Latest / The Growth Project / Episode 339: Misconceptions About Psychological Safety (Part 2)

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Episode 339: Misconceptions About Psychological Safety (Part 2) · The Growth Project

• 0:00
  You.
• 0:03
  Welcome to the Growth Project, a podcast brought to you by amylose. Doctor Drew Brannon joined today by doctor Corey Schaffer.
• 0:12
  Doctor Schaffer, it's great to be back.
• 0:14
  Doing episode two, of the series. Yeah, I enjoyed the first one. I thought, some good content in there for our listeners. So we're going to, you know, pick it up where we left off and shift the focus a little bit today, but, it's probably good if we start with a little recap, don't you think?
• 0:33
  Yeah. And if you were not able to get in to episode one on this construct of psychological safety, no problem. It's, you know, certainly available, you can click back and check that one out. And if you're if you're tuning in on this one and didn't know there was an episode one, our suggestion would be to hit pause and go fetch.
• 0:51
  The first episode, which will help this one be even better for you. But yeah, let's let's get into it. And maybe just a quick reframing of of why did we feel like it was so important, Corey, to, to dig into and dive on, psychological safety? Yeah. I mean, there's been, some pretty compelling research in recent years.
• 1:12
  First and foremost, just talking about how important psychological safety is in creating a thriving high performing team. So just starting there.
• 1:21
  You know, if research says it's important, we should probably be paying attention, however, because it's starting to gain so much attention. People are talking about it, writing about it more. It's amazing how quickly sometimes stuff like that can just sort of become, I don't know, almost like a fad in the corporate world.
• 1:40
  A buzzword, so to speak. But maybe not fully understood. And so that was really the point of the the first part of the conversation here was to, I was almost play MythBusters, right, with this concept and, and sort of talk about some of the misconceptions related to psychological safety and hopefully set the record straight on what it is and what it is not.
• 2:06
  Yeah. What would you add? Yeah. No, I think that's great. That's spot on of it's, I almost think things can become lost in translation, and I think you can people can develop a, an advocacy mindset for a construct that they don't fully understand. And on the one hand, it's great. You're trying to be an advocate for psychological safety.
• 2:28
  However, we would prefer that you do that with a proper understanding of what it is. So yeah, we got into really these misconceptions that we're going to run through even right now and restate, which I think will be a good way of of kind of cueing them back up for everybody ahead of today's conversation. So those are the five misconceptions we got into last time.
• 2:46
  Were beginning with number one here. First of all, that psychological safety equals me being nice. Which being nice is good right.
• 2:57
  Yeah. Yeah. Well even even the article again we, we differentiate between being nice and being kind. Yeah. True a different set of. Right. Yep.
• 3:05
  But yeah in in spirit theory this is not bad. The problem is being nice means you're probably not also speaking truth or saying what needs to be said.
• 3:15
  And that's that's kind of the issue here. And that's where it misses the mark with 680. Yeah. If you're being nice, you may or may not be avoiding some things. Right. So okay, so the first one was, psych safety means being nice. What else we got? Number two, psych safety means getting your way. So, feeling empowered to, let's say, share opinions and ideas, but then almost having this expectation that because you're willing to do that, that your ideas need to be selected, as the ones that that the, the group of the team, you know, moves forward with which, which is just simply not the case.
• 3:53
  It means that, yeah, we feel safe enough that we can throw out the ideas. That has nothing to do with whether or not our ideas are selected or I get my way. Yeah. Just because you were bold enough to suggest that we paint the walls purple doesn't mean we will then paint the walls purple. I, I would push back on.
• 4:12
  Why not though a see point two? Yeah, this might. All right. The third one was psych safety means job security. Right. That if we've built this, this pro, employee culture where people's opinions are valued and we've and we have trust and we respect each other, some of the key kind of drivers of psychological safety that that as a result of that, I can work here forever.
• 4:39
  Not necessarily true.
• 4:40
  Yeah. And again we we talked through the example that this article that we've reference provides even related to Google, where a lot of this research was done, and openly talked about, and which is great.
• 4:53
  And, and sort of again, just showing how even in a moment where Google was laying people off, they were still providing the psychological safety for people to like, share their their thoughts on it and ask questions about it and get answers and so on.
