Introduction: What is psychological safety among employees?

Dissatisfaction at work can stem from many factors. But what if your employees are not comfortable speaking up about what bothers them or avoid asking challenging questions at work? Are your employees not suggesting innovative ideas because they fear rejection?

A 2017 poll by Gallup found that 3 out of every 10 employees felt their opinions did not count at their workplace. These statistics only worsened in the remote work scenario in the post-pandemic era. A survey by Catalyst found that around 50% of female business leaders found it difficult to speak in business meetings, whereas 1 in 5 reported they were ignored or overlooked during video meetings.

There is adequate research that states that organisations benefit from a diverse group of people with ideas and suggestions stemming from their life experiences. When these individuals are provided with safe workplaces where they can ideate, suggest and take feedback, they are motivated and enthused to develop creative solutions. The lack of psychological safety among employees can impact your business!

Psychological safety at the workplace is a shared belief among teams in an organisation that others will not punish, embarrass or reject them for speaking up. This gives employees the psychological freedom to speak up when they have ideas, solutions, questions, and concerns without fearing those around them.

But do organisations provide this psychological safety for their employees? 

Importance of Psychological Safety in the Workplace

In an American survey, 89% of respondents said that psychological safety is essential in workplaces. According to Pew Research Centre, many Americans say women are better at creating safer workplaces than men.

Psychological safety at the workplace and among employees is vital for the organisation as well as each employee working there.

• It is an important factor in high-performing teams and teams who are adept at effective problem solving
• Enhances employee engagement
• Creates an inclusive work culture
• Improves employee well-being
• Reduces employee attrition and turnover
• Inspires and encourages creativity and new ideas

Four Stages of Psychological Safety of Employees

Before an organisation creates and implements strategies, it must understand that psychologically safe workplaces begin with a feeling of belonging. But, before employees get there, they go through four stages of psychological safety:

Stage 1: Inclusion Safety

This is the first stage of safety and satisfies the basic human need to be able to connect and belong. Employees must feel safe to be who they are, accept their unique characteristics and strengths, and recognise their weaknesses.

Stage 2: Learner Safety

This safety satisfies the employees’ need to learn and grow in their roles and career. At this stage, employees feel safe to share knowledge and have the humility to ask questions, give and receive feedback, experiment and make mistakes– all in the learning process.

Stage 3: Contributor Safety

Employees are motivated to make a difference when they reach this psychological safety stage. They trust their environment to support them while they use their abilities and skills to contribute to their role, team and the organisation at large.

Stage 4: Challenger Safety

When employees reach this stage, they have the inherent urge to improve things. They feel it is safe to speak about and challenge the status quo in their team or organisation and recognise the opportunity to change themselves or improve a system or process.

To help employees cross these four stages of psychological safety, managers, team leads, and HR should ensure a nurturing and safe workplace environment.

Strategies to Create Psychologically-Safe Workplaces

The right strategies can help organisations create a thriving culture that assures psychologically-safe workplaces. Here are a few ways to do so!

• Promote self-awareness

Begin by encouraging employees to become self-aware using engagement activities and mentoring sessions. Self-awareness empowers employees to understand their typical responses, behavioural nuances and challenges.

Combining this with emotional responses, employees can learn to react in a way that encourages open and amicable discussions and debates. 360-degree reviews and assessments are great tools for self-awareness exercises among teams.

• Encourage an empathic culture

An empathetic organisational culture that encourages managers and team leaders to value their peers and show concern and care can help employees feel comfortable sharing about themselves.

• Encourage inputs

To ensure every employee and team member feels involved and valued, leaders and managers must encourage input in meetings, discussions and conversations. Different viewpoints may lead to innovative ideas that may be valuable when implemented.

• Motivate employees to share feedback

Not all employees are the same. While some are comfortable sharing their thoughts verbally, others may be introverts or fail to articulate what bothers them. Organisations should have multiple avenues of sharing feedback, including tools like Microsoft Team, Slack, and e-mail. Initiatives like open-door conversations or in-person chats may help employees’ voices be heard.

• Appreciation and recognition

A great way to encourage employees to share their thoughts and ideas is to appreciate and recognise them. While not every idea needs to be acted upon or implemented, thanking or appreciating people for their insights goes a long way in establishing psychological safety among employees.

• Encourage a culture of owning up

Failure is always frightening, but that must not stop one from owning up to it. Just as successes are celebrated, ask your employees what they learnt from their failures. Doing so helps them understand what went wrong while also making them comfortable sharing their thoughts about their failure. This also encourages them to continue innovating and taking risks.

Here are five tips that managers must remember to ensure psychologically safe workplaces:

• Make psychological safety the utmost priority

Talk and promote the importance of psychological safety at the workplace and how it benefits organisational innovation, team engagement, cross-functional collaboration and a sense of inclusion. By using inclusive leadership practices, managers and HR leaders must model the behaviour they wish to see.

• Encourage employees to speak up

There needs to be a culture of curiosity and empathy at the workplace to ensure employees find it safe ad comfortable to speak their minds. At the same time, employees are also open-minded, compassionate and willing to listen to their colleagues and peers when they have something to say, even if that means challenging the status quo.

Organisations that have a coaching and mentoring culture usually have people who have the courage to speak.

• Create practices for handling failure

To encourage employees to speak, they must be secure about handling failure. Organisations must have practices that help employees handle failure and encourage them to share their lessons. This inspires people to take risks and innovate without fearing failure.

• Make space for new ideas

When you encourage your employees to speak or share their ideas, the organisations must make space for their new ideas. An agile culture willing to accept highly creative or innovative ideas further strengthens employees’ psychological safety.

• Encourage productive conflict

Most people avoid confrontation or conflicts, especially at work, to avoid awkwardness or conflict. However, encouraging productive conflict by promoting dialogue and healthy debate can help resolve issues effectively.

Key Takeaway

Psychological safety represents the organisation’s climate and defines its culture. Realising the enormity of the impact psychological safety can have on employees

When there is an environment of interpersonal trust and respect, employees enjoy the freedom of collaborating and taking risks- both of which drive innovations.

If all this sounds like a tall order, remember that psychological safety represents an organisation’s climate and culture. And when you consider the enormity of changing a culture, it can feel overwhelming.