Psychological safety is a concept coined by Harvard professor Amy Edmondson. It describes a work environment where employees feel safe expressing their opinions, concerns, and even mistakes openly—without fear of negative consequences.
Edmondson illustrated this concept in her book "The Fearless Organization" through particularly severe incidents: plane crashes, medical malpractice, and the VW emissions scandal. With such a dramatic perspective, I initially found it difficult to see the relevance for a small IT consulting company like ours.
However, after delving deeper into the topic, I eventually came to understand the importance of psychological safety even in our context. And I believe my insights are valuable enough to share.
Agile methodologies like Scrum and Kanban require far more than just formal structures and processes. They rely on a fundamental mindset shaped by agile values—above all, respect, trust, and courage. Without these values, agile methods remain an empty shell: meetings like dailies or retrospectives become ineffective if participants are not open about problems and opportunities for improvement.
Psychological safety, therefore, serves as the foundation on which feedback and learning processes can thrive. It is only through this foundation that continuous improvement—the core of agility—can emerge. Without psychological safety, however, we risk merely iterating on existing problems, potentially making them worse.
An understanding of the effects of lacking or existing psychological safety can be gained through classic psychological models—such as Maslow's hierarchy of needs. This model explains that people can only strive for higher goals once their basic needs are met. These needs follow a hierarchy: as long as fundamental needs like hunger, thirst, or oxygen are unmet, the resulting deficiency drives us to act and directs our focus toward fulfilling these needs. Only when the needs of the preceding level are secured can we progress, and higher needs become relevant—for instance, we won’t consider treating ourselves to a luxury vacation while we’re struggling with hunger.
Patrick Lencioni describes a similar principle in his model of the “5 Dysfunctions of a Team”. In teamwork, psychological safety corresponds to the lowest level of Maslow’s pyramid: the foundation for collaboration—trust. Only when trust exists within a team are we willing to address and resolve conflicts openly. And only by working through conflicts can we truly commit to decisions and ideas. Commitment then leads to taking responsibility, and only with responsibility can we align our efforts toward shared goals.
Lencioni’s model also follows the principle that each level builds upon the previous one. Everything begins with trust—or, in our context, with psychological safety. In fact, we can view “trust” in Lencioni’s model as a synonym for psychological safety. This makes one thing clear: everything starts with psychological safety.
Characteristics and Processes of Psychologically Safe Environments
Psychological safety is not a state that can be achieved once and then taken for granted. Rather, it is a process that must be continuously nurtured and protected—like a plant that requires regular water and light to thrive. Just as plants can flourish, so can people when they feel psychologically safe in their environment.
Amy Edmondson describes it like this: In an environment that provides psychological safety, people are willing and able to take interpersonal risks. They openly share their ideas, opinions, and concerns, admit mistakes, and do not fear shame or sanctions. They feel safe to be authentic and engage in dialogue, even in conflict situations.
Psychological safety exists on an interpersonal level—in teams, committees, or meetings. A whole company cannot be "psychologically safe," but all the institutions and relationships within it can be.
This kind of safety is not an end in itself, aimed at making the world a bit better. As the saying goes, "Life is not a wish concert." From an economic perspective, psychological safety is highly beneficial: it reduces friction, such as that caused by hidden conflicts. Psychological safety removes the "sand from the gears" and ensures smooth operations. It allows learning from mistakes and, over time, leads to fewer—or at least different, new—mistakes.
Moreover, it protects the well-being of employees and acts preventively against burnout. It reduces the emotional pressure we all face. Health-related absences and high turnover are also costly.
What Destroys Psychological Safety?
There are numerous behaviors that can undermine psychological safety, such as:
- Degrading Nonverbal Communication: Eye rolling, heavy sighing, angry looks, crossed arms, reclining in a chair—without saying anything.
- Criticism Only in Groups or Behind Someone’s Back: Never addressing issues in a one-on-one conversation.
- Degrading Remarks: "You probably didn’t think of that?", "Isn’t that actually your responsibility?", "This is obvious—can’t you see that?", or "Couldn’t you have figured that out?"
- Sarcasm or Irony: Remarks like "Oh, and now everyone just does what they want?" or "So, we’re going to document everything from now on until we can’t find anything anymore."
- Blame Shifting: Blaming others or actively seeking someone to blame.
- Dominating Discussions: Insisting on "winning" discussions or trying to convince others of your opinion at any cost.
- Personal Sensitivity: Interpreting factual statements from others as personal attacks.
This list could be extended indefinitely, and probably, everyone can recognize themselves in at least one of these behavior patterns. Often, these things happen unintentionally—we're all not angels or saints.
