I’ve had a few conversations recently with people about psychological safety within the school environment. Most places I’ve worked at have had great psychological safety and I’ve felt really supported, the first time I realized that this wasn’t the norm was a huge shock to me. I’ve written some notes…
In a nutshell, psychological safety is about staff being able to speak up about ideas, raise concerns, ask questions and admit to mistakes without fear of punishment or embarrassment in any way. It comes from a 1999 team study by Dr. Amy Edmondson. Fear is the key aspect of psychological safety.
Much of what I know is from previous employers and from listening (audible) to Amy Edmondson’s The Fearless Organization.
Timothy Clark also offers a practical guide in his book The 4 Stages of Psychological Safety. I’ve yet to read this, but he uses a Four Stage model which consists of Inclusion Safety (feeling safe to belong), Learner Safety (feeling safe to ask questions), Contributor Safety (feeling safe to contribute ideas), and Challenger Safety (feeling safe to question others or suggest significant change).
Psychological safety is a responsibility of the school leadership. It is dynamic and should be something that is constantly worked on.
Why is it important?
You spend a lot of time recruiting staff who are talented and capable. You want to be able to put that to good use and not lose it. Psychological safety is key for extracting the fantastic thinking, and for retaining the staff.
High psychological safety has many benefits. Staff will have the confidence to speak up, it supports learning from any mistakes made, it lowers the actual number of mistakes made (as people will speak about possible problems before rolling out an initiative), it increases performance, innovation, engagement and commitment, it helps with conflict so it can be used positively and reduces anxiety amongst staff.
“If there is no vulnerability, there is no creativity. No tolerance for failure, no innovation. It’s as simple as that. If you’re not willing to fail, you can’t innovate. If you’re not willing to build a vulnerable culture, you can’t create”.
Brené Brown
Low psychological safety inhibits staff from speaking up about their ideas; ideas that could allow for huge improvements. The fear associated with low psychological safety reduces creativity. It also means that people will hide their mistakes, cheat, and/or blame others. You’ll often not be aware of just how silencing your presence is as a leader but you do need to know what is going on in your school. Effective leadership is much easier when you have the whole data set.
Of course, in order for norms of collaboration to be effective, there has to be psychological safety in place.
Why don’t staff speak up?
Fear. Silence is safe. If staff don’t say anything they can’t get into trouble, be labelled or viewed as difficult or perceived negatively, they can’t damage a relationship, embarrass or offend someone or their work. They’re able to protect themselves.
What can leaders do?
Remove the fear.
Model. Humans are fallible. You need to show that you’re human. Be humble and admit when you don’t know something; ensure that your staff don’t get the impression that you think you know everything. Be open about when you fail; you should demonstrate vulnerability. Destigmatize failure and create a culture where it is safe to fail, where failing is reframed as something that is required for learning and progress. If staff can trust leadership, it will help to improve the psychological safety of the working environment.
Communicate. Be as candid, clear, honest, and transparent as possible. Are you approachable and accessible? Are you proactively looking for feedback and asking questions? Do you have an open-door policy or set times people can come to speak with you? Can teachers speak without their middle leaders being made aware?
Make it very obvious that you care about what staff have to say; put systems in place which give them voice. How have you made it clear that you value staff? Are you invested in their personal growth? Are you connecting to improve their sense of safety and relationship with you?
Take advice from classroom teachers, don’t make the assumption that you’re smarter than them. Those in the classroom on a daily basis will have a better perspective and insight on certain things. An easy example would be listening to art teachers or science teachers when redesigning classrooms and labs – if they’re the ones working in them they will know much more about what makes a good design than you do.
When conversations need to occur staff need to trust that you’ll do this with them professionally having built a relationship. Talk to staff directly and not behind their back. If staff are too scared to come to you, and you don’t go to them, you’ll allow them to suffer in silence and resolution will not occur.
“When we avoid difficult conversations, we trade short-term discomfort for long-term dysfunction”.
Peter Bromberg
As a quick aside, for leaders who want to improve or learn about how questions can help to build relationships I recommend the book Humble Inquiry: The Gentle Art of Asking Instead of Telling by Edgar Schein. You can also listen to this on Audible.
Respond. Perhaps the most important as this will determine whether staff will speak up a second time. Your initial response should always be an expression of appreciation for staff coming directly to you. It helps to shift the frame and make the assumption that any failure or mistake is the result of an accident or oversight rather than incompetence. You should be respectful of the courage that coming to you has taken and then offer a path forward.
As leaders there needs to be a communicated and clear policy (boundaries) in place for failures which are deliberate rule breaking (blameworthy acts) etc. The path forward with these clear violations will be different.
How psychologically safe is your school?
I adapted a quiz from elsewhere using the following questions:
- I am confident that if I were to make a mistake, it would not be held against me.
- I feel that my ideas are valued and I have the confidence to offer them to the team.
- I fully understand what is expected of me in my role.
- I feel confident (no repercussions) raising concerns and voicing any problems that I identify.
- No one on my team is ever rejected or left out for being different.
- I feel safe to take a risk by trying something new.
- I find it easy to ask other members of my team for help.
- No one on my team would deliberately act to undermine any of my efforts.
- My unique skills and talents are valued and utilized.
- When something goes wrong, I am confident that members of my team will help me find a solution.
The above is useful in painting a picture of how individuals, departments and the whole school feel about their own psychological safety. I’d consider looking at how different demographics within a school might be affected differently.
“Better to jump and make a mistake than to sit there too frightened to make a move”.
Richard Templar
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I really like the highlighted comment “Psychological safety is a responsibility of the school leadership. It is dynamic and should be something that is constantly worked on.”
This topic could always be talked about more as negative pockets usually exist somewhere in large organisations and supporting people to change habits or be more aware of their actions is important.