Psychological safety in leadership

Lee: 00:00:00

What's the, what's the phrase?

Lee: 00:00:01

Close?

Lee: 00:00:01

All the hatchets?

Lee: 00:00:02

No, I, I dunno what the phrase is.

Lee: 00:00:05

Er hatchets.

Lee: 00:00:06

No, what's, what's the

Carrie-Ann: 00:00:07

Well, you've confused me now cuz there's so many in there.

Carrie-Ann: 00:00:10

I'm like, I dunno which saying she wants.

Carrie-Ann: 00:00:12

Hun hun.

Carrie-Ann: 00:00:13

I dunno.

Carrie-Ann: 00:00:14

And we hun her in down.

Carrie-Ann: 00:00:15

Are we closing that?

Carrie-Ann: 00:00:16

I dunno what we're doing, but I get, I know what you

Lee: 00:00:19

You know what I mean?

Lee: 00:00:20

Some kind of Doro Wizard of Oz in the storm kind of

Lee: 00:00:24

situation I've got in my mind.

Lee: 00:01:07

hello and welcome to another week of How to Take the Lead.

Lee: 00:01:10

I have my lovely collaborator, Carrie Ann with me,

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:15

For some reason I thought you were gonna call me your assistant,

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:18

and I was gonna become like Debbie McGee,

Lee: 00:01:21

Do you know, as I was saying it, that picture also came into my mind,

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:25

Also reference points.

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:27

That's gonna mean nothing to quite a lot of our listeners, I should imagine.

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:30

But anyway,

Lee: 00:01:31

How weird that we both had the same image yeah.

Lee: 00:01:34

That, isn't, we're not here to talk about magicians , although I have Paul

Lee: 00:01:37

Daniel's magic set when I was little.

Lee: 00:01:39

Did you have one?

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:40

No, I didn't, but I feel like I've missed out now and I'm

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:42

gonna speak to my parents about that.

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:44

Why did I not have, you've had a neighbor's board game.

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:47

I didn't have one of those Paul Daniel's magic set of, seriously,

Carrie-Ann: 00:01:51

my, parents need to up their game.

Lee: 00:01:53

I'm gonna have to rethink my narrative to my younger sisters who

Lee: 00:01:56

I always complain, got everything when they grew up and I got nothing.

Lee: 00:02:00

But actually, I think I had quite a fruitful upbringing compared to you.

Carrie-Ann: 00:02:05

I'm writing a letter of complaint to my mum and dad

Carrie-Ann: 00:02:07

straight after this episode.

Lee: 00:02:09

But also all of these games are in a storage unit somewhere.

Lee: 00:02:12

So I think you and I have got a day some point in the future where we just,

Lee: 00:02:16

we can relive our eighties childhoods

Lee: 00:02:19

call that team building?

Lee: 00:02:20

I love it.

Lee: 00:02:21

Anyway.

Lee: 00:02:22

Well that's quite a frivolous start for a topic that we are covering

Lee: 00:02:25

today that isn't that frivolous

Carrie-Ann: 00:02:26

I know, I know.

Carrie-Ann: 00:02:27

But the only thing I'm really pleased about is we haven't mentioned the weather

Lee: 00:02:30

Oh, you had to go there, So today, we wanted to explore psychological safety.

Lee: 00:02:39

and what that means for you as a leader and for your organization as well.

Lee: 00:02:44

And so I suppose it, it feels quite a grand term.

Lee: 00:02:49

So to explain what we mean by psychological safety, It's that

Lee: 00:02:54

sense or that belief that you are not gonna be punished or made fun of

Lee: 00:02:59

or have any negative ramifications.

Lee: 00:03:03

If you speak up, and when I say speak up, it isn't about whistle

Lee: 00:03:08

blowing, which is what people often think about with that term.

Lee: 00:03:12

It's about feeling that you can share ideas, you can ask questions, you can

Lee: 00:03:17

raise concerns, you can make mistakes.

Lee: 00:03:22

You have that sense of safety amongst your team to take that risk.

Lee: 00:03:28

That's what psychological safety means and.

Lee: 00:03:32

All of those things we're gonna be covering in today's conversation.

Lee: 00:03:35

And the reason I wanted to cover this topic was because I read Amy

Lee: 00:03:40

Edmondson's brilliant book, the Fearless Organization, which will link, if

Lee: 00:03:45

you've not read it, I highly recommend.

Lee: 00:03:47

And it was a book that gave me so much to think about.

Lee: 00:03:51

I was reading it quite often in my random commutes into London to meet up

Lee: 00:03:55

with people and I was marking up pages, getting my phone out every few minutes

Lee: 00:04:00

to take notes the whole way through, which I don't often do with books.

Lee: 00:04:03

So it was one that spoke to me and I got really reflective, um, about the

Lee: 00:04:09

organizations that I'd worked in in the past, how safe I felt in them, and also

Lee: 00:04:14

how safe I made it for other people.

Lee: 00:04:17

And I've said before, about some of the organizations I've worked for have been

Lee: 00:04:22

quite toxic at times, but I'd never really considered it in terms of did

Lee: 00:04:27

I feel safe being in the workplace.

Lee: 00:04:29

But I think now in hindsight, I can absolutely see there

Lee: 00:04:32

are times I didn't feel safe.

Lee: 00:04:34

And I can think of examples where, you know, a boss who didn't

Lee: 00:04:41

want to hear bad news at all.

Lee: 00:04:43

Literally shouting at me in front of other people, accusing me of not protecting

Lee: 00:04:48

her when we hit a really bad point in, in our kind of organizational history.

Lee: 00:04:53

My team didn't want to deal with this person and I became a

Lee: 00:04:57

buffer to protect them so my mind immediately went to situations I

Lee: 00:05:00

had to deal with with that person.