• 5:09
  So yeah, it does not necessarily mean job security. The fourth one we talked about was like safety requires a trade off with performance. We spent some time here probably the most time arguably on this one and sort of just debunking it. Again, I would argue that they go hand in hand in that the best performance, so safety is sort of a, requisite for it.
• 5:32
  So we talked about that. And just balancing safety with standards and accountability in, you know, striving for excellence. And so on. Yeah, yeah. You really can't have one without the other. If you want to perform at the highest level with consistency, those teams and organizations have psych safety. So it's definitely not a trade off. It's more of a, facilitator of high performance.
• 5:51
  And then lastly, psychological safety requires a top down approach. And one of the things we mentioned related to that point was, it's great when the person or the people at the top are fully bought into psychological safety. However, that is not a requirement in terms of it can only work through this top down, approach. Right? Right.
• 6:20
  Yeah. In fact, it needs to come from every level of the organization. Everybody has responsibility in creating that environment. Yep. Absolutely. Okay. So those are our misconceptions. And really the idea behind the last episode was to to thoroughly examine and discuss those. And then that leads us into today, which is really about okay, hey, I've heard episode one.
• 6:39
  I'm clear on what psych safety is versus what it isn't. And I am ready to hit the ground running with my team, my organization, whatever it might be, and bring this to life. What do I do next? So, Corey, what do I do next? Yeah, I mean, again, the the article here, provides a couple of simple practices, that we'll talk a little bit about that people can implement within their groups, to help build and also then reinforce psychological safety.
• 7:12
  So the first one,
• 7:14
  and this is interesting, again, if you hear it on the, on the surface of it,
• 7:18
  it almost sounds counterintuitive. But I'm excited to kind of unpack it here. So first suggestion is to double down on work goals and why they matter. So I want to I just want your reaction to that.
• 7:28
  Yeah sure. It's interesting that like, hey, we're having a conversation about psychological safety. And yet the the first practice suggested is we had just double down on the work goals. Talk to me about that. I had to go back and reread that one first because, yeah, because of what you just said. I saw that as the kind of beginning point for this roadmap and like, doubled down on working goals.
• 7:50
  I thought we were talking about how do you really facilitate and grow psych safety? And I think it's easy for our initial reaction to that to be just that, right of like, hey, why are we going straight outcome orientation or outcome focus in order to build a construct of a psychological nature. But if you kind of can get past your initial reaction and begin to think about how that actually looks and what takes shape makes a lot of sense.
• 8:16
  Because if you're going to double down on work goals, whatever they might be, what is that immediately going to do? Is going to pull everybody into a very task, solution focused, aim of like, okay, hey, we're working on this. Yeah. Like we're working together. We're interacting like we've got a job to do. Yeah. They provide an example, and I think they do a really good job of sort of summarizing it.
• 8:38
  They say when there's a focus on psychological safety as sort of the byproduct of that is that everybody feels that they have to kind of be nice. Yeah, right. Like everybody's so hyper focused on, well, I've got to make sure that everybody in the room feels like there's a sense of trust and support and safety, and that's maybe why people think of like this construct as being, like, soft.
• 9:03
  Yeah. You know, and the point is, it's amazing how when I was even thinking about this in different settings that I've been in, when you just start talking about a problem, a goal, sort of a target and just sort of put it out there and you just say, hey, let let's figure this thing out. It's amazing how candid the conversation becomes almost immediately.
• 9:26
  And I think that's ultimately what they're getting at here is you get the most candid responses and conversation and so on. When you just start talking about like the work, the goal, whatever. Yeah, yeah. And versus if you start off that working session with maybe like, hey, here's our five minute primer to remind you of what psychological safety is.
• 9:48
  Then we kind of go into this working session almost with like elevated heart rates and trepidation of like not wanting to step on anyone's toes. And that's a huge problem, right? Because now I'm allocating way more energy and attention to something other than whatever the working goal needs are. So yeah, I mean, when, when versus if we get really dialed in and focused on solving a complex problem.
• 10:12
  As one example, let's say that is the working goal. We've got to solve a problem. Well, now we're kind of in the we kind of jump in the trenches together in that moment. And we're building psychological safety and building trust by us, kind of co-creating whatever the solution is.
• 10:31
  Yeah. There's a couple good lines in here. They talk about, an ambitious goal conveyed in a way that reminds people why it matters, makes it easier for team members to take interpersonal risks by reporting bad news or expressing a dissenting view.
