The term psychological safety is used a lot today, and it’s important. But I think many people mischaracterize what it means. Promoting psychological safety doesn’t mean to make people feel comfortable. It means helping them trust your intent—and having good intent—as you engage in a Crucial Conversation.
Hearing someone’s honest perspective isn’t always comfortable, but it shouldn’t be demoralizing. There is a difference between feeling comfortable and feeling safe. If a person can’t handle feeling uncomfortable in conversations, they will be limited in life. We all face uncomfortable conversations where safety remains intact. Psychological safety is threatened when people or their viewpoints are disrespected or disregarded.
The way we learn to have crucial conversations with people who have beliefs or behavior we don’t respect is by doing the opposite—look for commonality.
But if your goal is dialogue and meaningful influence, you’ll only achieve those when the relationship and the conversation is built on commonality.
Being honest has nothing to do with being angry, hurtful, mean, or “letting off steam.” Showing those emotions has nothing to do with honesty, but for some reason, we equate them with each other. Being more honest is about being more clear, more specific, more sincere, and more authentic.
I have yet to see someone in a fiery discussion suddenly change his perspective because of how disrespectful and clever the other party was; not only do people not change, they stop listening.
I find that people accept “no” much better when you respond to their request with respect for them and their needs. Ask them questions to clarify what they need. Let them know you understand why their request is important and that you want to be helpful. Then, take five minutes to help them brainstorm alternative solutions (that don’t involve you) that could yield similar or better results.
There are four primary reasons to hold a meeting: to influence others, to make decisions, to solve problems, or to strengthen relationships. Since all of these are active processes, passive passengers in a meeting rarely do quality work.
Never engage a group in solving a problem until they have felt the problem.
If everyone is responsible, then no one feels responsible.
When leaders share their opinions before hearing others’, they inadvertently “anchor” the discussion, causing others to sway to the opinion of the boss. So, if you’re the boss seeking input, hold your tongue until after your team members have spoken.
As you try to understand what might be contributing to your peer’s bad behavior, consider these possible factors: Are they motivated to change? Do they have the skills and knowledge to change? Are others modeling the bad behavior or suggesting it’s “normal” or “ok?” Are there incentives to the bad behavior? Do they have the tools to adopt the desired behavior? Are policies and processes making it difficult to change? Asking these questions is not about looking for excuses. Like a doctor, you’re trying to diagnose by identifying personal, social, and environmental factors that may be contributing.
Stories are the conclusions, assumptions, and judgments that follow our observations. We often hold to them as though they are facts, but they aren’t.
Due to the sheer number of tasks that are likely on your list, there are some items I’m going to encourage you to procrastinate. Yes, that’s right. But I won’t call it procrastination—I’ll call it incubating. Procrastination is not doing something and then feeling bad about it. Incubation, on the other hand, is not doing something and feeling good about it. There are a lot of items on your list you may want to accomplish at some point but you aren’t committed to any immediate actions or timelines. You should put these items on a separate list.
Spend the last three minutes of every meeting to clarify what the next actions are, who is responsible for them, and when you’ll follow-up. The very next meeting MUST begin with a review of those actions. If you don’t do this, your meetings are activity without achievement.
If your story is wrong about a situation, you have no right to get angry. If your story is correct about a situation, you have no reason to get angry. Therefore, there’s no need to get angry or upset. Getting upset in response to someone letting you down undermines your credibility and your ability to influence them.
The term psychological safety is used a lot today, and it’s important. But I think many people mischaracterize what it means. Promoting psychological safety doesn’t mean to make people feel comfortable. It means helping them trust your intent—and having good intent—as you engage in a Crucial Conversation.