Psychological safety, the belief that you won’t be punished when you make a mistake. It is both fragile and vital to success in uncertain, interdependent environments. It allows for moderate risk-taking, speaking your mind, creativity, and sticking your neck out without fear of having it cut off — just the types of behaviour that lead to market breakthroughs.
How to increase psychological safety between your teams/employees –
1. Approach conflict as a collaborator, not an adversary – Avoid triggering a fight-or-flight reaction and resolve by how could we achieve a mutually desirable outcome.
2. Speak human to human – Recognizing needs such as respect, competence, social status, and autonomy to elicits trust and promotes positive language & behaviours.
3. Anticipate reactions and plan countermoves – Gather concrete evidence to counter defensiveness when discussing hot-button issues.
4. Replace blame with curiosity – (a) State the problematic behaviour. (b) Engage them in exploration. (c) Ask for solutions.
5. Ask for feedback on delivery – It increases trust in leaders.
6. Measure psychological safety – Routinely take surveys on psychological safety and other team dynamics.