Human Insight

Psychological safety at work

How to create psychological safety?

Every day at work, we are busy communicating with others, wanting to be ourselves and express ourselves in our own way. We want to be the same person at work as we are with our friends and family. It turns out that when people are able and free to be and express themselves, this has a direct impact on the performance of the team or organisation.

Do you want to improve and measure psychological safety? We have the right assessments and tools to do so.

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More about our approach
Measuring and improving safety in your organisation

Creating safety: Why are we doing it?

Increasing attention is being paid to improving safety within successful organisations.

Psychological safety means a working or living environment where people feel safe enough and are able to share ideas, ask questions and give and receive feedback without fear of being negatively addressed or reprimanded about it.

Psychological safety according to Amy Edmondson

The shift in ways of working and the stakes of creating safety in a team can be seen in Amy Edmondson’s research.

In this research, she looks at issues of diversity, inclusion and workplace safety. According to her, a safe workplace starts with:

  • Creating clear frameworks
  • Inviting participation
  • Responding productively

How to create psychological safety
by using our Qi Index

The benefits of employees that feel safe to show who they are and say what they feel are linked to overall team performance and organisational development.
 
However, for management teams or budget holders it can be difficult to quantify; what is the return on investment in absolute terms when working on a subject that is difficult to grasp? To answer this question, Human Insight developed a quantitative and practical approach to create more safety in teams.
  • Increase performance and creativity within teams
  • More effective and autonomous teams
  • Foster an inclusive workplace without a culture of fear
  • Increase performance and creativity within teams

Research on diversity and safety

Together with David Lewis from London Business School and Alison Reynolds from Ashridge Business School, Human Insight conducted research into organisational diversity and the interrelationship between psychological safety. This led to the Quality of Interaction Index, or Qi Index for short. The Qi Index is embedded in our approach to help organisations understand what is currently going on in their organisation and also to question the desired state. 

Teams Solve Problems Faster When They’re More Cognitively Diverse

If cognitive diversity is what we need to deal with new, uncertain and complex situations, we need to encourage people to reveal and deploy their different ways of thinking. This involves building psychological safety.
By David Lewis and Alison Reynolds
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Research

The Two Traits of the Best Problem-Solving Teams

How people choose to behave determines the quality of interaction and the emerging culture. To lay the foundations for successful performance, everyone must reinforce and maintain psychological safety through ongoing gestures and responses.
By David Lewis and Alison Reynolds
Download research
Research

Working with the Qi Index

By using the Qi Index for organisations and teams, we can use clear insights to improve safety at work. With the Qi Index we focus on:

Team performance

In a team where people feel safe to speak up, team members dare to express their opinions without fear of the consequences. This ensures better team performance.

Organisation development

A high level of safety is an important factor in organisational development. This ensures that people can express themselves safely within organisations.

Measurable diversity

Our tools and insights make strategic diversity measurable. On the basis of this, teams and organisations can be better classified.

Do you want to measure and improve psychological safety?

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Many organisations are struggling with measuring psychological safety and improving it. A high degree of safety is important within teams and organisatinos in order to work as efficiently as possible.

Addressing the subject and applying it in your organisation can be done in different ways and with different strategic results. Think of creating awareness about this topic or actively working on bringing safety practices to the workplace. But you can also think of applying development or leadership programmes within organisations.

Human Insight has various practical working methods at its disposal to get to work on this subject in the form of assessments and insights via the Qi Index. Not only we have a way to measure psychological safety, but we also offer practical tools that can be used immediately to support the people within your organisation.

 
Our approach with the Qi Index

Our approach

  • Our approach creates understanding and awareness of what psychological safety is and how it can be practically used for performance improvement;
  • The Qi Index creates a common language within the organisation on this subject. In addition, it provides insights into where things are going well, what can be improved and how this can be done;
  • The Qi Index is able to measure psychological safety and provides insight into how the people within the organisation currently view the level of safety at work. This is expressed in clear scores about how things currently stand;
  • The Qi Index provides insights that can be used on multiple levels. For example, what impact does the leadership have on safety within the organisation at the moment?
  • The results of the Qi Index are shared with the client in the form of a management report. This serves as input for workshops to get to work practically with the employees of the organisation.

Interested or a question?
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Schedule a meeting with Human Insight to discuss the challenges in your organisation and how Human Insight can help you.

Simply fill in our contact form or call us directly on +31 (0)85 8229827. 

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