• 10:46
  It's too hard not to write. Exactly. Yeah. They go on to say, with an explicit focus on solving problems. Team members could appreciate the need for fast, honest reporting of information from the field, sharing new ideas and seeking help from one another. In short, they felt empowered to speak up to have more honest and direct conversations.
• 11:04
  Yeah,
• 11:05
  and all that comes. It's again, it seems counterintuitive, but I feel like when I reflect on just experiences like, man, it's true. When you just get everybody sort of fully behind and pulling in the same direction, sort of pulling on the same rope, saying like, hey, let's solve this problem. You get the best ideas, you get dissenting views at times, you have conversations, you sort of talk it out, but it's all productive.
• 11:29
  Yeah, it's all in the spirit of solving the problem, making things better, whatever. This is reminding me of one of the settings in which some of this research has been done, which is hospital settings. And I know you're familiar with that data also in specifically often within operating rooms. And one of the things that they have found is that and this specific language you'll see in some of the literature is what's unique about an operating room environment, is you raise the cost of not speaking up.
• 11:58
  You know, we're talking about patients, human lives on the operating table where the cost of a mistake is death. You will get people speaking up pretty quickly and although there are unfortunately examples of hospitals that have poor psychological safety, the ones that are doing this right have extremely high success rates in their operating rooms because this is what they're doing.
• 12:25
  Yeah, they've raised the cost of not speaking up. Yeah. All right. I think we hit that one pretty good. What do you think? Should we move on. Yeah I agreed with it
• 12:35
  okay. So let's get into this next one here. So the the again step one double down on working goals. That's an important place to start and a logical place to start if you want to really begin to kind of move the needle with this on your team.
• 12:48
  Another idea, we kind of got to go to next here is focus on improving the quality of team conversations. Now that might seem like, oh, I mean we do that right? Like fun like yeah, we we we talk. We have great conversations. Do you like like I have found that many teams think that your communication and the ways of operating are, worth studying.
• 13:19
  But the research would say otherwise, like there's a lot of work to be done on. How do you train your team to create norms where there's a certain type of conversation happening?
• 13:29
  Yeah. So ultimately, what we want to get at in this, this kind of builds on, you know, that first one, like, okay, we we've shifted the focus and now we're a little more goal oriented.
• 13:39
  Everybody understands why we're doing what we're doing and so on. Now what we need to do is we need candidate information, and we need people to be processing that information thoughtfully. So that's a lot of what, you know, the sort of,
• 13:53
  suggestion is about and specifically then, well, how do we strengthen these conversations? What is a what is a really good, high quality conversation, even look like or sound like?
• 14:02
  I think high quality conversations and they mentioned this in the article, they're both an outcome and a driver of psychological safety. So they foster mutual understanding and progress, but then they also create a learning environment as a, as a byproduct. So a lot of people might think, well, it sounds like these conversations are going to take longer.
• 14:22
  Right. And often that's not the case in fact. And they mentioned this. But if you think about just low quality conversations, they're indirect. Yeah. They're repetitive. Like we're talking about the same things day after day or week after week. And they're just extremely inefficient. And so in the long run, they're again, they may seem like they're quicker, but they're just inefficient because you're not solving any problems.
• 14:49
  Right, right. So kind of the point here is like, you know, hey, a high quality conversation is one where you're making progress while also using time. Well, yeah. Yeah, a high quality conversation might be long, might be short. It's really not about the duration of it. I think it's the quality of it of what's how are you going about it in of course it's nuance based upon that whatever the case use case is.
• 15:11
  But
• 15:11
  many conversations that lack psychological safety take forever because people talk too long. They're making such a great attempt to like, kind of landed a certain way because they're apprehensive about just like saying it just, you know, labeling it for what it is. So, so I think we want to get into like building a little bit of a system here, right about how do you how do you how do you create these conversations a certain way?
• 15:39
  Yeah, they provide a good framework. I do think this is an interesting point though. This is one area. And again, we hit this in the misconceptions in the last episode. And we just we just went through that quick recap. But you know, one of the the fifth point we talked about their misconception was like safety requires a top down approach and how that's a misconception.
• 15:58
  Like everybody's, needs to kind of play their role within it. But they then do make the point here that leaders have some responsibility to be the architect of these conversations, like they need to have the pulse on it. Right? They need to, to be structuring them in a particular type of way. So I do want to throw that out there.
