Cohesion
Cohesion measures whether the group feels like a unit or just a collection of individuals who happen to know the same person. Does the group have a shared identity, inside jokes, and rituals? High cohesion means the group is more than the sum of its parts and can survive a member leaving. Low cohesion is the hub-and-spoke model — everyone is friends with one central person but not really with each other, and the group collapses the moment the hub leaves. Cohesion measures whether the group feels like a unit or just a collection of individuals who happen to know the same person. It is the metric most often confused with loyalty, but the two are structurally different. Loyalty is about whether members choose the group when life expands. Cohesion is about whether the group exists as a thing in members' minds at all. A high cohesion group has its own… A healthy cohesion score looks like this: Members refer to the squad as a thing — 'the squad,' 'the group,' a name. Warning signs include the group is organized around one central person and everyone else is friends with them, not each other, and the group chat is quiet unless the hub initiates. The single most effective improvement: Build direct relationships between spokes that do not route through the hub. Cohesion is one of 5 squad health metrics, alongside Reliability and Fun Factor. Take the squad audit to see your group's score.