When I was in the process of re-inventing myself from CEO to coach in the mid-noughts, some of my counseling psychology instructors expressed frustration and weariness with the concept of “codependency.”
Originally coined in the 1980s as a concept to help families of alcoholics understand their potentially unhelpful behavioural patterns, the term became overused and misused to the point where it was applied to virtually anyone and any situation. And all the while the term codependency was not formally defined or recognized in the DSM, the standard diagnostic manual used by mental health practitioners. This meant the term was not subject to the same review and scrutiny as other psychological diagnoses.
It seems that psychology is particularly prone to having these pseudo-concepts infiltrate popular culture to the point where they can mean everything and nothing. I fear that the latest example is the concept of “psychological safety” in the workplace.
At its core, the idea is noble. The end state of a psychologically safe environment is a workplace where people feel free to take risks and be themselves. Such an environment helps foster innovation and enhances employee well-being. All good stuff.
The problem is that psychological safety has now become a buzzword that people throw around to sloppily diagnose anything they don’t like about their workplace. Or maybe to even make excuses about things they don’t want to address in their own behaviour. We have all seen examples in recent years where team members play the “I’m not feeling safe” card to avoid accountability and skirt responsibility.
Back in my days at General Electric, one of the traits we explicitly looked for in leaders was what we called “edge.” Having edge meant being competitive, pushing hard and not accepting “no” as an answer, even when the world thought you were crazy. Every founder I work with has edge. Some are quiet and some are loud, but they are all committed to pushing themselves and their organizations to do extraordinary things.
But in our current environment, it is far too easy for a team member to cop-out of such a team by saying that it doesn’t feel safe for them.
I encourage my clients to apply a little rigour to the concept of psychological safety. To begin with, they obviously need to ensure that their teams are not actually unsafe in the sense of not behaving in a reckless or negligent manner.
But beyond this legal and ethical threshold, I see psychological safety as a rarely achieved aspirational state of a really high performing team. If we go back to the definition of creating an environment that fosters innovation and enhances employee well-being, this outcome can only be created in a team or organization that exhibits profound trust where individuals feel comfortable being vulnerable.
When I work with a group of executives that profess to be a truly high performing team, I look for their willingness to show a high level of vulnerability with each other. The high level of trust required for people to be comfortable being vulnerable does not happen quickly. But we can sometimes accelerate the trust-building cycle if team members are acting with positive intent and some level of emotional intelligence.
The power of a team where individuals can really be vulnerable with each other is extraordinary. By removing the emotional armour that we normally don for the workplace, we are able to freely ask the stupid questions that often lead to the biggest insights. We can openly contribute ideas and critiques without concern about attribution or retribution. And we can support our peers without fear that our efforts can be misinterpreted.
I have seen a small handful of teams over the years that are legitimately operating at this level, and it is quite beautiful to behold. For most of us, we will spend our working lives on teams that span somewhere from completely dysfunctional to somewhat trusting, and we should adjust our level of vulnerability to be appropriate to the circumstance.
I encourage you — whether you lead a company or work on a team — to think about psychological safety as both a very basic legal and ethical threshold of behaviour, and also as a very aspirational, and rare, outcome of a high performing team. Try not to conflate the two, and be ready to push back on this over-used psychological concept, at least until the next one comes along.
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