• 16:18
  And in some ways, that sort of counter to what's mentioned. Right. Like it's not just all on the leader and it still isn't to be clear. Yeah. But again, I think even using the phrase like they can be the architect of it does not mean that they're just dictating everything. Yeah. I mean, to me that just means the translation would be you've got a sales leader on a on a call with ten members of the team, and there's a point that's getting just belabored, belabored, belabored.
• 16:44
  It's probably only the leader who can say, okay, we're going to move on now like I, you know, could there be some one off examples that perhaps. But I think more often than not, the leaders and the person on the call who can say like, okay, switch gears. Well, yeah. And we'll talk about some of these attributes. And there are only three.
• 17:00
  And there's some questions that you can, you know, ask yourself for your team, some things to look out for. But for example, the first attribute to having a high quality conversation is that people are both contributing and listening. Okay. So some of the questions, you know, to to sort of look yourself in the mirror here are people sharing information and opinions candidly.
• 17:22
  And to what extent do people seem to be holding back and saying only safe things? Right? So tying that back to the idea of, you know, leadership is again, you you should be paying attention and have the pulse on and feel empowered, obviously, to, like, invite more people into the conversation to make sure that you're hearing from everybody in the room, you're getting the best ideas, you know, on the table and so on.
• 17:47
  you know, just go back to that first question. Are people sharing information and opinions candidly? And then just the overall objective here of, contributing and listening. And that doesn't mean listening so that you can contribute in a more savvy way. Yeah, that means listening to really hear and understand. Right. And they again, they provide some suggestions here.
• 18:06
  Here's what's the what. Here's what to watch for. So from a positive standpoint everyone appears engaged in the substance of the discussion. It's great. The negative thing you're looking for though is one person or a few people are dominating the conversation. And that's what I mean is in most settings it's most appropriate for as you mentioned in your example, like the sales leader, to sort of shift the conversation to make sure that other people are getting the opportunity to speak.
• 18:31
  Yeah. You know, just like the same person puts her hands up or whatever on the teams meeting, be like, hey, I'll hear from you in a minute. I want to hear from this person, in this person first. Yeah, right. It's most appropriate for them to be the one sort of inviting in people. And almost pressing pause on maybe voices that are getting too loud or speaking too much.
• 18:49
  Yeah. And I think that those are the if you really don't do that well, that probably means that leader needs to be having some one off conversation outside of those team meetings with the people who aren't speaking. Yeah. And the way that I'm picturing this again is everybody's responsibility. Imagine, like an orchestra, right? Everybody is their job is to sort of play their, instrument.
• 19:13
  Right? Right. But there's still a conductor who's sort of making it all sort of work together. Yeah. And sort of bringing in, you know, this set of instruments, at different points and quieting down this sort of it's like that, like you're sort of just, conducting the conversation. That's what I maybe architect in my mind, isn't the best word.
• 19:33
  It's almost like you're conducting the conversation to make sure that it just. We hit all the notes, it all kind of works together. Well. So I think orchestra orchestrator is better because it's it's like a live living and it's happy right now. Exactly. You know, architects make the plans, then they go out and build and then they react to it like this is happening.
• 19:51
  Yeah, it's it's a living thing. So that was our first attribute. What's the next one? Secondly, we have the attribute of advocacy and inquiry are both present. So there's advocacy and inquiry. And then let me touch on a couple these questions here that help you assess this, beginning with what's the balance between advocacy, which we're defining as to promote certain ideas and inquiry which means to understand them.
• 20:20
  And so, promoting ideas via support and then inquiry, which would be just asking questions like, are we, you know, a classic example. I was I heard a conversation about this last week, actually is if in a sports environment, if you have a coach who is is kind of like teaching, teaching, teaching, teaching, and then at the end says, so do you understand this?
• 20:44
  Like 99.9% of the time? What is the person going to say? Yes, yes, for so many reasons, for so many reasons. Right. Well, that's not really inquiry like you'd be much better off saying what did you just hear from me? Sure. Or there's a million other question. Yeah. I feel like, going back to where we started the conversation.
• 21:02
  Let's just say we get a team together, we throw a problem out. But me, as the leader, I started off with, just like, here's what I think we should do, but what do you guys and I. Yeah, I say, here's what I think we should do, but like, what do you guys think? Yeah. And then even I'm getting answers like people are throwing ideas out, but I'm just kind of like, yeah, okay.
