The Danger of Silence
Have you ever shared an important announcement with your team only to get "radio silence" on the other end? I have. And when this happens, I know that one of two possibilities exist: 1) everyone is 100% on board or 2) people are confused and have questions and concerns. The first rule of leadership: it's almost never option one!
Over the last 20 years, a critical concept has gained attention, called psychological safety. When teams are willing to take the interpersonal risk of speaking up about ideas, questions, and concerns, they have psychological safety. Conversely, if they fear retribution or embarrassment for speaking their minds, they will choose to stay silent.
Here's what happens when team members stay silent. Organizations can't innovate. There are more workplace injuries. Turnover is high. Morale is poor and employees are unwilling to give discretionary effort.
In my research and practical experience with change and innovation, "resistance" is a poor label for how employees respond to something new. There's no doubt that the phrase "people resist change" makes good fodder for blogs and books. But ... it's simply not true most of the time. What really happens is that people are apathetic when they are confused or disagree.
And let me be clear: leaders own whether or not the work culture is apathetic. As the subtitle of my book suggests, Change Isn't an End-User Problem. Instead, leaders need to nurture the conditions required for psychological safety. The good news: these conditions generally don't cost a lot of money to create.
For those of you closely reading my recent blogs, I've started to let the cat out of the bag on what leaders can do to nurture an environment of psychological safety. In fact, I'm putting the finishing touches on a new series of speaking abstracts, masterclasses, and tools focused on this important topic. In the next few blogs, I'll really unpack the research and offer some ideas on how you can take action as a leader.
In the meantime, I encourage you to do some self-reflection and discovery on the following questions:
Does my team experience an abundance of rework?
Does my team struggle with creating new and novel ideas to problems that can't be solved with off-the-shelf solutions?
Does my team exhibit artificial harmony and avoid conflict around key topics?
Have I recently received low employee engagement scores?
Has my team experienced high turnover lately?
If you answered yes to any of the questions above, I invite you to fully explore the concept of psychological safety with me. It doesn't make you weak to need help here. And it doesn't make you a terrible leader if you've made mistakes with your team. In fact, if you feel weak or terrible, you yourself might be experiencing a psychologically unsafe environment.
I encourage you to approach this topic with curiosity.
Chris Laping is the best-selling author of People Before Things. He is also the CEO of Change Needs Leaders, Inc. (proud makers of POPin). Kickstart honest, real-time conversations with your team by starting a 14-day trial today!