Anyone who has read "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Noah Harari may be familiar with the thesis that gossip and chatter played a crucial role in human evolution: they enabled us to form more complex forms of collaboration.
However, the point here is not for someone to feel ashamed or self-deprecating for having behaved in one of the ways listed above. Rather, it's about raising awareness of these behaviors for those who recognize them in themselves and giving them the opportunity to consciously choose how to handle them moving forward.
These behaviors are deeply human, but over time, they leave marks on team dynamics—marks that we should either avoid or at least reflect on.
Why?
"Without psychological safety, everything sucks."
Imagine you're sitting in a meeting and ask, "Does anyone have an idea?" and no one answers. Psychologically unsafe environments foster exactly these kinds of behaviors: silence in meetings, lack of honest feedback, and absence of openness. A work culture emerges where conflicts remain the "elephant in the room," stifling innovation and slowly but surely poisoning team dynamics.
In such teams, members feel uncomfortable expressing their opinions openly. Even when there is uncertainty, they often hesitate to ask questions. Honest conversations about the challenges they face are rare, and mistakes are more likely to be covered up than openly addressed. Responsibility is increasingly avoided, and no one feels truly understood. A vague mistrust spreads, both toward others and—subjectively—toward oneself. This environment often leads to covert forms of resistance.
Passive-aggressiveness is one such subtle form of resistance and a strategy to express frustration without open confrontation. It manifests in many ways: sarcasm, ambiguous statements, withdrawal, excuses, lies, gossip, and passive refusal through delays, blocking, inefficient work, "forgetting" tasks, or resisting change.
The fact is: avoiding conflict inevitably leads to deeper conflicts, further weakening trust and openness within the team. It becomes a downward spiral: violations of psychological safety lead to mechanisms that intensify these violations.
Often, this behavior is not intentionally passive-aggressive, but rather a learned psychological survival strategy. We adopted these strategies early in life—at the same time, we learned to fear interpersonal conflicts and realized we couldn’t avoid certain demands. Therefore, a consciously cultivated, psychologically safe culture benefits from a deeper understanding of individual conditioning and societal influences.
The Role of Shame
When we perceive external signals suggesting that we have violated social or moral norms, that our integrity is being questioned, that we appear incompetent or “not good enough”—whether due to mistakes or weaknesses—we often respond with shame. Shame is one of the deepest and most powerful human emotions.
While guilt relates to a specific action (“I did something wrong”), shame attacks our sense of self-worth and affects us as a whole person (“I am wrong”). It touches our deepest vulnerability and can leave us profoundly unsettled. Because shame is such a painful emotion that we strive to avoid at all costs, institutions and societies have historically used it as a tool for control and behavior regulation. Black pedagogy and Christian teachings, for example, turned shame into a means of "discipline" to suppress individuality and promote conformity. This conditioning left deep psychological scars and continues to influence our culture to this day.
Naturally, we tend to hide our weaknesses and mistakes. We don’t want to reveal them to our colleagues, friends, or partners—some we even hide from ourselves. Speaking up is also difficult for many people, which can largely be attributed to the powerful influence of shame. Expressing something in a group means drawing everyone’s attention. It’s a personal risk that increases when it comes to criticism or controversial opinions. This risk is perceived differently by each individual—some simply cannot bring themselves to trust.
Our ability to trust others and feel safe in groups is deeply shaped by our personal experiences. These experiences act like filters through which we perceive the world around us. They influence us in fundamental ways:
- Do I see the world as inherently friendly or dangerous?
- Am I constantly worried about what others think of me?
- Do I believe that others see me as incompetent, too loud, or boring?
- Do I approach interpersonal interactions with a generally positive outlook?
Those who have had negative experiences with conflict conversations or criticism in the past will often struggle to build trust within a team, even when the environment is objectively safe.
It’s not just about the external world being safe enough—it’s also about realistically assessing our own ability to trust.
Each of us has two levers to pull:
We can actively contribute to creating a psychologically safe external environment while also working to loosen the chains of past experiences within our internal world.
What exactly can we do?
Psychological safety cannot be created or mandated by a single person. It is a shared responsibility carried by every team member.
+ Feedback Culture: The Foundation of Respectful Candor
A key element of psychological safety is the ability to give and receive constructive feedback—both positive and negative. Constructive feedback is open and direct but also respectful, aiming to help everyone involved move forward. Kim Scott refers to this as “Radical Candor”: honest feedback that remains compassionate and empathetic.
A healthy feedback culture requires the ability to request and accept criticism without taking it personally. It demands openness to recognizing one’s own mistakes and a willingness to learn from them.