• 21:23
  And what do you think? Yeah. All right. Sure. Now what do you think? Right. It almost is just painting a picture you can see right of like, I think my ideas the best. I'm not even attempting to understand your idea. Right. So I'm just taking at face value, whatever you say. And then just checking the box and moving on to the next one.
• 21:40
  So. But you can't say I didn't ask because I did exactly right. So the advocacy, the we're checking the box for advocacy. Like I'm letting you provide an idea, but the inquiry is not present. Right. Like there's no attempt to even understand more about your perspective or the idea that you're suggesting or whatever. So probably not the highest quality conversation, I doubt it.
• 22:03
  Yeah. And then here's a second question to consider. Are people asking genuine questions that prompt others to respond with their ideas and concerns? Like, do people feel the freedom to do that? Can I really ask a genuine question that prompts others to respond, or am I just asking to only feel like I can ask questions that really kind of just, you know, is it more about the logistics of the idea that you already said is the one we're going to go with?
• 22:29
  That's not really a question, right? Those aren't high, high caliber conversations. Yeah. So what to watch for here. From a positive standpoint, good questions are frequent and expand the understanding of something.
• 22:42
  The negative is that people get stuck trying to prove their original points regardless of new information. That's kind of what I was describing. Right. Like that. That's the, you know, sort of scenario that I described is not one that's really lending to a high quality conversation.
• 22:58
  Because in that case, it's like I've already got my mind made up what we're doing. This is all just a formality. Maybe this is a good time to go back to the purple wall. And I could just, like, talk a little bit about why that. Sure, sure, sure. Although that would probably be the kind of example we're talking about where I'm like, although the team around the table is a voice, their reasons why they don't think purple is the way to go.
• 23:19
  I'm just continuing to. That's right. To hammer on the purple as the non Clemson person in the room here. Okay. What's the last one here. Yeah. One more attribute that we're looking for in high quality conversation. Mutual learning and progress are happening. So again some of the questions to ask yourself. Do I feel that I'm gaining understanding of the topic as the conversation goes on?
• 23:46
  And then secondly, does the team seem closer to making a good decision? Yeah. So let me make a point on that real quick, too. And this is a good question for leaders to really think about as you're hearing this conversation, and maybe kind of running it through your filter of how you lead some of your meetings or conversations.
• 24:03
  And just a question to reflect on is when you go into a meeting or a discussion that's going to be focused on landing on a decision. Ultimately. And as you go into it, naturally, you're leaning somewhere. You have an inclination of what you think you want to do. Are you going into that truly with a mindset of your mind could be changed?
• 24:30
  I think that's an important question for leaders to really think about. Like, are you creating a universe in which the team is capable? Not that they're just not that their only goal or ambition is to like, change your mind like that. That's kind of a phrase we tend to not feel real comfortable with. But if the if the evidence presents itself and it becomes just clear that a different route is better, are you willing to do it?
• 24:58
  Yeah. And you know, if you think about I don't I can imagine scenarios in which, you know, some of the things we're talking about and you're, you're mentioning here where that happens and everybody in the room pretty quickly doesn't take too many meetings before everybody's like, well, some point we can present all the facts and figures and it doesn't matter, right.
• 25:19
  So what does that do now to the quality of the conversation? It just further like they're getting worse now because at some point people aren't even willing to, you know, share an opposing insight or ask questions for clarity and understanding because they know, like, mind's already made up, there's no changing it. Right? Yeah. Let me give you a personal example.
• 25:38
  This this was years ago. This was probably 7 or 8 years ago. I remember going into working on a project. We're going into an organization doing, what I would call like a version of kind of a 360, assessment of sorts. And it was less about an individual person and more about a department or a leadership team in this case.
• 26:01
  And I was interviewing one of the senior leaders, and we get into the probably ten or so minutes into the conversation, and he stopped me, and I had a little bit of a prior relationship with him in a professional sense, did not know him well, but he stopped me and he just said, listen, I'm going to level with you.
• 26:20
  This isn't going anywhere. Like, these are good questions and I will sit here and give you answers that are entirely safe and kind of like, you know, politically correct, because I already know no one's going to do anything with this information of, of significance. Like nothing's going to change and there isn't even going to be a true appetite to honestly assess these answers.
