Psychological Safety

Rocking Psychological Safety 7
– Preface by Jitske Kramer
Introduction 11
Safe Zone 15
The Journey Takes Off 16
To the Point and Practical 17

1 The Secret of Successful Teams 21
Help, Emotions! 22
Fear as an Incentive 22
Anything New is Met with Resistance 23
Why one Team Outperforms the Other 25
The Secret of Successful Teams Unraveled 26
You’ll Only See it When You Get it 27
The Hidden Life of Psychological Safety 30
Big Five: Dimensions and Proven Effects of
Psychological Safety 32

2 Psychological Safety: Ins and Outs 37
War Rooms without Safe Zones 38
The Abilene Paradox 39
The Fear of Loss and Change 40
Just do it 42
The Benefit of the Doubt 43
Why Strong Teams Make More Mistakes 44
‘My Bad’ 45
Three Golden Ingredients of Psychological Safety 46
Look the Captor Straight in the Eye 47
Even in Teams, People are Taken Hostage 49
Care & Dare 49
A Delicate Balance 53

3 The Everyday Reality of Psychological Safety 57
Create Positive Impact 58
Energy at Critical Moments 60
Psychological Safety in Figures 61
Psychological Safety in the Four Energy Zones 63
One Team is Not the Other 65
Chill Team 67
Fear Team 69
Race Team 70
Safe Team 71

4 Safety Leaks and the Logic of Fear 75
The Inventor of Safety Leaks 76
Terror Regime on the Factory Floor 77
Psychological Unsafety on the Dutch Work Floor 77
The Rise of the Scaredy-lion 80
Viral Fear: Imaginary Threats 82
The Logic of Psychological (Un)safety 84
From Big Five to Small Five 86
The Use of Safety Leaks 87
Fear as a Weapon 89

5 The Warm Way to Psychological Safety 93
Psychological Safety Can be Radical 94
Actions Speak Louder than Words 96
A Question of Authentic Leadership 98
Cold and Warm Ways to Psychological Safety 101
Change Formula for Psychological Safety 103

6 How to Spark Safety 111
A Grip on Trust 113
A Grip on Candor 117
A Grip on Making a Difference 121
Three Flight Routes to Create Safe Zones 125
The Procedural Route 126
The Cultural Route 128
The Interplay Route 130

The Story of Joriene and Hans 133
Joriene’s Story 133
Hans’ Story 136

Frequently Asked Questions 139
Content-Related Questions 140
Process-Related Questions 142
References 147
Literature 153