Title: Psychological Safety: Creating the Respectful Workplace
From: Pam Jackson, PhD, Consultant
People in workplaces are high performers when they feel empowered, equipped, self-expressed, and respected. When diverse views and voices are honored and included, creativity and innovation flourish, people thrive, and profitability soars.
Psychological safety is present in the workplace when people believe that they are free to speak up and share their ideas, questions, concerns, or mistakes. When people feel unsafe or fear punishment and/or retaliation, humiliation, discrimination, or alienation in response to their self-expression, the workplace is psychologically unsafe. Productivity, performance, and profitability are all in jeopardy when team members do not feel safe to speak freely.
To ensure psychological safety is to have people feel comfortable voicing their opinions and fearless of being judged. Teams develop a safe environment when a few ground rules are created as to how they interact with one another. These could be for example:
Here are five ways of being that leaders can create and nurture in the workplace to create the safety that is desired:
From the Author,
Pam Jackson, PhD
Title: Crisis Communication: Managing During Difficult Times
From: Pam Jackson, PhD, Consultant
Crisis management and communication is the art of dealing with and communicating about sudden and unexpected events that disturb employees, the organization, and external clients. Proactive crisis management prepares individuals to face unexpected developments and adverse conditions in the organization with courage and determination. Reactive crisis management tends to waste resources, destroy morale, and risk the reputation of the enterprise.
In today’s COVID environment, the crisis, which started as sudden and unexpected, has become sustained, prolonged, and stressful. Management and communication systems break down more easily in the face of constant, sustained pressure and scarcity. When management decisions are sound and reasonable and clear communication happens, employees (and even clients) adjust well to the sudden changes. When management decisions are hasty and poorly thought out, often because of a panicked state, employees do not adjust, and clients are not well-served.
The key issue that most organizations miss is that it matters to make the investment of time—to think and plan. Rather, firms choose to “make do” or “get by” or “survive” as a matter of practice in the face of crisis. Those that took the time to stop, plan, and pivot were well-positioned to endure the most unexpected length of time that the COVID threat and related social distancing practices have existed. The time cost is much lower than most realize for the preparation or ordered response to a crisis. When prepared, employees can understand and analyze the causes of crises and cope with it in the best possible way, and managers can devise strategies to come out of uncertain conditions and also decide on the future course of action. Training and preparation in advance can assist managers in noticing the early signs of crisis, warning the employees against the aftermaths, and taking necessary precautions for the same. Training and preparation during a crisis are usually impossible because most crises are short-lived and intense. Instead, unusually so, this crisis has been sustained and devastating to families who have lost loved ones and to the economy.
Recommendations:
From the Author,
Pam Jackson, PhD
Title: Valuing Diversity: Creating the Respectful Workplace
From: Pam Jackson, PhD, Consultant
Most employers express the desire to have a diverse, inclusive workplace and often do not realize how critical it is to pay attention to communication. What holds most organizations back is a complex web of systemic, cultural, and structural issues that must be understood before they can be overcome. A carefully considered program is invaluable for a workplace to accomplish its objectives. Structurally, the company may have policies and procedures to empower diversity and inclusivity practices. What is happening to enforce those policies to create a culture of diversity and inclusion?
Best-practice diversity management involves an organizational culture that values, embraces, and celebrates individual differences. Diversity practitioners and researchers refer to this as inclusion. An inclusive workplace does not seek to assimilate its members to a dominant cultural norm. Rather, inclusion involves the preservation of individual differences. Inclusive workplaces encourage the coexistence of different cultures, values, beliefs, and styles in the workplace.
Respect and trust are key ingredients of any relationship, especially those relationships in the workplace. Without them, productivity and talent retention diminish. While we all believe we deserve to be treated with respect and dignity, it is when we are not treated well that it affects our on-the-job performance and our motivation to excel at our job. The critical, essential component to creating and retaining the respectful workplace is leadership and communication.
When everyone treats each other with respect and courtesy, the workplace is created respectfully, and staff members are excited to come to work every morning. They will want to do their best for the organization and make their managers proud.
From the author
Pam Jackson, PhD
A global transformational leader, consultant, and coach, Dr. Jackson leads diversity and inclusion training for several organizations in the UAE and Saudi Arabia. She achieves workplace performance objectives in service of creating high-performing and respectful workplaces. She holds three degrees in economics, with a focus on organizational behavior and performance, corporate and public finance, and education administration and training. She is also qualified as a Certified Healthcare Quality Professional® (CPHQ) with powerful training in quality management, performance improvement, and organizational leadership. Originally from the United States, Dr. Jackson served as a senior-level executive in the U.S. Congress for 15 years. In this time, she led consultations, trainings, and courses regarding public policy and workplace issues involving performance, diversity and inclusion, female empowerment in the workplace, and other related topics designed to address productivity and performance.