Lee: 00:05:02

I think of another place that I worked when I didn't feel listened

Lee: 00:05:07

to or didn't feel my views were appreciated by certain people around

Lee: 00:05:12

the table, and their bad behaviors weren't being tackled by other people.

Lee: 00:05:17

So I actually started avoiding having conversations or avoiding situations where

Lee: 00:05:22

I had to deal with those individuals.

Lee: 00:05:24

And then I reflect as a manager.

Lee: 00:05:26

I've shared, you know, the hideously embarrassing story of me slamming

Lee: 00:05:31

my hand on the table to show authority, which is so, so cringe.

Lee: 00:05:36

And it was a one off thing and I definitely didn't do it again cause

Lee: 00:05:39

I immediately knew how cringe it was.

Lee: 00:05:41

But now I realize just that behavior, that one action, I wasn't creating

Lee: 00:05:45

a safe environment for my team.

Lee: 00:05:47

And, what impact did I have on them?

Lee: 00:05:49

I don't, I don't really know.

Lee: 00:05:51

So I've had a real journey exploring this and having looked

Lee: 00:05:56

more into the topic as well.

Lee: 00:05:58

There's, there's so many different ways that we can go with this conversation.

Lee: 00:06:02

I think it's really important as a leader that you need to build

Lee: 00:06:07

connection, as I always say.

Lee: 00:06:08

But you've got to create safety to do that.

Lee: 00:06:11

And so that's really like how I come today with this topic.

Lee: 00:06:15

And I suppose I just wanna lay it on the table where my

Lee: 00:06:18

mind's gone with some of this.

Lee: 00:06:20

Get your early thoughts on it as a topic.

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:23

absolutely.

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:24

And gosh, the, yeah, it is, it was a frivolous start to a

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:28

heavy conversation, wasn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:29

but I'd like to think that that Frivol came because there is a level of

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:33

trust between us that we can have.

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:36

Any sort of conversation, no matter how lighthearted or how heavy it might be.

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:40

So one of the things that struck me as partly as I was listening to you and

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:44

partly have my own reflections on where I've worked and, and who I've worked with.

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:48

And I think trust for me feels like such an important aspect of

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:52

building that psychological safety.

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:55

And I know we've done an episode before.

Carrie-Ann: 00:06:57

Done the plug for people to listen to that one.

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:00

But I think, you know, part of, of being able to share your opinion,

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:04

being able to share ideas, it doesn't even have to be a controversial

Lee: 00:07:08

No.

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:08

could be a creative idea or possible solution to

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:12

something does often come with that.

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:14

Need to be open and to be vulnerable in terms of being able to share

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:18

that without that fear that you are, that you're going to be judged.

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:21

So I, I absolutely think this is a really important topic to talk about, and I

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:26

reflect on some of the situations I've been in before where like you, I wouldn't

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:32

maybe necessarily have described it at the time as not feeling psychologically

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:36

safe, but actually on reflection it, it definitely has been that for me.

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:40

I've worked in a leadership team where there were two, absolutely,

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:44

defined camps in that leadership team.

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:46

And you were either in the CEO's camp or you weren't, and actually there were

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:51

a couple of us in that leadership space who didn't really want to align ourselves

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:55

with either camp and, but actually what happened was we didn't share a view

Carrie-Ann: 00:07:59

at all because it didn't feel safe.

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:01

I realize now to have an opinion or to share your professional view on

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:06

something, because the safest thing to do was just to keep your head down.

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:10

So actually, That on reflection now has resulted in me thinking, how many

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:15

times did I, um, accept or enable bad behaviors by just keeping my head down?

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:21

Because personally for me, that's where I felt safest, but also it meant I wasn't

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:26

contributing to the success of anything.

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:28

I didn't feel valued as part of that team because actually, just to get through the.

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:33

Head down, you know, don't make a view cuz you'll be judged, you'll be

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:37

perceived to be in one camp or the other.

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:39

And that will have, have ramifications.

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:42

And, and I also thought about a time, quite early on in my career where I

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:46

worked for a leader who it was now on reflection quite complex, I think in

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:52

terms of the kind of impacts of that bit was a leader who actually in the early

Carrie-Ann: 00:08:57

days of working with, did absolutely load to make us feel safe as a team.

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:02

You know, lots of team building activity, lots of opportunities

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:06

to come together and share ideas.

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:10

Appeared to be very openminded.

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:12

Um, very empowering, very enabling.

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:15

They would all be words I would use to describe that leader.

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:18

But then at some point, something obviously shifted for them and actually

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:22

their actions changed and their behaviors towards the team and individuals in

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:27

the team started to become quite toxic.

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:31

And again, it was your point about sometimes as well, You end up in a

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:34

position where you are acting as a buffer, around some of that to try

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:38

and help other people to feel safe.

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:40

So you absorb a lot.

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:41

A lot of what you've said is, is really resonated with me and, and I've definitely

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:45

come away from my thinking ahead of recording this episode with you about,

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:50

what impact do I have in my own team?

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:52

Do I help to create a culture of psychological safety?

Carrie-Ann: 00:09:57

Am I putting in enough time together as a team to help build that trust?

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:01

And I, and I think one of the things I've reflected on is.

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:05

Despite having been in my organization for six and a half years, I've actually

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:09

got quite a new team now because we've got new people that have joined.

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:12

We've been through a restructure that actually is creating that

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:16

psychological safety harder.

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:18

When we've been developing as a team in a virtual world, we don't

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:22

have time together in person.

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:24

We do a lot of what we've done online.

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:26

We've had people who joined the team and for, for many months, didn't

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:29

even meet in person, another member of the team because of the pandemic.

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:34

Has that had impacts on how psychologically

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:36

safe my team feels?

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:37

So you opened up a whole Pandora's box by having the conversation with me about

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:42

recording an episode around this thing.

