Team Disease (glossary entry)
team disease n. Any of a number of clearly identifiable conditions that exist within the team but are generally not evident in any of its members in isolation.
A classic example of a team disease is the "gentleman's agreement", a sort of mutually agreed upon, but unspoken, agreement between two parties that "if you don't mention my weak spot, I won't mention yours". By definition, such a problem can manifest itself only when the two parties are in the presence of a third.
In general, the notion of the team disease existing only in the group and not in its individual members goes along with the perception of the team as an independent entity, much like a person unto itself, with its own personality, character, strengths and weaknesses.
Team Belief System
A group can help individual belief systems spread throughout the group. This happens through the same mechanism as autosuggestion, but between different members of a group. The more the group's members believe a certain thing, the more times that thing will be stated, and this causes it to be heard more often, which helps establish the belief with even more certainty. This effect works equally well for any and all beliefs, including damaging or disempowering beliefs. This phenomenon of bad beliefs spreading is a sort of "psychological contagion"1. It is conceptually similar to emotional contagion but involves more complex behaviours and spreads over longer periods of time.
Many Examples
See my core values page and follow the 15 links to the pages on each core value; near the end of each of those 15 pages is a section titled e.g. "MCV07 for Teams" with one or more descriptions of negative things that happen "When this core value is lacking". Those are examples of team diseases.
References
1 : Michael Torrice, "Bad Decisions May Be Contagious", ScienceNOW Daily News, 10th Nov 2009
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