What is psychological safety?
The term psychological safety was coined by Harvard Business School professor Amy C. Edmondson. She defines it as “a belief that one will not be punished or humiliated for speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns or mistakes, and that the team is safe for interpersonal risk taking”. Psychological safety is about showing up to work as your authentic self, with your own unique perspective, and being welcomed to engage in a genuine and collaborative way. It allows for full participation, regardless of any and all aspects of your identity.
According to Edmondson, you can gauge the level of psychological safety in a group by measuring the extent to which:
- Mistakes are not held against you
- Team members are encouraged to raise problems
- People are not rejected for being different, and uniqueness is valued
- People are willing to propose and take risks
- People feel comfortable asking for help
- People do not undermine each other
Additionally, Dr. Timothy Clark developed the 4 stages of psychological safety, stating that team members must progress through these stages in order to feel comfortable enough to speak up and make valuable contributions. The stages are:
Stage 1: Inclusion safety
This level of safety refers to satisfying the basic human need to connect and belong. It’s about being accepted as who we are, as our authentic selves. When we are accepted in this way we develop a sense of validation, shared identity and that we matter. When inclusion safety is not present, we can experience rejection, fear of punishment, and an overwhelming lack of confidence. It activates our primal fears of social isolation, and therefore can be deeply debilitating.
Stage 2: Learner safety
In this stage, you feel safe to learn, ask questions, and experiment. You feel open to giving and receiving feedback, experimenting, and making mistakes. Because it’s not about IF we make mistakes, it’s about WHEN. So having an environment that minimises anxiety and removes the fear of raising your hand to ask questions and truly learn is, as Dr Clark and I both believe, critical to our intellectual and emotional ability to learn.
Stage 3: Contributor safety
For the most part, we all have a need to contribute and make a difference, using the skills and abilities we have learned competently and confidently. It is contributor safety that allows this. And, the more contributor safety we create, the more empowered we feel, and the more confidence and competence we develop, leading to a high effort and high performing group environment.
Stage 4: Challenger safety
This final stage involves feeling safe enough to challenge the status quo when we see an opportunity for change or improvement. It allows this to happen without the fear of retaliation, or the risk of damage to our personal reputation. This is the space where respect and vulnerability meet to allow for constructive dissent, creativity, and innovation.
Why is psychological safety important?
An effective team values psychological safety as much as they do physical safety and performance standards. Psychological safety in the workplace is important because organisations who deliberately make space to include, learn, contribute and challenge will:
- Experience increased employee engagement
- Foster an inclusive workplace culture
- See a boost to creativity, new ideas, and innovation
- Improve their employee mental health and wellbeing
- Reduce employee turnover
- Be more attractive to future talented employees
That can’t be bad, right?!
What about when it isn’t present?
- A lack of psychological safety in the workplace can lead to employees feeling:
- Reluctant to stand out
- Holding back their ideas and thoughts
- Fearful of offending, saying the wrong thing, or looking stupid
- Ashamed, unvalued, out of place and not good enough, like an imposter
But how do we create it?
We all know that culture is not about inspirational posters on the walls, or a website full of values, it’s about how it feels to be somewhere, and the way in which things really are “done around here”. As the saying goes, actions speak louder than words.
The best way to demonstrate a culture of physical and psychological safety is to role model the behaviours you want. This means leadership really needs to be walking that talk, focusing on their own behavioural change, and coaching their teams to follow suit. This is where the support of a coach to help guide the learning process can be helpful too, making individual and real-time changes that ripple through the organisation.
To maintain a psychologically safe work culture, leaders must also consistently model these inclusive behaviours to build new team norms over time. Creating an environment of psychological safety takes self-awareness and a commitment to learning new behaviours. But the trade-off is more than worth it — and necessary!
Want more information on how you can foster psychological safety in your workplace? Check out my article, 4 Ways to Create Psychological Safety in your Workplace.
But, if you hold a senior level position, you may want to think about volunteering to sponsor an employee resource group, and prioritise time to attend events hosted by these and other groups, regardless of whether you are a sponsor or not. This will demonstrate your authentic interest and appreciation for their work, that can help build trust.
Even if you don’t have seniority in your organisation, but you would like to start creating a psychologically safe culture within your own team, there are still steps you can take. Be sure to have open and transparent conversations with your team prior to taking any action. This will be the first step for establishing trust and gaining the commitment of your team to experiment with you.
Remember, psychological safety doesn’t just come from the top. Team members need to take responsibility for creating a better environment for each other.
This is the reason why contracting is always a fundamental and important part of all the workshops I run. Sharing basic ground rules around confidentiality, participating and respect for all participants to agree upon is key to making sure people can build trusting and safe spaces for learning. As is allowing all participants to add additional ground rules that are important to them, and are agreed by the group, further deepening their commitment to the learning environment and to each other.