• 26:49
  So there is no incentive for me to do anything other than just keep the ball in the middle of the fairway with how I respond. That would be a great example of a low quality conversation. Yeah, yeah, but those things happen a bunch. Yeah. And it's easy to kind of laugh about that. But that's a very real thing, especially in some organizations where they're the going to do things year in and year out, such as like the annual pulse survey and things like that.
• 27:15
  And what you end up getting is very meaningless data and information because everyone questions the point of it. Yeah. It again, the second and I think people start to sniff like, hey, I actually did give a genuine response to this and I know some other people in my department or on my team did too. And it still didn't change anything then.
• 27:35
  Like, what's the point? Yeah. If we can't actually be honest in our responses then yeah. And within reason, right. It's not like, hey, I put 39 things down on my feedback form and we only adopted 37 of them. Right. We're not talking about that. Right. You know, we're talking about you put down 39 things and zero of them were adopted.
• 27:54
  That's when we don't blame you when you no longer want to fill out. And again, potentially stuff that is rooted in something real, you know, data driven and so on. And not just the the opinions or, subjective insights of, you know, one grumpy employee. Yes. Right. That's what we're talking about too. So so let's say it is positive and negative on this last major course.
• 28:13
  So I think on this on the mutual learning in progress, you're happening each attribute what to look for or watch for on a positive sense. The conversation is disciplined, systematic and data driven. Kind of to your point a minute ago of like, hey, we have points. We're making them, in a in a respectful, appropriate way with something behind them.
• 28:36
  Yeah, they're validated in some way. Whether it's whether it necessarily it does it always have data to back it. Maybe not, but it's valid in some way. In some way. It's not just like, well because I don't like it. Right. We're not doing that. And then the negative is the conversation goes around in circles. Yeah. Again, we should always feel like we're progressing toward something.
• 28:58
  Yeah. And not just repeating the same things and, you know, rehashing the same information. Right. Okay. All right. So, yeah, I mean, those are some really effective questions that can, you know, taken together, can create a good assessment for you. All right. So so we hit our first two practices again, double down on work goals. Why they matter then to improve the quality of team conversations.
• 29:22
  And now our third and final, sort of practice here, a suggestion to help build and reinforce, like safety institute structures for sharing reflections and tracking progress. I'll let you start off here. Yeah. I mean, I think that let's just pull this apart here for a second. Structures for sharing reflections and tracking progress. How does that build psychological safety in a team?
• 29:48
  Well, for one, it helps me see very concretely that someone is like valuing my contributions, that we're track. I'll just harp on the example of tracking the progress of like we're trying to work on something together. I'm taking some risks here or there with what I say or how I approach it. And you're listening. The team is listening, and we're getting somewhere, and there's evidence of that or keeping up with it.
• 30:19
  And I think that's really what it comes back to, is people are willing to, to push some comfort zones and some boundaries when it comes to psych safety, if they feel like there's value to it, that's really the name of the game. And so how do you create that value for people? How do you help them see the value of you?
• 30:39
  You know, you create systems and you create methods where we see what the contributions are creating. Yeah, they do a good job here. Again, they, they provide some an example. I've never heard of this phrase, but I actually really like it. And it makes a ton of sense. And they talk about the use of progress reports and again, progress report specifically here.
• 30:59
  Okay. And how what they do is they avoid the quote, big reveal trap. So where people wait until they believe their work is good enough or like perfect to be shared, only to discover that what was produced didn't fit expectations or assumptions. So imagine being assigned some piece of work and go in a month to a quarter, like working on this one particular project.
• 31:24
  But in in at no point they're sharing any feedback, getting a different set of eyes on it. You know what I mean? Like, we're we're making a lot of assumptions. They're wrong around like, we are on the same page about exactly what is expected. And then the big reveal, like, here it is, guys, you know, step in front of the room or deliver the presentation to leadership or whatever it might is, and it just falls completely flat because it's like, well, that's not what we were expecting.
• 31:51
  I thought you wanted mid-century modern. Like, who do you want me? I mean, seriously, I can't imagine how often that happens, right? When if just we were doing hey, on a weekly or biweekly basis, we're going to touch base and just give us a quick rundown and update on the progress you're making. Show us what you've added to the presentation.
• 32:09
  We get an opportunity to beat it up a little bit, and we're sort of providing feedback along the way. Now, by the time we get to whatever the the date is that we had said, I mean, we've looked at this thing maybe half a dozen times. Yeah. Think about how much better it is. And how much closer it hits the mark to where everybody wanted it, because we're on the same page, because we just took the time to sort of share along the way.
