psychological safety

7 Steps To Build A Highly Effective Team
Every team is different as human beings are complex. And organizations can be even more complex. If the team members do not gel and work together effectively, problems can arise very quickly or they can slowly simmer under the surface. Talk about missed deadlines, infighting, declining productivity, poor customer service, etc. All of these have a bearing on the team’s output and the company’s bottom line.

Finding the right people is the first step in building a high-performing team. However, bringing several talented individuals together under one roof is not enough to make an effective team. So what can you do to ensure the group of people becomes an effective unit which works together? Here are 7 common attributes of highly effective teams, and how to build such a team?

1. Good Leadership

Leadership has less to do with positions and more to do with the ability to influence. Today, leadership is no longer reserved for those at the top. Everyone has within them the ability to become a leader in their own sphere.

Effective teams don’t necessarily have one great leader. Instead, they promote a culture of leadership. That doesn’t mean multiple people competing to become leaders. It is about each individual playing their part and supporting each other for the benefit of the team.

Every team needs a north star—a clear and shared vision. Each member should know the direction and purpose behind what they are doing. A team without a united vision is like a group of chickens with a lot of energy. They will continuously be busy running around but never make any progress.

Therefore, a team should first co-create the shared vision, objectives, and outcomes before undertaking a project. Moreover, the vision should be restated often. It is not enough to engrain it on the door or post it on the website.

According to research by Rungway, 52% of employees don’t know their company’s vision. The same research shows employees want to be involved more in actualizing the company’s vision and values. Even when working on different facets of a project, team members should know the end goal.

When the team is involved in setting goals and objectives, they are more willing to rally behind them. As John F. Kennedy noted, “Effort and courage are not enough without purpose and direction”.

It is hard to focus when multiple needs are competing for your attention. And when the team is overloaded with tasks, chances are that people will struggle with one thing or another. With so many buttons to push and levers to pull, the team can get easily frustrated.

Do You Know Your Own and Your Team’s True North?

Highly effective teams navigate these muddy waters by focusing and prioritizing. Establishing priorities ensures that set goals are met on time. Unfortunately, it is human nature to want to accomplish everything at the same time. However, that is a surefire way of producing shoddy work.

Instead, it is better to prioritize your tasks according to their importance and urgency. That will involve listing down all your goals, and then deciding how long you would like to spend on each goal.

However, keep in mind that goals are not the actual actions taken, but rather the metrics you intend on hitting. Those metrics are what allow you to know whether the team is moving in the right direction. As such, to get closer to achieving those metrics, you must determine what projects need to be fulfilled first to get there.

So, how do you go about prioritizing projects?

Simply choose the 3 most important priorities and start working on them. People work better with clear and attainable goals. Therefore, choose 3 projects that will allow you to make a significant advancement towards a longer-term goal, and then set deadlines for their completion.

By putting the team’s focus on a few defined priorities, you will evade the all-too-common syndrome of spreading yourself thin trying to accomplish everything at the same time.

A good leader also understands the critical role shared values, standards, and boundaries play in the development of a high-performing team. This is because it is impossible to sustain high-performance standards without shared values.

Shared values ensure that your team does not always depend on you or policies to tell them what to do. Those values guide their behavior. The former EVP at Advanced Micro Devices, Tim McCoy, put it best, “values tell you what to do when you do not know what to do.”

A good example of how shared values can have a monumental impact on a team’s success is the Mayo Clinic. During the Civil War, a group of individuals known as the “Mayo Family” formed a medical practice whose entire operation was guided by two primary values:
- The only interest to be considered is the patient’s best interests
- Nobody is big or good enough to be independent of others
Guided by those values, the Mayo Clinic has gone on to become one of the world’s most reputable nonprofit hospital systems, with a net worth of around $17 billion.

Collaborate with your team to develop a set of values and standards to uphold. Those values should act as moral and operational compasses. In other words, they should guide the behaviors of the team.

In addition to shared values and standards, it is crucial to establish boundaries within the team. Boundaries prevent conflict within the team. Conflict (not disagreement, which is natural and healthy) is one of the biggest deterrents to productivity. With boundaries, everyone knows what is considered acceptable behavior, and what is not.

One of the most critical benefits of setting boundaries is the clear expectations that come with it. When everyone knows what is considered acceptable, they are more likely to uphold those standards.

Do you know your values? Does your team know theirs?