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:44

But I feel like it's been an opportunity to, to really reflect

Carrie-Ann: 00:10:48

and try to gain some insight.

Lee: 00:10:50

And you're right about the different types of work spaces and the

Lee: 00:10:55

different generations and all of that will will view certain situations,

Lee: 00:11:01

certain ways of work, and certain expectations all very differently.

Lee: 00:11:04

And that can all impact on how safe someone feels.

Lee: 00:11:09

Thinking about this topic actually got me thinking again about imposter

Lee: 00:11:15

syndrome and anyone that's listened to the Women in Leadership episode would've

Lee: 00:11:19

heard my views that, imposter syndrome, usually a cover for something else.

Lee: 00:11:25

And there's something behind that feeling, something that's happened.

Lee: 00:11:28

And I suppose when I started to read that book and think about more

Lee: 00:11:33

broadly, creating that sense of psychological safety at the workplace.

Lee: 00:11:37

It connected some dots for me.

Lee: 00:11:39

And when people are reporting that they feel like an imposter in

Lee: 00:11:44

their team or organization, I'm not made to feel comfortable here.

Lee: 00:11:48

Does that mean they don't feel safe?

Lee: 00:11:50

I don't feel like I know enough people know more than me is

Lee: 00:11:53

that they're not feeling safe.

Lee: 00:11:55

So is imposter syndrome another symptom, I suppose, of people not feeling safe.

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:02

I, I think that's really interesting and the more you've talked

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:05

about it, the more I, I would absolutely start to think yes it is for sure.

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:09

I think it's linked to, definitely that sense of psychological

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:13

safety for sure, but also that.

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:16

What's, what's your experience been to date?

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:18

And if your experience of sharing your professional opinion, for example, has

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:23

always been met with that negativity, or somebody putting you down, or somebody

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:27

making a, a judgment that has impacted on you negatively, then you are gonna

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:32

be more and more cautious to do it.

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:34

And I think that's where that imposter syndrome, you know, whatever we want

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:37

to label that creeps in and, and maybe it is just another label for people

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:42

not feeling safe in their organizations or safe to, perform in their role

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:46

in the way that they really should.

Carrie-Ann: 00:12:48

So yeah, I think that's quite an interesting take on it Lee.

Lee: 00:12:52

Just thinking, I can absolutely close my eyes and I am back round, the

Lee: 00:12:56

executive table and I can see certain individuals, um, It might be their body

Lee: 00:13:01

language folding their arms when certain other people are talking around the table,

Lee: 00:13:05

rolling their eyes, sighing if we verge into a conversation that they don't like

Lee: 00:13:10

or they feel bored or they don't want to engage in it, getting really defensive

Lee: 00:13:15

if you question something in their area and, and quite often people would feel

Lee: 00:13:21

threatened, maybe that is a strong word, but they would feel like, oh my opinion

Lee: 00:13:26

doesn't matter, or I'm not allowed to, to tread on, you know, stay in your lane.

Lee: 00:13:29

I hate that phrase because that's that sense of you can't get involved in

Lee: 00:13:33

conversations that don't relate to you.

Lee: 00:13:36

And so all of that for me, I think that's is why I don't really resonate

Lee: 00:13:40

with the term imposter syndrome.

Lee: 00:13:41

Cause I just think stuff sits behind.

Carrie-Ann: 00:13:44

Absolutely.

Carrie-Ann: 00:13:44

And your point about you can close your eyes and go straight

Carrie-Ann: 00:13:47

back into those circumstances, that's really powerful, isn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:13:50

That resonates with me because I can now think of, a handful of individuals

Carrie-Ann: 00:13:56

who probably haven't made me feel psychologically safe in different

Carrie-Ann: 00:13:59

parts of my career journey that actually if now, even now, if somebody

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:04

said their name, I would probably start to feel a level of anxiety.

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:08

I would question how good I am at, at something, because I, I think,

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:12

oh, how would that person react?

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:14

I've been in situations where, you know, they haven't been supportive or they

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:17

have thought I've not been good enough.

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:19

And despite how confident I can be and what I've achieved in my career,

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:23

just the mere mention of a few different individuals will throw me

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:27

right back into that, that space.

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:28

And I can't do it.

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:29

I dunno what I'm talking about.

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:31

Somebody's better than me.

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:33

And you are right.

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:34

That's, that's that imposter bit, isn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:36

So maybe imposter syndrome's the label for a whole range of symptoms

Carrie-Ann: 00:14:40

that are caused by not being psychologically safe in the work.

Lee: 00:14:43

but I dunno about you.

Lee: 00:14:45

But certainly I have that everything just goes rigid when I think of,

Lee: 00:14:51

you know, one or two in particular people that I've had to deal with

Lee: 00:14:55

in my kind of corporate career.

Lee: 00:14:58

And when they moved on to other places, my trust in where they went

Lee: 00:15:02

and the judgment of the people that appointed them and the people who became

Lee: 00:15:07

friends with them or became part of that inner circle was all affected.

Lee: 00:15:11

So, so actually that, that safety net doesn't just limit to your organization,

Lee: 00:15:17

but can limit to how you view anyone that interacts with people who make you feel.

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:22

Yeah, and it's back to that trust point again, isn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:25

You start to lose trust in other people because of decisions they're

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:29

making around those individuals.

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:31

So, uh, I think it's, it is hugely complex and hugely nuanced.

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:35

And about the only experiences that, that you've actually had For sure.

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:39

And, and I would say just on that point, I have actually been doing some

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:42

work myself around reframing, some of my thinking about some of those

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:46

individuals that still actually do fill me with fear and try and really hard

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:50

to, to reframe that to be actually when I think about those individuals, I'm

Carrie-Ann: 00:15:56

reframing that to actually remind me of how confident I should be because

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:01

there's a, a bit of that as well that surround other people's insecurities

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:05

and maybe people, people have their own insecurities that play out because they

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:10

don't feel psychologically safe either.

