still visible in isolated metrics, declines in creativity, accountability, and shared ownership.
This is the new proximity problem, the widening distance between leaders, teams, and the shared purpose that once held organisations together. The question for Nigerian leaders is no longer whether remote work can deliver results but whether leadership can evolve fast enough to sustain connection, collaboration, and trust in a workplace no longer defined by physical presence.
Why Territorial Leadership Fails in the Modern Workplace
In the legacy workplace, territorial leadership was often mistaken for strength. Leaders were rewarded for fiercely protecting their departments, owning information, and controlling access to influence. Teams operated in silos, and success was measured by how well one defended their turf. However, in today’s complex and fast-moving work environment, characterised by cross-functional collaboration, distributed teams, and shared accountability, territorial leadership is not only outdated but also actively destructive.
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Territorial Leadership Erodes Collaboration
When leaders hoard knowledge, control relationships, or resist collaboration outside their unit, they slow down decision-making and dilute innovation. Work today flows across disciplines, marketing needs tech, operations needs data, and HR needs strategy. Walls between teams mean ideas die in transit, and opportunities are lost in translation.
Modern leadership requires bridges, not borders. The most effective leaders are those who cultivate shared ownership, foster transparency, and unlock the flow of information and trust across the organisation.
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It Limits Talent Development and Visibility
A territorial leader often keeps top performers cloaked within their unit, hesitant to share them on cross-functional projects or enterprise-wide initiatives. But in doing so, they shrink their team’s exposure, limit growth opportunities, and block succession pathways. Talented employees become restless in isolated environments. They leave, not for more pay, but for more visibility, mobility, and meaning.
Modern leaders grow their influence not by holding people back, but by sponsoring everyone of them forward.
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It Breaks Down in Remote and Hybrid Models
In today’s work structure, especially with distributed teams, territorial leadership becomes even more dangerous. Without informal visibility or organic touchpoints, siloed behaviours worsen. Teams become fragmented. Work slows as each unit optimises for its own survival rather than shared outcomes. Collaboration must be intentional, and that begins with leadership that prioritises connection over control.
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It Misaligns with Organisational Agility
Agile organisations, those that adapt quickly, seize opportunity, and navigate change, thrive on transparency, rapid decision-making, and aligned leadership. Territorial leadership, by contrast, thrives on individual-based interests, delay, and protectionism. In a competitive market, this misalignment is fatal.
The more an organisation grows, the more interdependence becomes a strategic necessity, not a courtesy.
A New Model of Leadership for the Modern Workplace
What remote and hybrid work have revealed is not the failure of leadership but the end of leadership by default. The workplace is no longer held together by proximity but by design. This moment calls for a new model that redefines what it means to lead when presence is no longer physical.
This Human-Centred Leadership Model is based on six foundations of clarity, connection, equity, culture, well-being and presence. Together they transform leadership from an act of observation into a system of intention that sustains trust, performance and belonging across any distance.
How to Remain Human-Centred When Leading Remotely
C-suite leaders can no longer rely on leadership by observation. Today, the most effective leaders are those who treat connection, clarity, and care as strategic assets.
- Build clarity into everything: Articulate goals, values, and decisions in writing. Don’t assume shared understanding; create it.
- Make space for human connection: Schedule regular 1:1s, team check-ins, and open forums. Use these not just to track progress but to listen deeply.
- Equalise opportunity and visibility: Track who gets recognition, stretch assignments, and promotions. Where gaps exist, close them proactively.
- Use rituals to reinforce culture: Whether digital or physical, create regular moments that reflect your values, such as town halls, feedback loops, and onboarding ceremonies.
- Protect well-being by modelling it: Set boundaries publicly, respect focus time, and give permission for rest. What you model, your leaders will replicate.
- Lead by presence, not pressure: Be visible, accessible, and predictable, even when remote. Leadership presence is not physical; it’s emotional and structural.
Final Thought for Executives
Remote work hasn’t made leadership harder; it’s made the absence of real leadership impossible to ignore. Where proximity once masked weak systems, distance now demands a strong design. To lead effectively from anywhere, you must be deliberate about how people connect, how work flows, and how fairness is felt.
The proximity gap is real, but so is the opportunity. This moment calls for a deeper kind of leadership, one where empathy is engineered, culture is codified, and connection is not left to chance but treated as a core business function.
pcl. can help organisations navigate the challenges of remote and hybrid work by designing and implementing tailored human-centred leadership frameworks that prioritise clarity, connection, and accountability. Leveraging data-driven insights, best practices, and change management expertise, pcl. can assess leadership gaps, optimise team structures, and establish systems for transparent communication, cross-functional collaboration, and employee development. By providing hands-on coaching, digital tools, and structured interventions, the firm ensures that leaders are equipped to sustain trust, foster engagement, and drive performance across distributed teams, transforming leadership from reactive oversight into strategic, measurable impact.
Author’s Note
Lead human-first, from anywhere, and you will build an organisation that performs with heart, resilience, and clarity across any distance.
Written by:
Chinonso Nwabuisi
DTC