Effective collaboration and alignment: four stages of building a psychologically safe culture

Feb 7, 20234 min read

A psychologically safe culture is one in which people feel comfortable and confident sharing ideas, opinions, and concerns. It's where they don’t have to worry about someone else using words against them in the present or later.

A psychologically safe culture is not just a concept but a powerful tool that can help teams reach their full potential. It empowers everyone to speak up, share ideas, and contribute to a project's success. But how do you create such a culture? And what can you do if your team already has toxic leaders or territorial work environments?

Explore these questions and create a more inclusive and productive work environment.

Stage 1 – Territory

In the first stage of building a psychologically safe culture, we want to establish a sense of territory. Team members need to feel like they belong. They also need to know that they’re part of the team—that their ideas will be heard and considered by others in the business, that they can rely on each other for support when needed, and so on.

Stage 2 – Us vs Them

The second stage of building a psychologically safe culture is the “Us vs Them” stage when you’ve instituted your code of conduct and are working to ensure everyone knows about it and how they can use it. You might feel good about your progress at this stage, but more work is still needed. This stage is about breaking down barriers and fostering a sense of unity and shared purpose among team members, regardless of their roles or backgrounds.

You may notice that some people haven’t changed their behaviour or attitudes. Those who have may not have changed enough for you to feel genuinely invested in creating an inclusive environment where everyone feels comfortable bringing whole selves to work daily.

The problem?

It's easy for people who aren’t part of an organisation’s majority group or don’t share its values to feel marginalised by colleagues' actions and beliefs and sometimes excluded from conversations entirely. These individuals think it unsafe to speak up without being invited into the conversation by someone else within the group.

Stage 3 – Toxic Leadership

Toxic leadership is critical to understand if you want your team and organisation to thrive. However, poisonous leaders can be very hard to spot, especially if they are good at pretending to have good intentions and care about the team. The first step in dealing with toxic leaders is to recognise them when they appear on your team or in your organisation. Some telltale signs of poisonous leadership include always believing they are correct, blaming others for mistakes, and treating people as objects rather than human beings with feelings and needs.

They’re always right – even when they aren’t!

They blame others for mistakes instead of taking responsibility (and apologise only under duress). They treat people as objects rather than human beings with feelings and needs, which includes giving negative feedback without context and micromanaging every detail of what people do without understanding why those details matter or how they relate to upstream processes and projects.

Stage 4 – creating a psychologically safe culture

Creating the right environment is the fourth and final stage of building a psychologically safe culture. It's where your organisation’s efforts come together in one place and become integrated into your operations. It takes time, but it's worth it! Here are some ways you can create this kind of environment, such as creating processes for bringing up concerns or issues, ensuring everyone knows what behaviours are expected of them, and allowing each team member to share feedback about how well expectations have been met.

Create processes for bringing up concerns or issues that help employees feel comfortable speaking up without fear of being judged negatively.

Have you considered whether everyone on your team knows what behaviours are expected of them? If not, there will be no surprises when someone does something unexpected, and, as a result, effective collaboration and alignment will be missing. For example, if someone has been working with another team member for years but suddenly starts acting differently at work (or outside work), have you considered whether both parties know who needs to be notified to figure out what happened and get things back on track quickly?

You may also want to give each team member an opportunity every year or two where they can share feedback about how well expectations have been met. Allow everyone in leadership positions not involved with creating the earlier Stage 1-3 policies/procedures to see whether any changes need to be made.