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:12

It is so complex, isn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:14

For sure.

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:14

But it has such a huge, huge impact that sometimes I don't think

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:18

you realized till much later on.

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:21

As you've said, you do those reflections now and you go, actually, that was

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:24

about me not being psychologically safe.

Carrie-Ann: 00:16:26

It wasn't about some of the other things that I, maybe put around that.

Lee: 00:17:25

One of the interesting things I read around this concept of trust and

Lee: 00:17:29

psychological safety, as you've mentioned trust a few times, was that often they

Lee: 00:17:34

do get used in quite an interchangeable way, but they aren't necessarily one

Lee: 00:17:38

in the same thing, so safety is how you feel perhaps at that group level.

Lee: 00:17:44

But trust is definitely that one to one thing so, safety might happen

Lee: 00:17:49

in the moment, whereas your trust will that person do The right

Lee: 00:17:53

thing is, is more future focused.

Lee: 00:17:57

Um, safety is, I might not say something or take an action or flag

Lee: 00:18:01

something up cuz I'm worried about the immediate consequences, whereas

Lee: 00:18:05

trust, Do I think in the longer term, the right thing will happen.

Lee: 00:18:09

So there are some nuances in trust and psychological safety.

Lee: 00:18:14

I dunno whether trust would exist if you don't feel psychologically safe.

Lee: 00:18:20

But, um, I think if, if you do feel psychologically, psychologically

Lee: 00:18:24

safe, it doesn't necessarily mean you also have trust.

Lee: 00:18:27

If that makes.

Carrie-Ann: 00:18:28

That absolutely does make sense cuz I think if you

Carrie-Ann: 00:18:30

think about trust in terms of those one to one relationships,

Carrie-Ann: 00:18:33

that takes a long time to build.

Carrie-Ann: 00:18:35

But I, there is something about if you are in that group scenario, How many

Carrie-Ann: 00:18:40

people in the room do you feel like you trust and do you trust them enough to

Carrie-Ann: 00:18:44

air an opinion and feel like you can do that safely without a consequence?

Carrie-Ann: 00:18:48

And actually the, the bit that's quite frightening for me is sometimes just one

Carrie-Ann: 00:18:51

individual in, in a group can limit how psychologically safe everyone else feels.

Lee: 00:18:57

Yeah.

Lee: 00:18:57

Yeah, absolutely.

Lee: 00:18:59

So one of the conundrums that I've had, and I'm, I'm sure other people have

Lee: 00:19:05

as well, is this concept of how do you as an organization, as a leader of an

Lee: 00:19:10

organization, develop a safe culture, but also ensure high performance and

Lee: 00:19:17

accountability because there's a sense of, oh, well if you're psychologically

Lee: 00:19:20

safe, do you just let things slide and anyone can do what, do what they want?

Lee: 00:19:24

And you see organizations, the book talks about Volkswagen, it talks about Nokia,

Lee: 00:19:30

for example, as organizations where they really drove performance and, and wanting

Lee: 00:19:36

to be the best at all costs and actually what they ended up creating was really

Lee: 00:19:41

unsafe environments that that failed.

Lee: 00:19:44

This links with empowering innovation in organizations.

Lee: 00:19:48

And there was a McKinsey study, which we can put a link to that showed

Lee: 00:19:53

something like 85% of executives believed fear was holding back

Lee: 00:19:58

innovation in their organization.

Lee: 00:19:59

So that's fear of criticism, fear of uncertainty, fear of negative

Lee: 00:20:03

career impacts and, all the rest.

Lee: 00:20:06

So how do you start to create a culture of safety whilst ensuring innovation,

Lee: 00:20:15

accountability, high performance, which as leaders you strive for.

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:19

Yeah, it's, it is really interesting, isn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:21

That perception that is perhaps been out there that you can't have both.

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:25

And like you say, you've given some examples of companies where they've

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:28

been so focused on one, it's been at the neglect of the other, and that.

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:32

Created sort of unsafe outcomes for sure.

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:35

But I think a lot of the research and a lot of the reading that you can do

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:38

around, um, psychological safety does demonstrate that high performing teams,

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:44

so we're talking about performance often have a high sense of psychological

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:48

safety when you delve into that.

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:50

Because I think for me, psychological safety is really linked to being open to

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:56

having an approach to problem solving.

Carrie-Ann: 00:20:59

And solution finding and creating an environment where

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:04

there's divergent thinking.

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:07

People in, in psychologically safe teams, I think often feel more motivated or

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:12

it's linked to things that motivate them.

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:14

There's higher motivation in high performing teams, and it's a word

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:18

that I'm sometimes uncomfortable with as a description, but I also

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:21

think the research shows high performing teams with a high sense of

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:26

psychological safety are more resilient.

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:28

So actually when there are issues that come up, they are able to deal with them.

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:33

I, I guess, in, in a more comfortable way.

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:35

So I think for me, building that culture is around self-awareness, both

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:40

self-awareness of you as a leader, but self-awareness within the team as well.

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:46

Think that, you know, again, thinks maybe back to some level of, of emotional

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:49

intelligence around some of that.

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:51

Having that insight in terms of, how you are having an impact

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:55

on your team and how other team members are impacting on each other.

Carrie-Ann: 00:21:58

But I think the key things are around that blame avoidance.

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:01

We've talked about fear, people fear being blamed if something goes wrong, if

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:07

they have an idea or share an opinion, they're gonna get blamed If people take

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:10

action on it and it wasn't quite right, you need to find a way to avoid that

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:14

blame culture if you can in your team.

