Fear is a poor driver of cultural transformation. Management guru W. Edwards Deming knew it back in 1982 when he included among his 14 points for management transformation: “Drive out fear, so that everyone may work effectively for the company.”
Deming’s words remain true today, say Professor Mohamed Saleh and John Dyer, co-hosts of Behind the Curtain: Adventures in Continuous Improvement. In this podcast episode, the continuous improvement experts tackle the twin topics of psychological safety and driving out fear as necessary elements to building a culture of team-based continuous improvement. They weigh in on leadership actions that destroy trust and create fear, as well as those that grow trust and inspire problem-solving and innovation.
Among the discussion points:
What is psychological safety? Saleh defines it as:
- Feeling secure to make change (operating without fear of reprimands)
- Being capable of making change (having received appropriate training or development
Moreover, he emphasizes that psychological safety is a prerequisite for any change. Three ingredients that hamper psychological safety are lack of transparency, command and control leadership style, and create a culture of fear and blame.
Invite participation in meetings and huddles with the use of open-ended questions/guides. “Tell me more,” is a favorite of Saleh’s. “It's simple and clear, it's thought-provoking and it's centered. There's no blame in it. I'm clearly being vulnerable and saying I don't know, I need more,” he says.
Dyer adds his favorite: Please help me understand. This phrasing says, “I'm here to help, but we're a team. We're partners,” Dyer says. “I'm not no longer a boss or a leader, we're partners. How do we work together to move this ball forward?”
Take care with daily management boards. Done poorly, they can be more harmful than helpful.
One final note: Saleh cites what he describes as one of his favorite books about psychological safety. It is Amy Edmondson's The Fearless Organization.
