Can You Have Too Much Psych Safety? | Curious Now 47

In the final pages of her book, The Fearless Organization, Amy Edmondson answers a number of frequently asked questions about psychological safety.

And many of them, as I scan them, boil down to, if I create too much psychological safety, won't people just talk too much? Won't meetings just become endless? You know, it sounds really nice to have psychological safety, but I actually have work to get done.

And frankly, I can relate.

At the moment, I'm working on a large project with a number of my colleagues creating a new leadership course.

And I was actually working on it over the holiday weekend because I'm pretty anxious and I want to get it done.

And thoughts like this were going through my mind.

You know, I just need to tell James, who's the producer of this show, but also one of our amazing instructional designers.

I need to just tell James that I need him to do this and this and this.

And I need to tell Grace, one of my colleagues, that she needs to do this.

And then I have to tell Chris that he has to do this.

And the irony, of course, was I'm working on a leadership course.

And one of the things we address in the course is leadership styles.

And when you do the sort of thing I was just naming of myself, that's a pace setting style or a commanding style and can be extremely useful to move things along.

But when you have amazing colleagues who have amazing input and could make what you're thinking about way, way better.

as I do, I have to figure out how can I both continue to move really quickly on this project, inspire and corral people to do the same, but also keep the situation open enough so that we don't go veering off track or I don't make a mistake or they don't collude accidentally in our producing something that none of us can be as proud of as we'd like to be.

So what I learned by reading through those questions at the end of the book, The Fearless Organization, is psychological safety isn't the opposite of discipline.

It's the partner of discipline.

So when we have to get things done, we have to get things done.

That doesn't mean you can't do them in a way that skillfully allows people to speak up, share their opinions, and drive the project forward nevertheless.

So this week's readiness goal is be ready to balance discipline and openness when the pressure is on.

I just got to say one more word about this.

You know, I've noticed about myself that the more anxious I get, the more unilateral I get.

And so being a skillful leader under time pressure or being a skillful leader, if as many of my amazing colleagues in healthcare are, as a patient is deteriorating rapidly in front of you.

while also getting necessary input, not missing things, requires a lot of self-awareness, the ability to reset, down-regulate your own emotions, et cetera.

So we've spoken primarily about the externally facing work of the leaders toolkit that Amy Edmondson introduces in the field of this organization.