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:16

There's something about how do you engage with each other as members of that team

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:21

and as a leader of that team, are you being open to, to seeking feedback.

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:26

There's something about that clarity of purpose as a team, if you are a

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:30

high performing team, you are often very clear about what your purpose is.

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:35

So having that clarity of purpose is really important.

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:38

But creating an environment for people to constructively challenge that I think is

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:43

the bit where you come into that space of people feeling psychologically safe.

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:47

Your bit about fear, I think is an important one because I personally

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:52

think fear does hold back innovation.

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:54

I think it's fear of failure and I think sometimes that, there are leaders who

Carrie-Ann: 00:22:59

often fear failure, so they start to lead with a bit of an iron rod and that

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:03

psychological safety isn't there because it becomes all about the performance

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:07

because they don't want to fail.

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:09

That, that fear of being blamed with, we kind of mentioned fear of speaking,

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:13

speaking out, but if you can start to develop a culture of people in your

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:18

team feeling psychologically safe, I think that encourages experimentation,

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:23

creativity, people to really foster and, and build on new ideas.

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:29

Focus on sort of being curious about actually where certain things

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:33

can take you I think all feel like an important kind of test bed for

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:37

innovation, to be honest with you.

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:39

So for me, I think psychological safety and and performance almost work together.

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:45

I, I think it's better if it works together rather than being

Carrie-Ann: 00:23:48

focused on one or the other.

Lee: 00:23:49

The point you make about clarity of purpose.

Lee: 00:23:53

I think when you look at organizations that have failed, they might have had

Lee: 00:23:59

a clarity in purpose, but there was a rigidity in the leader who was so

Lee: 00:24:04

outcomes focused that they weren't willing to try different things and

Lee: 00:24:09

to test whether the purpose was the right purpose or the question they were

Lee: 00:24:12

seeking to answer was the right question.

Lee: 00:24:14

So I think that's really important.

Lee: 00:24:16

. And I think on the accountability part, that's an important part of making

Lee: 00:24:22

people feel safe as well, because we all can think of, well, I go back to

Lee: 00:24:27

my earlier example of bad behaviors not being tackled made me feel unsafe.

Lee: 00:24:32

So if people are seeing an injustice of people not being held to account,

Lee: 00:24:37

if someone has put someone at risk or, or perhaps not met the organizational

Lee: 00:24:43

policy or whatever it might be, if that's not dealt with appropriately, it

Lee: 00:24:47

is gonna impact how people feel about the safety of the organization, if they're

Lee: 00:24:52

being protected, by their leader, by their manager, by the organization.

Lee: 00:24:57

So I think that's an important part as well.

Lee: 00:24:59

You can be tough without creating

Lee: 00:25:05

fear.

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:05

Yeah, I, I think that is absolutely true.

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:08

And it, it is really important.

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:09

It's part back to that sort of role modeling, isn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:12

And that action and addressing poor behaviors.

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:15

You are right, you can do that and still create a sense of psychological safety.

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:20

Cause I think we touched on it in this conversation earlier, if, if people see

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:24

poor behaviors not being addressed and being allowed to continue and allowed

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:29

to fester, that stifles people's ability to be able to participate, fully,

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:34

and that that therefore will have a knock on effect on your performance.

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:38

So you do have to address some of those more challenging issues,

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:42

obviously, in a compassionate way, but to demonstrate that actually certain

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:46

things are not acceptable in terms of behavior because it doesn't create

Carrie-Ann: 00:25:50

that psychologically safe environment.

Lee: 00:25:53

Yeah.

Lee: 00:25:53

And I think when we've, we've touched on this before about the sense of

Lee: 00:25:57

not having too much ego as a leader.

Lee: 00:26:00

And I think, um, that sense of.

Lee: 00:26:03

Power and ego are all things that influence the creation of an unsafe

Lee: 00:26:09

environment If you are a leader, so if you think you know best, if you are super

Lee: 00:26:15

directive or micromanaging people, then you are reducing the likelihood each time

Lee: 00:26:21

you behave like that, that someone's gonna speak up, is gonna give you a suggestion,

Lee: 00:26:26

will report a mistake, for example.

Lee: 00:26:28

So there is a lot of stuff that you need to do as a leader.

Lee: 00:26:31

Who you choose to listen to.

Lee: 00:26:33

We've all seen that where people have been dismissive and I'm sure we've done it as

Lee: 00:26:38

well, been dismissive of people who they think aren't perhaps expert enough in the

Lee: 00:26:43

field to have a, have a view on something.

Lee: 00:26:47

And that plays to your ego.

Lee: 00:26:49

Just look at your staff survey results.

Lee: 00:26:52

Are people saying that they feel their opinions matter?

Lee: 00:26:56

Do they feel they can raise issues or ideas?

Lee: 00:27:00

Do they feel listened to?

Lee: 00:27:01

You've probably got a weight of data out there around how people are feeling

Lee: 00:27:05

about either you as, as a manager or a leader, or your organization as a whole.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:11

Yeah, I, I think that is a really good point to make

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:14

in terms of how do you work out?

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:17

I mean, I, there's a bit of you that wants to think it should be really

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:20

obvious as a leader if you're not in a psychologically safe organization and

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:24

you're not help helping to create that.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:26

But I think the point you're making that there are some leaders

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:28

who are not open to seeing that.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:30

And

Lee: 00:27:31

Because of the ego.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:31

Yeah.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:32

because of the ego.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:33

So I think to be a good leader, you, you do need to.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:37

You know, triangulate all of that data that you've got that is telling

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:40

you whether or not people feel able to speak out, share new ideas.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:45

The point you raise about do people feel that they can report a mistake

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:50

or an error without that fear of being blamed or judged for it.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:53

I think that's really crucial, isn't it, to being able to

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:56

improve as an organization.