+ Error Culture: Realistic Approach and Self-Compassion
Another crucial aspect of psychological safety is the constructive handling of mistakes, especially our own. Mistakes are often tied to feelings of shame and self-criticism, but fostering a healthy error culture requires us to understand these emotions and transform them into self-compassion. This helps us normalize our own fallibility—especially when we’re willing to share it openly with one another.
If we only judge ourselves harshly for our mistakes, it becomes difficult to credibly convey to others that their mistakes are forgivable.
A good error culture also includes apologizing for mistakes. For example, if we’ve been impatient with someone during a meeting, and in doing so, have damaged their trust, a constructive error culture requires us to take responsibility, acknowledge the mistake, and offer a sincere apology. A simple, honest statement like "What I said was hurtful. I’m sorry" can be the first step toward healing. However, trust is often fragile, and things don’t always return to normal immediately. Sometimes, it takes patience and a genuine understanding of the other person’s feelings, especially when the hurt runs deeper.
But what if the trust has been broken towards us? In this case, too, a healthy error culture is essential: it means recognizing the pain, allowing it to be felt, and processing it—not pushing it aside or dismissing it. From there, the willingness and genuine desire to rebuild the relationship and trust can emerge. This also includes the ability to accept an apology without holding a grudge—after all, things must eventually be allowed to heal.
However, it is not only about making the external circumstances safer. It is just as important for us to question our own distrust and vulnerability:
- Can I see others clearly and realistically?
- Am I perhaps too suspicious or, conversely, too naive?
- Can I realistically assess my own trust and openness?
- Am I willing to accept criticism without immediately feeling attacked?
- Do I dare to express my opinion, even if it might face resistance?
- Do I feel like an equal and valuable member of the team?
Ultimately, psychological safety is a shared responsibility, requiring the courage to approach both ourselves and others with trust.
One exercise I recommend whenever you feel uncertain about what others think of you is a so-called "reality check."
If you feel unsure or experience shame in a situation, you might ask:
"As I said XYZ the other day, I felt that you reacted negatively. Do you perhaps find me unsympathetic?"
Often, the surprising answer will be "no," revealing that you've taken something personally that wasn’t directed at you. Our perception can sometimes be misleading.
We have discussed the importance of a constructive culture of mistakes, but a culture of success is equally essential.
This should not only value the final result but also appreciate the efforts and the entire process.
Another "evergreen" we should continually remind ourselves of is Nonviolent Communication.
Although it’s not always directly applicable in everyday life, it provides a valuable tool for self-reflection.
For conscious interactions to occur, we need to actively create spaces where we can pause and reflect.
Slowing down in our daily routines allows us to regularly ask: What is happening here right now? How am I interacting with others? How are others interacting with me? And how am I interacting with myself?
Most importantly: Practice, practice, practice.
A healthy culture of psychological safety does not emerge overnight.
At the organizational level, we can also take actions to foster psychological safety.
These include clear roles and expectations, appropriate facilitation in meetings, targeted development opportunities, and individual coaching. These frameworks help create a psychologically safe environment in which everyone can thrive.
The Role of Leaders
Leaders play a central role in promoting or undermining psychological safety. While we often think of people in hierarchical positions, power can also emerge from other roles or systemic contexts—such as meeting moderators, long-term employees, or those with specialized expertise.
Whether we want it or not, power often attaches itself to us. Acting responsibly means being aware of this role. In any position of power, we are role models and shape the culture of the group with our behavior. We set the standard: Our actions can create a healthy or a toxic environment.
Leaders are not automatically better at interpersonal relationships and can feel psychologically insecure as well. However, through courage and attentiveness—such as acknowledging their own mistakes, requesting and accepting feedback, or actively addressing conflicts—they can model a culture of respect and trust.
A single thoughtless action by a leader in a meeting, such as embarrassing an employee, can undo many positive interactions that team members had previously shared with one another.
Psychologically unsafe environments are the norm
Building psychological safety means developing comprehensive, complex interpersonal skills that are often neglected in our society. In a world where psychological insecurity is typically seen as the norm, creating safety requires conscious action – often going against the societal grain. The deep-rooted fear of shame and punishment is rooted in societal and psychological conditioning, which can only be overcome with time, effort, and continuous practice.
I hope I’ve been able to convey that it’s crucial that we not only look outside for causes and solutions but also question and understand our own insecurity.
And I’d like to point out, as a final thought, that this topic is equally important outside the workplace. Our engagement with our own insecurity and behavior benefits everyone close to us, especially our partners and children.
Therefore, I believe it’s worth making this effort for ourselves – one way or another.
