Increasingly, teams are the main, essential working unit in most organizations. The values of true teamwork are widely recognized. And the primary responsibility for developing a team to its highest potential rests with the team leader. The vast literature on leadership highlights a number of distinctive “styles” of leadership, including charismatic, transformational, and laissez-faire. While leaders may prefer one style over another, as a practical matter effective leaders adapt their style to the needs of their team at any point in time. When well led, teams progress from initial formation through a predictable series of stages. The leader’s challenge is especially daunting when team composition is not stable, but changes over time, as is often the case with healthcare teams . Consistent with leader-member exchange theory, leaders in healthcare can leverage the relationships between themselves and their team members and among the team members themselves to promote team member health and performance. The most effective healthcare teams, in terms of both health and performance, share one important common denominator: they are well led.