2. What is psychological safety?...
Psychologists and other academics have been writing about psychological safety since the mid-1960s. The leading researcher in the field is Amy Edmondson.
Her insights are based on almost 30 years of research, supported and reinforced by an extensive five-year research programme with 15,000 employees at Google.
Psychological safety is fundamentally about interpersonal risk-taking. How do you judge the risk? What is at stake? Is the risk of speaking up greater than the risk of not? What are the likely consequences if you do and don’t?
Whether people feel safe enough to speak up is influenced by three key factors:
- Previous experiences - have you or others been slammed for speaking up?
- Impression management - we prefer to be considered smart, in the know and positive. Speaking up could jeopardise this perception.
- My opinion won't count anyway - why bother?
PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY 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 inter-personal risk taking. (Amy Edmondson)
Safe does not mean soft
A psychologically safe environment is not a soft environment, nor is it always comfortable.
There is an expectation of speaking up, high standards are encouraged, and mistakes are visible rather than hidden. It is not a panacea, but is a foundational factor needed for teams to thrive – work teams and learning teams alike.
