Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace

Creating psychological safety is about building an environment where employees feel empowered to speak up, take risks, and grow together. A psychologically safe workplace isn’t just a nice-to-have; it’s a must-have for a thriving, productive, and engaged team. Psychological safety is an ongoing process that requires constant attention and effort to foster and maintain, just as authenticity is determined by one's choice to be authentic in each moment.

Building a company culture of psychological safety takes time and effort, especially when businesses face unprecedented, and often overwhelming, change. But intentional planning and sincere implementation go a long way toward creating a safer workplace

Consider these steps to improve psychological safety:

·         Managers and leaders must recognize the importance of psychological safety and be both willing and able to apply new ideas and processes. Leadership can encourage this by modeling a willingness to speak up, admit mistakes, and demonstrate growth. Leaders can also take open responsibility for expressing compassion and empathy for their employees.

·         As a leader of a team, it’s important to set the stage for psychological safety by creating a shared identity among team members and providing structure for them to feel safe in their work. This includes fostering a sense of their individual contribution and cohesion as a team, and being open and transparent about any challenges or uncertainties that may arise.

·         Invite your team to challenge perspective and push back. While this may be uncomfortable at first, healthy conflict leads to better decisions and greater accountability—making it a win all around. Leaders might also lead by example by taking interpersonal risks and sharing failures. Try getting up at the next all-company meeting and presenting on a failure—and what you learned.

·         Psychologically safe space is a courageous space where people feel safe dissenting opinions and delivering constructive criticism, by inviting participation and encouraging individuals to challenge and question ideas, which ultimately leads to stronger culture. It’s crucial for the leader to role-model vulnerability and show their humanity in order to establish credibility and trust where team members feel comfortable being open and honest in return.

·         Psychologically safe workplace needs to be an inclusive workplace, with a culture of belonging, where everyone feels genuinely needed, wanted and valued for who they are and what they contribute.

Psychological safety, just like authenticity, isn’t a permanent state but rather is constantly being created and reinforced through the actions and behaviors of team members. Psychological security also fosters inclusion, as diverse team members flourish regardless of ethnicity, background, gender, disability, or race. Psychological safety is key to building a more open and innovative workplace.

Our talented Guest Author Ms Preeti Ahuja is a seasoned HR professional with 19+years of experience in shaping the organizational culture, nurturing progressive employee relations, driving inclusive culture, talent & organizational development. 

She brings diverse industry experience across many organizations like Atlas Copco Group, Alfa Laval, Lear Automotive, Larsen & Toubro and Peak AI. She has been recognized as one of the Top 50 Most Influential HR Leaders in 2024.