A Psychologically Safe Environment
What is Psychological Safety?
Publication Date: October 2021
During these uncertain times, many leaders and executives are looking for ways to create a sense of unity, stability and cohesion for their teams. Therefore, we are increasingly talking to our clients about the concept of “Psychological Safety”. Psychological Safety describes a person’s ability to be themselves without the fear of negative consequences for their brand, self-image, status or career. A person’s interpretation of their Psychological Safety is a result of the climate rather than culture, in other words, it impacts how a person feels about working for the company or within a team.
This research was conducted to help people in business understand how they can work with their teams to understand the climate in which they work and the impact this has on performance, well-being and the sense of belonging. Our intention was to understand, articulate and find a simple way of assessing people’s level of Psychological Safety so that we could identify and build ways of helping teams to change the environment in which they work. We achieved this by researching, designing, and validating a model which articulates 10 aspects of Psychological Safety.
The research summarises both the antecedents of Psychological Safety and its benefits. It also discusses how to improve the level of Psychological Safety in an organisation.
