When you want to create psychological safety: 11 tactics to try as a manager
You can’t pick up a business magazine or access a website these days without reading about “psychology safety”. It certainly seems to be a hot topic of the day but is in no way an empty, buzzword bingo phrase. Ensuring psychology safety is one of the most important climates a manager can create.
Some think of the term, psychological safety, as meaning trust. Trust is certainly part of the phrase but it doesn’t only mean trust. The more specific definition is creating an environment where people can speak openly, voice their opinion or even share a mistake without fear of punishment, embarrassment or humiliation.
You may be in a situation where you feel safe speaking your mind and can’t imagine why we talk about this to begin with. That is amazing! I am thrilled for you if you work in that situation. For many, this is an area of concern and a focus for many management and leadership training programs today. Some organizations, especially large, complex organizations with more traditional structures, tend to have a climate of reluctance or even straight out fear to say what you really think.
An “unsafe” climate can be detected via several organizational cultural behaviors, including:
People say “yes” no matter what.
People have one face with their own team but another face with senior leaders — they can challenge their team but fold when a senior leader disagrees with them.
People withdraw and say nothing — giving in can indicate a fear to speak up.
People have the meeting outside of the meeting — people say only what they really think outside of the meeting with a few people.
People become defensive or even passive aggressive.
People whisper around the water cooler or virtual water cooler.
People do just enough to perform well but don’t take risks to excel.
As a leader, you have a great responsibility to ensure people who are on the payroll feel empowered enough to challenge the status quo, present an alternate opinion even if it isn’t a popular one, take risks when appropriate, and openly disagree with facts with senior levels. I have always asked why I was on the payroll if I was only to perform in a certain way dictated by someone else. I have a brain and talents. Everyone has a brain, skills and experiences. If you embrace diversity of thought and perspective, you need to allow those perspectives to be shared.
As a middle manager, it may feel daunting to try and create a safe place if you think your leader does not. This can be one of the most difficult situations to be in. My strongest piece of advice is to still create the climate you feel should be in place with your team even if your team is small. Leading by example is the best way to nudge a culture in a different direction.
Here are 11 very tactical actions you can take to create psychology safety with your teams.
Have candid conversations.
As with most of these tactics, being candid takes trust. Candor goes both ways. First, managers need to be candid with their teams about feedback, performance, and priorities. The best way to inspire candor is to listen. Allow people to share what is on their minds. I had a colleague once who was very frustrated that all their team did was complain. I said at least they feel comfortable sharing their frustrations. If they are out in the open, then you can address them.
Share personal information.
This used to be so taboo. Work was work and personal was personal. Now more than ever, work and personal are blurred. You bring your whole self to work. Today, this is even more true. You bring your whole self, your house, your pets, your kids, your spouse, your handyman, your neighborhood lawn mowing service. I think not only acknowledging but allowing people to talk about their personal lives builds trust, creates safety and also builds a better relationship with your team. Don’t avoid the personal stuff. Embrace it and ask about it. Share something about you back.
Be inclusive.
Inclusiveness is also not just another buzzword worthy of a Harvard Business Review headline. To create psychology safety, you need to be inclusive. If the same person volunteers and speaks up, try and ask others to join in. Broaden your network or project teams and ask others to provide input. People feel really good when they are asked their opinion. Help make people feel good.
Allow experimentation.
One of the great results of a climate of psychology safety is innovation. True innovation and creativity comes from heterogeneous teams….those with different perspectives will always create a better solution. Some of the greatest achievements come from trying something new. Allow your team to challenge the status quo and give them room to try something a different way. If it doesn’t work, so what. Capture lessons and move on. If people are allowed to take risks, they will feel more empowered to voice their thoughts.
Don’t dismiss or sweep conflict under the carpet.
If conflict arises among team members or between you and a team member, address it head on. The more that conflict or disagreement gets dismissed and pushed to the side, the less confident people will feel to voice their opinions. If conflict is always met with a wave of the hand or a quick changing of the topic, people will feel they can’t raise hairy issues or even try and solve problems, which is probably why they are on the team in the first place.
Ask for help.
If you ask for help or input, this demonstrates how open you are to others’ opinions. Inspire others to ask for help. As a manager, I will often suggest to my team members that they check with someone else on the team to get their opinion. This builds a sense of team, inclusiveness and shows that you value asking for help. Successful people have usually made a mistake at one time or another and have always asked for help with areas they were not an expert in.
Express gratitude.
Gratitude can have a profound effect on people’s mindsets and attitudes. Many professional psychologists will recommend people make a gratitude list to move themselves into a more positive frame of mind. Expressing gratitude and giving forums for people to thank others, also creates a safe place. If people are appreciated for helping, sharing and taking risks, this will create a climate of positive reinforcement.
Avoid rewarding heroes.
This can be a cultural phenomenon, where leaders tend to promote or reward heroes — the ones who single-handedly do all of the work. The more a company does this, the more the message communicates it is every person for themselves. Teamwork becomes less important and entertaining different perspectives becomes less critical. This creates an environment that squashes any feeling of security in honoring different perspectives. Especially if the same hero gets recognized over and over again. It makes others feel they can never be recognized so why even try.
Lead by example.
I mentioned this earlier but do these tactics yourself as a manager to show your commitment. People look to their manager for how to behave and to determine what is acceptable and not acceptable. If you personally employ the tactics above, others will follow.
Share good examples.
Another way is to highlight, feature and share examples of others’ doing these behaviors. This may seem to heavy-handed but if you want to nudge a culture, sharing stories about how others have created psychological safety, supported risk-taking or celebrated diverse perspectives help create a groundswell of support. Groundswells can lead to systemic change.
Observe and hold others accountable.
If you have this leeway, pay attention to what others are doing on your team and broader team. Help to influence and nudge others’ behaviors to be more of safety and candor than secrecy and fear. Even as a non-manager, people should feel free to respectfully ask questions about decisions. As a manager, you should demonstrate what matters by influencing others to behave differently. Modeling this behavior will also help as it shows that you practice what you preach, which demonstrates integrity.
Creating psychology safety is multi-faceted. There are many different actions you can take that clearly demonstrate how important this is to you as a manager. Each one of these tactics can have a significant impact if done consistently.
In our virtual or hybrid world, creating this climate becomes more important as building trust and including diverse perspectives can be more difficult if everyone is not in the same place. This does not mean it is impossible. You have to be more intentional about doing this. Make it a goal for yourself as a manager and try a few of the tactics above and collect feedback from your team. It will make a difference!