• 32:33
  Yeah. Versus I mean, you think about how costly the example would be. I was kind of joking about whether it's the architect or whatever, the kind of the design of where we've gone and we've designed the project and we've it's been eight weeks since anyone's looked at it and the the designer or the architect, they're all fired up about it.
• 32:53
  And sure enough, as you said, the great reveal doesn't exactly get rave reviews. But let's just imagine this is a low psychological safety team, or the people in the room who need to be the ones to say, oh, I don't think we've we're hitting the mark here. Don't say it right. And they know it. So yeah, it's not good.
• 33:10
  And so now, now we're going for the project that the leaders in the room already know is missing the mark, and we're going forward with it anyways because we don't want to hurt someone's feelings. Yeah. So the the line here is really powerful. It's very simple. It's just sharing incomplete and imperfect output reduces wasted effort and allows better coordination and progress.
• 33:32
  And think about again, what we're trying to develop here is this skill of psychological safety. So the the the more repetition we get at it and taking smaller bites of it. Yeah, probably the better it's going to be, right? If I have six opportunities to have my work looked at and just have a conversation about versus one big, massive one, you tell me what is a better chance of developing psych safety, right?
• 33:57
  Right. Like there's so much at stake for that one. What's at stake for these smaller ones? Like not so much if you have psych safety. Right. Because if we don't, then I don't want to go in there six times. Yeah. True. And do that. But this I mean if this is a skill that needs to be practiced, we need some repetition at if we need to get better at it, that's still the better way forward.
• 34:16
  And then beyond that, and I've talked a ton on on the podcast in the past about, you know, like after action reviews and that type of stuff. But those are just great learning moments and opportunities. Like, it just inherently requires some vulnerability to say, hey, here's some things that we think went well, but here's some things that didn't.
• 34:34
  And when everybody sitting at the table gets an opportunity to sort of share, you know, their thoughts on it, I think you can have good kind of candid conversations like that. Yep. Yeah, I totally agree. I think this is but, you know, this this kind of brings some things back to the the heart of the leader here a little bit too, is all these things we're talking about.
• 34:56
  They really require you to do your job well. Like you've got to think about how do you build the right systems, how do you uphold the systems, how do you stick to them? Like you got to do your job? Well, you can't just, like, walk into a meeting blindly where you hadn't really thought a whole lot about it, or prep very well and just expect it to go well, right?
• 35:15
  That's not going to happen now. So again, I these ideas are relatively simple. Yeah they are
• 35:21
  but I think really effective and and as we talked about a minute ago, like if you are, you know, sort of orchestrating things here, as, as a leader, not that this is solely your responsibility, but, you know, to just have your pulse on this stuff, to be mindful of it, to try to implement some of these simple practices might go a long way.
• 35:42
  Yeah. And I like what you said there because it's so true. A lot of things that are effective are simple. And it's not that we aren't missing on them because they're too complicated. We're missing on them because we're just not doing them. Or maybe we're overcome hating it, whatever it might be. Yeah, I mean, I to simplify that, this could have been about a 32nd podcast just hey to to help build and reinforce site safety, to focus on your goals, have better conversations and then reflect and share progress.
• 36:12
  Thanks for tuning. If only you would do that. All right. Well, hey again, thank you to our listeners for jumping in here. This was part two. If you if you listened to part two and didn't catch part one, please go back and catch. Part one will make this conversation make even more sense. So we'd love for you to hit those in sequence and begin to think more and more deeply about how you can really build a sustainable and and winning level of psychological safety in your team, in your organization.
• 36:42
  Trust us, it is worth the investment of your time and effort. Doctor, save for a final thought as we sign off. You know, I think you said it. Well, again, the title of the article, What People Get Wrong about Psych Safety. We try to do it justice, but go back and read it for yourself.
• 37:01
  Harvard Business Review. This is an important skill, as we mentioned from the top here, it's going to influence the effectiveness of a team. So, if you are a part of a team, especially if you're leading a team, it should be paying attention to it. Otherwise, like us, write us reviews. Apple, Apple Music, Spotify, all those places.
• 37:23
  Check us out. Tell a friend. How about that? Send to a friend. We never ask that much. Send to a friend. Get them hooked on the growth project. And, that's it. We'll see you next time. Till then, thank you.