Carrie-Ann: 00:27:58

So if as a leader you are not open To thinking differently about that and

Carrie-Ann: 00:28:02

starting to understand where people are on that spectrum of psychological safety,

Carrie-Ann: 00:28:07

then I think you are hugely missing a trick because it's gonna impact on,

Carrie-Ann: 00:28:11

on your organization, the culture, the workforce, the performance for sure.

Lee: 00:28:16

I also think we've, we've been talking a lot about staff within

Lee: 00:28:20

organizations and your role as a leader, but I do think this is more broadly.

Lee: 00:28:25

Than that.

Lee: 00:28:25

I think it extends to people who interact with your organization.

Lee: 00:28:30

So how safe are you making it to speak up or to feedback?

Lee: 00:28:35

After I left my corporate role, I had, uh, quite an intense time with a family

Lee: 00:28:42

member who needed, care from the health service and it was interesting in, again,

Lee: 00:28:48

when I look back now and reflect, so my mom didn't want to complain about

Lee: 00:28:55

the issues because she thought A, it was gonna impact on the care that this

Lee: 00:28:59

person was being given at the time.

Lee: 00:29:02

And B, she assumed that the professionals knew best.

Lee: 00:29:07

So those were things that she was like, oh, we just have to go

Lee: 00:29:10

with what people are telling us.

Lee: 00:29:12

I knew better because I worked in a system and understood the process and,

Lee: 00:29:18

and knew I just wasn't gonna stand for that as, as a kind of quality issue.

Lee: 00:29:23

But even the first response we got through the complaints process, she would've just

Lee: 00:29:29

sat with that and accepted it even though it was really, really poor because she

Lee: 00:29:33

thought there was nothing she could do about I wasn't necessarily made to feel

Lee: 00:29:39

welcome when I did raise things, but.

Lee: 00:29:44

I suppose I knew enough about the rights and wrongs and felt I

Lee: 00:29:47

had a duty to do something about it for those who who couldn't.

Lee: 00:29:51

And I think about, you know, interactions that we had with individuals and we were

Lee: 00:29:57

having a conversation, my mother and I went on behalf of, of this relative with

Lee: 00:30:02

a doctor who was going to give some life changing news that was really hard for

Lee: 00:30:08

us as a family to process and, and my mum asked a couple of questions and the doctor

Lee: 00:30:14

waved in her face and said, hello, hello.

Lee: 00:30:17

Do you not understand?

Lee: 00:30:19

And we were shocked.

Lee: 00:30:19

And it shot my mom up.

Lee: 00:30:20

And even now, two, three years later, you know, she'll talk.

Lee: 00:30:23

I'm, I'm getting emotional thinking about it, but you know, that sense of someone

Lee: 00:30:29

in the way that they physically reacted, the words they used, how they made her

Lee: 00:30:33

feel stupid and belittling would've stopped her from taking that forward.

Lee: 00:30:38

Now I've pushed through my red headedness came out and I wasn't gonna stand for it.

Lee: 00:30:43

And, and so we have gone through quite a, a detailed complaints process with, with

Lee: 00:30:48

the people and the organizations involved.

Lee: 00:30:50

But my mom wouldn't have done that.

Lee: 00:30:52

And that organization would never have learned, they would've

Lee: 00:30:54

never known there was an issue.

Lee: 00:30:55

And that was cuz they didn't make the people who used the services safe.

Lee: 00:31:00

Sorry, that was a long

Lee: 00:31:01

no, no,

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:01

no.

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:02

And I, I can feel the emotion coming through in, in the

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:04

conversation and there's frustration there as well, isn't there?

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:07

And the bit that really frustrates me about that is you're not demonstrating,

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:12

you know, I, I just feel like.

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:14

None of us organizations or individuals are finished articles.

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:19

There is always, always, always room for improvement.

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:22

And actually, if you are gonna be closed minded and you're not going to listen to

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:27

people and you're not going to create a culture or an environment where people

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:31

can speak up and say, this doesn't feel right, then I think, know, you are not

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:36

being an organization or if you're an individual, a leader who is, is open

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:40

to that learning and that improvement, and that just makes me feel sad.

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:45

Actually, that makes me feel really sad because I'm like, actually the people

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:48

who know best of the people who are receiving your service or the goods or

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:52

whatever it is that you are, you know, your purpose is to serve someone else

Carrie-Ann: 00:31:56

when you are leading an organization and actually to, to not create an environment

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:01

and the conditions for people to tell you when something isn't going right just

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:05

feels like an absolute failing to me.

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:07

And that makes, that does make me feel really sad.

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:10

I know that doesn't just happen in healthcare, but I know

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:12

healthcare's where we've got a lot of our background and that.

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:15

Is always a very emotive place to be in because it is

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:18

genuinely about people's lives.

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:20

And I just think that's very narrow minded of organizations to be so

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:25

dismissive of people's experiences and it, it is just sad that there will

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:31

be individuals who don't have family members like you Lee, who feel that they

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:35

can keep pushing through to be heard.

Carrie-Ann: 00:32:38

That would just accept that first even when it's not right.

Lee: 00:32:42

Yeah.

Lee: 00:32:42

That's what drove me because I just knew I just wasn't going to accept it.

Lee: 00:32:47

And it, and it upset me to think that other people would be

Lee: 00:32:52

experiencing what we experienced.

Lee: 00:32:54

It upset me to think that, um, people who don't have the contacts or the

Lee: 00:33:02

knowledge of the system and the ways of working aren't helped to understand

Lee: 00:33:06

or feel that they can actually, but it goes back to the organization saysall

Lee: 00:33:11

this stuff that, they're open, they want to learn, blah, blah, blah, but

Lee: 00:33:15

their behaviors and actions don't match up with the, the things that,

Lee: 00:33:19

that perhaps the top team are saying.

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:21

Yeah.

