At the Monday meeting, everyone nods along with the boss. No one raises a question. Complete silence. 

But afterwards, by the coffee machine, the murmuring begins.

'This will never work.'

'Someone should have spoken up.'

Does this sound familiar? Then you have some work to do.

We have one of the most conformist work cultures in the world.

Bård Fyhn

Comfort trumps honesty

Psychological safety has become one of the workplace’s most popular buzzwords. But according to postdoctoral researcher and NHH scholar Bård Fyhn, many leaders misunderstand what it actually means. They believe the goal is to avoid friction, praise one another, and maintain a pleasant atmosphere.

‘It’s an unfortunate misunderstanding to think that psychological safety is about being nice and gentle. That can easily lead to what we call toxic positivity,’ Fyhn says.

What does that mean? That comfort takes precedence over honesty. People are so keen to be liked and agreeable that they avoid speaking up. According to Fyhn, this is a particularly Norwegian trait.

‘We have one of the most conformist work cultures in the world. We would rather avoid stepping on each other’s toes,’ says Fyhn, who has spent much of his academic career studying psychological safety.

‘Just spending more time together’? No!

Many people believe that psychological safety will naturally develop over time and that it emerges as long as people work together for long enough.
 According to NHH researcher Bård Fyhn, that is not the case.

‘The idea that “the more time we spend together, the happier and safer we become” sounds appealing, but it is wrong. Time in itself does not build psychological safety. What matters is how that time is used,’ Fyhn says.

In a recent study, he and his colleagues identified four practices that characterise psychologically safe teams regardless of how long team members have worked together:

• Colleagues support one another and show genuine care.
• They make an effort to get to know each other, actively include others, and prevent clique formation.
• They invite different opinions and perspectives, and help one another when someone gets stuck.
• They celebrate shared progress rather than individual performance.

The study, ‘Time Is Not Enough: Exploring the Processes That Shape Team Psychological Safety’, was recently published in the Journal of Business and Psychology*.*

‘Many leaders underestimate how deliberately this must be worked on,’ Fyhn says. Earlier this year, he published a book on the topic, which has received considerable attention.

Being born last can come at a cost

The youngest siblings tend to do worse than their older brothers and sisters. Less education and lower earnings are among the consequences of being born last.

A long history

The concept began to circulate in the 1960s. In 1990, organizational psychologist William Kahn took it a step further and defined psychological safety as the feeling of being able to be oneself without fear of negative consequences for one’s self-image, status, or career.

In a team, this means that you can say things like ‘I was wrong’, ‘I have a concern’, ‘I disagree’, ‘I don’t understand’, or ‘I have an idea’. You dare to appear incompetent, ignorant, or difficult without it being held against you.

‘This is what I call interpersonal risk-taking,’ Fyhn says.

Fyhn argues that psychological safety at work is particularly relevant right now.

‘There is a lot going on around us that makes people feel insecure. That makes it even more important to strengthen the kind of safety we can actually do something about,’ he says.

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