2. Working Together and Collaborating

It might look safe to work with people who don’t ask a lot of questions. Effective teams understand that such behavior hinders collaboration. Instead, successful teams embrace challenging each other in a space of trust and psychological safety.

Good teams focus on tackling the problems together. They share knowledge across different departments, which enables the organization to adopt a unified approach in handling issues.

Collaboration brings unique skill sets and mindsets together to create a team that can overcome any obstacles together. A highly effective team understands and leverages each individual member’s strengths to create momentum.

Highly effective teams understand that friction is natural when working with others. They welcome the friction and use its energy to enhance relationships and improve productivity rather than the other way around. Strong teams work together rather than against each other.

3. Performing Team Rituals

Outside the workplace, rituals are often used to unite, motivate and rally people behind a common cause. A good example is an annual family holiday that brings everyone together. Rituals also have a place in the organization.

Apart from defining the team’s culture, they increase employee engagement and help create lasting bonds between individual members.

Employees in an organization work together for more than eight hours a day. That means they see and spend more time with their colleagues than they do with friends and family. It is imperative that they build strong bonds when working and also in their social lives.

Celebrating rituals such as birthdays by bringing a cake and holding parties is a great way to create and foster long-lasting bonds.

Many organizations insist that fun is ingrained in their culture. But many often struggle to create an environment where workers are truly happy. Like everything else, fun needs to be structured. Otherwise, it will get lost in the busyness of daily life.

Think about lunch outings, comedy nights, and beach days. A team that has fun together is more productive. That’s because work is likely to be less stressful and frustrating when you are having fun. Downtime decreases and job satisfaction and loyalty increases with fun.

Apart from celebrating wins and forging lasting relationships, some rituals also promote growth. For instance, having regular brainstorming or knowledge-sharing sessions enables each member to share their skills and talents.

Participating in weakly share-outs, team-bonding events, and daily scrums can also help the team become more productive, creative, and adaptable.

Do people feel safe enough to be vulnerable and collaborate freely?

4. Safe Environment

According to a study by Google, psychological safety is one of the most vital dynamics that sets effective teams apart. Employees should be free to be who they are. And they should share their ideas and opinions without feeling insecure or afraid.

When a team member shares an idea in a meeting or opens up to a colleague about a bad experience, they are taking risks. Therefore, they need to feel safe enough to take the risk. If they can’t open up, they will end up putting a mask at work. Doing so drains a lot of productive energy which could otherwise be used for productive work.

Individuals should be able to ask questions without feeling lost. Granted, it is natural to want to protect one’s personal image. After all, no one wants to look like a fool in front of colleagues. However, when there is psychological safety, everyone supports you. When everyone feels free to look like a fool, there is so much possibility of awareness about matters which are otherwise never spoken about.

Even in the face of disagreements, everyone in an effective team knows they are on the same side. It is easier to share ideas, admit to mistakes, collaborate, and resolve any underlying conflicts. Consequently, it makes the team more productive.

With technological growth and increasing pressure to perform, people are finding it hard to make personal connections and friendships in the workplace. In fact, there is growing disconnectedness.

The importance of meaningful connections and deep conversations cannot be overstated. Research has demonstrated that having high-quality connections in the workplace leads to more creativity and resilience.

5. Open, Honest, and Trust-Filled Communication

Although the advent of technology has made communication faster, it has led to an information overload that has made it harder to communicate. Nowadays, you have to sift through countless emails and attend regular meetings to get information.

The annual total estimated cost of poor communication in the corporate scene is as high as $37 billion. Such losses can be mitigated by fostering honest communication. Open dialogue is the only way a team can achieve more than the sum of its parts.

Open communication allows everyone to have a voice. When employees know their opinion counts, they feel a great sense of ownership. They are also more willing to positively contribute to the organization’s success. The manner and frequency of communication also matter. The more freely and often the team communicates the more comfortable people are in sharing their ideas and insights.

It is through communication that ideas are birthed and nurtured. A team where members are not communicating encourages wrong assumptions. That’s because everyone is forced to join the dots alone.

As a result, many arrive at the wrong conclusions. For instance, when discussing growth, some may be thinking about market share while others may be referring to revenue. It is only through open communication that such differences can be brought to light.

Sometimes communicating means offering constructive criticism. Highly effective teams create an environment that encourages members to offer honest feedback. Although nobody likes to be criticized, there is no learning without honest feedback. And in a safe environment, feedback doesn’t look like a threat.

