When employees feel psychologically safe at work, they are happier, healthier, and more productive. Psychological safety is all about fostering an environment where people feel secure taking interpersonal risks like speaking up with ideas, asking questions, or making mistakes.

While it may sound abstract, psychological safety has concrete impacts on performance, retention, innovation, and more.

This article explores evidence-based strategies any organization can implement to help teams feel valued, included, and empowered to thrive.

Clarify Values Around Openness and Inclusion

Culture stems from shared values lived out every day. To foster psychological safety, an organization must be clear about prioritizing openness, inclusion and supportive leadership.

Some ways to embed these values include:

• Leadership messaging that models vulnerability and welcomes feedback
• Training programs on mitigating unconscious bias
• Mentorship initiatives to cultivate belonging
• Adding psychological safety to performance frameworks
• Celebrating employees who exemplify supportive behaviors

Articulating inclusive values and recognizing those values in action seeds the right cultural soil for people to feel safe being themselves.

Spotlight Vulnerability as a Strength

From the top-down, leaders should highlight vulnerability as a source of growth, not weakness.

Some ways managers can model self-disclosure include:

• Sharing stories of past struggles or failures and lessons learned
• Admitting when they don’t have all the answers
• Asking openly about others’ ideas to solve a problem
• Soliciting feedback through stay interviews and anonymous surveys
• Presenting failures as key milestones rather than embarrassments

When employees see leaders open up, they feel more comfortable taking that same risk.

Cultivate Self-Awareness Through Assessments

Self-awareness allows individuals to notice behaviors that contribute to trust and safety (or erode them). Assessments can raise consciousness.

Options include:

• 360 reviews providing multi-rater feedback
• DiSC profiles identifying communication preferences
• The VitalSmarts Crucial Conversations assessment highlighting capability for dialogue around high-stakes topics
• Personality tests like Myers-Briggs or Enneagram illuminating working styles

Assessments help teams understand differences, adapt behaviors, and enhance psychological safety.

Train Managers in Inclusion Practices

Inclusion starts with managers. They set the tone for teams. Invest in developing inclusive mindsets and skills.

Potential training topics include:

• Mitigating unconscious bias through empathy and curiosity
• Using norms and ground rules to foster team cohesion
• Having 1:1s focused on growth and care for the whole person
• Running effective retrospectives where all voices are welcomed
• Leading meetings where introverts feel comfortable contributing
• Responding constructively when employees make mistakes or raise tough issues
• Being allies and advocates who give credit and share power

Equipped with inclusive leadership skills, managers cultivate safety daily.

Provide Anti-Racism and Bias Mitigation Training

Bias and inequities undermine psychological safety. Take proactive steps to cultivate racial literacy and counter prejudice.

Training should cover:

• The business case for racial equity and psychological safety
• The impact of conscious and unconscious bias
• How to have constructive conversations about race
• Allyship and advocating for underrepresented groups’ needs
• Equitable hiring practices
• Microaggressions and healthy ways to respond and interrupt them
• Anti-racism commitments and accountability

Working toward racial equity enables all employees to thrive without fear.

Launch Employee Resource Groups

ERGs like groups for women, LGBTQIA+ employees, working parents and more provide community support and amplify perspectives.

Key benefits include:

• Fostering belonging and connection
• Providing “safe spaces” to share common experiences
• Raising awareness of issues or needs unique to the group
• Creating development opportunities around shared identities
• Building communities that bolster psychological safety beyond the ERG itself

When ERGs are funded and supported, they powerfully cultivate inclusion and psychological safety.

Gather Regular Employee Feedback

Create mechanisms to routinely gather feedback that might otherwise go unheard. Anonymous input often surfaces crucial insights.

Tactics can include:

• Bi-annual engagement surveys with safety-specific indices
• Anonymous forums or suggestion boxes to voice suggestions without repercussions
• Stay interviews exploring reasons employees choose to stay
• Peer recognition programs that highlight acts of courage or care
• Small group listening sessions on topics like flexibility, caregiving, or career advancement

Regular check-ins on employees’ experience fosters openness and responsive improvement.

Emphasize Team Psychological Safety

Beyond individual feelings of safety, team dynamics play a massive role enabling candor, risk-taking and learning behaviors.

Some best practices include:

• Cultivating team “charters” with norms like listening, empathy and including all voices
• Adding psychological safety to team goals and performance reviews
• Training groups in dynamics like groupthink, diffusion of responsibility, and social loafing
• Running team assessments like the Harvard team diagnostic or Lencioni’s Five Behaviors
• Having managers highlight examples of candor, humility, and speaking up respectfully

When teams rather individuals feel psychologically safe, they can achieve exponentially more.

Respond Constructively to Disagreements

Moments of tension or disagreement present crucial opportunities. Train leaders in mediation to re-humanize conflicts.

Key skills include:

• Letting all parties share their perspective one at a time
• Asking curious questions to uncover root issues or misconceptions
• Restating key concerns and emotions before responding
• Finding common interests or motivations
• Outlining agreements and next steps
• Checking egos and avoiding blame or judgment
• Following up to ensure resolution

When conflict leads to greater mutual understanding, trust deepens.

Conclusion

Psychological safety pays dividends in performance, retention, innovation, engagement, and overall human thriving. But it doesn’t happen by accident. It requires intention.

By taking proactive steps like modeling vulnerability, cultivating inclusion, gathering feedback and mediating conflicts, leaders can create environments where all employees feel safe being themselves.

The benefits for organizations that invest in psychological safety are immense. And the rewards for employees who get to do fulfilling work without fear are immeasurable.