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:21

And the experience therefore of their customers, clients, patients, whichever

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:26

scenario you want to put that in.

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:28

I think that just from, from my point of view, I feel like You showed

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:31

a level of bravery and a level of courage there because you continued

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:35

to speak out and you continued to push even though the conditions were not

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:40

psychologically safe or safe in any way.

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:42

From, From,

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:43

know what I know of your experience, but.

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:46

But that took a level of bravery and that took a level of courage and it,

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:50

it probably took a lot of energy at a point in time and in your circumstance

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:55

where actually your energy would've been better spent somewhere else.

Carrie-Ann: 00:33:57

And, and for me, that makes me cross because I feel like that's very unfair.

Carrie-Ann: 00:34:02

Fairness is something that's really important to me.

Carrie-Ann: 00:34:05

And I'm like if I was a leader in that organization, I would really struggle.

Carrie-Ann: 00:34:10

With how well I slept at night, because sadly, I imagine your experience

Carrie-Ann: 00:34:14

won't be one of an exception, but the organization won't know that because

Carrie-Ann: 00:34:18

it's been made too difficult for other feel like it's safe to speak out.

Lee: 00:34:22

It does have that knock on effect, which, you know, as we've already spoken

Lee: 00:34:26

about, that sense of someone can move or you have one experience somewhere,

Lee: 00:34:32

and then it can have a ripple effect in how safe you feel in other environments.

Lee: 00:34:36

When you're trying to build trust, you don't know that starting point when

Lee: 00:34:40

you're trying to build safety you don't know that starting point that someone's

Lee: 00:34:43

coming at and what they've experienced and, and where they might need to be met.

Lee: 00:34:47

It will be different for every person.

Lee: 00:34:49

Yeah, people's

Carrie-Ann: 00:34:50

backstory is always gonna be there, isn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:34:52

And unless you take the time to be curious about that and, and understand

Carrie-Ann: 00:34:56

that you could be acting with all good intent and still have a negative impact

Carrie-Ann: 00:35:00

you don't know that person's story.

Carrie-Ann: 00:35:02

So I think that is a really important point.

Lee: 00:35:04

So moving this on.

Lee: 00:35:06

One of the other responsibilities that that leaders have is this notion of

Lee: 00:35:12

they need to protect the reputation of the organization that they serve.

Lee: 00:35:16

And sometimes in the need to preserve the reputation, it

Lee: 00:35:23

ends up directly or indirectly silencing other people's voices.

Lee: 00:35:29

And I suppose again, this is another question of can the two exist?

Lee: 00:35:33

You know, can you create or protect the reputation whilst ensuring safety that

Lee: 00:35:41

means people are speaking out and stuff.

Lee: 00:35:43

Well, I

Carrie-Ann: 00:35:43

think the example that you've just gave, which was a very personal

Carrie-Ann: 00:35:46

one, Lee demonstrates that perfectly, that actually if the organization had

Carrie-Ann: 00:35:52

reacted differently and started to demonstrate and create conditions of

Carrie-Ann: 00:35:56

safety and people being able to speak up.

Carrie-Ann: 00:35:59

It might have had a more positive impact on their reputation because

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:03

actually what you've just demonstrated is that organization now has a

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:07

really negative reputation with you.

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:09

It's not a

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:09

reputation that stands well, but then with your family, your family members,

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:13

the people that are close to them, like you said, that's not an isolated incident.

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:17

So that will continue to have that ripple effect that you talked.

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:22

In relation to reputation.

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:24

So for me it feels like that, there is obviously a tension there, I think,

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:28

because it, it can feel like quite an uncomfortable space to operate in.

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:32

But for me, leaders who are genuinely open, genuinely transparent, genuinely

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:38

compassionate, will not be looking to silence people and they will actually

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:42

see the act of somebody speaking up, sharing feedback, giving a good

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:47

idea, talking about a mistake that's happened as an opportunity to learn

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:53

as an organization, to grow as an organization, and therefore to have a

Carrie-Ann: 00:36:57

positive impact on that reputation.

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:00

And I think you can see examples of leaders where, quite frankly,

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:04

the crap has really hit the fan.

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:06

And something terrible has happened actually, the way that

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:09

person chooses to handle that and represent their organization.

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:15

Can mean that that reputation is there as, as an organization that learns, that

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:20

is compassionate, that holds its hands up to the mistakes that's made and, and

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:24

makes every effort not to make them again.

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:27

for me, I want them to be able to coexist so passionately because I

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:31

think it's so important and, and where there is something negative

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:35

that needs addressing then you are more likely to find the solution if

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:39

you are working in a psychologically safe environment, rather than shutting

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:43

people down and silencing them.

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:45

So I guess for me, there's something about organizations needing to create

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:51

mechanisms for people to share their voice rather than silence in it.

Carrie-Ann: 00:37:55

Because I think that silencing whether it is intentional or not, it does

Carrie-Ann: 00:38:00

actually quite a lot more damage to an organization's reputation than it

Carrie-Ann: 00:38:04

mm mm

Lee: 00:38:05

And I think that's because often, and I'm not saying this, across the

Lee: 00:38:10

board happens, but often leaders who perhaps aren't open to listening and

Lee: 00:38:16

all of that kind of stuff, they think or behave as if managing their reputation

Lee: 00:38:22

means they've got to keep the bad news out, they can't be criticized,

Lee: 00:38:26

and all of that kind of stuff.

Lee: 00:38:28

Whereas for me, I always think of, it's more about making sure you're not

Lee: 00:38:32

bringing your organization into disrepute.

Lee: 00:38:35

And that is absolutely linked to people's trust and respect,

Lee: 00:38:39

and that's completely different.

Carrie-Ann: 00:38:41

Yeah.

Carrie-Ann: 00:38:42

Yeah, I agree with you.

Carrie-Ann: 00:38:43

And I think that view of like we can't ever have any bad news is very

Carrie-Ann: 00:38:46

naive view of have and I have worked with the leader like that who pretty

Carrie-Ann: 00:38:51

much was asking me to spin what they perceived to be some bad news.

Carrie-Ann: 00:38:54

And it was like, absolutely no, that's not, that's not what's gonna happen here.

Carrie-Ann: 00:38:58

And I think that also comes back a bit down to personal integrity, doesn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:02

And if

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:02

you, Mm.

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:03

if you have strong moral compass, then you will always be striving to do the

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:07

right thing and if that means that you have to be open about a mistake

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:13

or something that's gone wrong, that is the right thing to do to be able

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:16

to fix that and resolve that for other people and people you are right, will

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:19

respect you more, and therefore your reputation, you know, stays intact, or

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:24

it does have a positive impact on your reputation by actually openly addressing

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:28

an issue rather than trying to cover.

Carrie-Ann: 00:39:30

Yeah, it all, it

Lee: 00:39:31

all goes back to what are the boundaries that you are setting as

Lee: 00:39:35

a leader, as an organization, and how clear are you in the process?

Lee: 00:39:41

So if someone does something to breach that, Boundary or that

Lee: 00:39:47

policy or whatever it might be.

Lee: 00:39:48

Then obviously you need to act, as we've already talked about.

Lee: 00:39:51

If you've got something that's really woolly and unclear, then that's

Lee: 00:39:55

when you get the noise and the mess and the confusion and you're gonna

Lee: 00:39:58

have to take a different approach.

Lee: 00:40:00

I kind of want anyone listening to this not to think that managing

Lee: 00:40:05

their reputation means they've got close down and hunker down.

Lee: 00:40:09

What's the, what's the phrase?

Lee: 00:40:10

Close?

Lee: 00:40:10

All the hatchets?

Lee: 00:40:11

No, I, I dunno what the phrase is.

Lee: 00:40:14

Er hatchets.

Lee: 00:40:15

No, what's, what's the

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:17

Well, you've confused me now cuz there's so many in there.

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:19

I'm like, I dunno which saying she wants.

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:21

Hun hun.

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:22

I dunno.

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:23

And we hun her in down.

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:24

Are we closing that?

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:25

I dunno what we're doing, but I get, I know what you

Lee: 00:40:28

You know what I mean?

Lee: 00:40:30

Some kind of Doro Wizard of Oz in the storm kind of

Lee: 00:40:34

situation I've got in my mind.

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:38

Down the hatches.

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:39

Are we down the hatches?

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:42

I was like, goodness, if one of us can't think of the saying, then I've

Carrie-Ann: 00:40:46

definitely caught your Leeism affliction

Lee: 00:40:49

To move us to a conclusion, I suppose, of our conversation

Lee: 00:40:52

cuz it's been a meaty one.

Lee: 00:40:54

But if you want to build a more psychologically safe

Lee: 00:40:58

organization, where do you start?

Lee: 00:41:01

I say that as if that's like a really simple one

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:03

Yes.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:03

Hang on, let me just get out my, uh, action plan with my 10

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:07

points of what you need to do.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:08

We've, I think.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:09

Agreed.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:10

It's very nuanced and it's very complex, isn't it?

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:13

And it's all about people's own personal experiences.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:15

But for me, I think it's about starting to have conversations

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:20

in your organization about this.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:22

Listen to what your organization is really telling you.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:25

If you want some tips on that, listen to episode six of this podcast

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:29

where we talked about listening, and then try to think about working

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:32

out what's needed to enable others to feel more psychologically safe.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:36

It is about listening.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:37

It is about trying to build that trust, and again, we've talked

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:40

about that in another episode.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:42

I think it's as a leader about being compassionate, but all of that

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:46

needs to come from a genuine place.

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:48

For me, I think you have to be a leader who wants to create and

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:52

enable that environment for people to be able to feel empowered and to

Carrie-Ann: 00:41:58

raise concerns and to challenge the status quo if that's what's needed.

Carrie-Ann: 00:42:02

But you know, you have to be on board with that because if you're

Carrie-Ann: 00:42:06

not, it, it won't come across as genuine and it won't therefore

Carrie-Ann: 00:42:09

start to create that psychologically safe culture in your organization.

Lee: 00:42:14

I think those are all really important points.

Lee: 00:42:16

And, for me, it can be as simple as what are the questions that you need

Lee: 00:42:21

to ask to, to try and be more open in the way that you inquire of people.

Lee: 00:42:27

It could be how you choose to respond.

Lee: 00:42:31

When people are taking risks, so, you know, appreciate the fact, even if you

Lee: 00:42:37

don't like what you're hearing, appreciate the fact that they've taken the time that

Lee: 00:42:40

they've risked it to raise it with you.

Lee: 00:42:44

How are you praising people for the efforts they make

Lee: 00:42:47

regardless of the outcome?

Lee: 00:42:49

Again, links to that sense of, if failure doesn't need to be a bad

Lee: 00:42:53

word, if you've learnt from it.

Lee: 00:42:55

. And a lot of that comes to how, how you frame stuff as leaders.

Lee: 00:42:58

So what's the language you are using, what's that culture

Lee: 00:43:03

you're trying to create?

Lee: 00:43:05

And there is something that I read in the book that there were the four phrases and

Lee: 00:43:12

I suppose I would want to leave people with, with a question to themselves.

Lee: 00:43:15

When was the last time that you said one of these phrases?

Lee: 00:43:20

I don't know.

Lee: 00:43:22

I need help.

Lee: 00:43:24

I made a mistake.

Lee: 00:43:26

I'm sorry.

Lee: 00:43:27

Because if you're not using words like that, you're not role modeling