Don’t make people wear emotional armor at work

6. They Embrace Empathy

A team that cares for each other performs better. And highly effective teams value empathetic listening and compassionate conversations.

Often in movies, when the ship goes down, the captain and crew are ready to sacrifice their lives to save others. That is only possible because they know they are part of something bigger than themselves.

Likewise, in highly effective teams employees are willing to come together and take one for the team. They shelve their own self-interests and put the needs of the organization and their team ahead of their own. And that is only possible with empathy and care for others.

Empathy is the ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes. It is a deep and compassionate understanding of what others are going through.

Without empathy, organizations and individuals run the risk of becoming too self-absorbed. This can affect all aspects of the business and the team’s productivity as well as their well-being.

According to a study by Google called Project Oxygen, employees prefer managers who care about their well-being than those with technical skills. When leaders and team members embrace empathy, everybody feels appreciated and valued.

Consequently, this creates trust and fosters high performance among individuals. Although it is not natural for most people to generate empathy, it is an emotional competence that anyone can learn.

Real Diversity Is When People Think Differently

7. Diverse Team Composition

One of the greatest advantages of working as a team is being around people with varying skills and talents. It doesn’t matter who does what, so long as the team has all the right skills. Highly effective teams include a diverse set of people who complement one another in talent, thinking, and personalities.

Diversity is not only about gender, ethnicity, and skin color. Real diversity is having people in the team who think and act differently. People who don’t just look different, but are so from the inside. When such people come together in a safe environment where they feel safe to speak up, wonders can happen.

A team’s main priority is to achieve the organization’s goals and objectives. Therefore, having someone who makes the team great is more valuable than a great individual. No matter how skilled a person is, they are not important if they don’t contribute to the overall strengths of the team.

What exact roles belong on each team depends on what a team’s goals and purpose are. Highly effective teams create a platform where individuals can both absorb and teach. No matter how talented or experienced one is, there is always room for learning.

Working alongside other equally talented individuals in diverse fields is a great way to learn and share knowledge and skills.

Final Thoughts

To create a high-performing team, good leadership is paramount. Without a clear and set-out vision, a team will only be groping in the dark. Collaboration is also key. The silo mentality fails to capitalize on the advantages of pooling different skill sets together to tackle problems. Honest communication, team rituals, and embracing empathy help create a fertile ground for such collaboration. But it takes a diverse team composition to make any meaningful impact.

Building a successful team might sound simple, but implementing the above takes practice, which is not easy. To succeed, team members need to share and jointly own the team’s goals and objectives. They must also put the team’s needs ahead of their own. Moreover, everybody should be free to be who they are. They should feel safe to share their ideas and opinions without fear of judgment. As I said, simple, but not easy.
Apr 12, 2021
Know What Great Managers Do? A List of 8 Expectations From Managers That Employees Have.

According to research by Gallup, the most common reason why people leave their jobs is bad managers and bosses. The study, which questioned more than one million working Americans, revealed that 75% of workers who left their jobs did so because of their managers and not necessarily the position itself. No matter how many perks a position offers, people often quit when they don’t enjoy a healthy working relationship with their boss.

Most people get promoted to management because they did well at their previous non-management job. Just because you excelled in your individual contributor role doesn’t mean you can seamlessly transfer over those skills to a management role. For instance, when an all-star football player becomes a manager after retirement, success is not always replicated in their new role.

People often forget that management is a totally separate role. Yet, most people are promoted or rewarded with a “management role” for succeeding in their previous role. The skills required to manage a football player or a software engineer are different from being a good football player or a good software engineer.

Do Managers Even Know What People Expect From Them?

However, a bad manager is not a bad person. They are just unaware and trapped between a rock and a hard place. Managers are rarely trained or educated about how to do their job well. It’s no wonder that they end up managing people like they were managed. Most of them don’t even understand what management is and what people expect from them.

Transitioning from an individual role to a manager is one of the most challenging moves you can make in the corporate world. Becoming a manager comes with new responsibilities and requires a new perspective about work and the people involved. It also requires you to form new types of relationships with your former peers, your new colleagues, and other stakeholders.

Nobody shows new managers how to develop a leadership style that is authentic as well as results-driven. Such disregard for management skills can derail an individual’s career and negatively affect the organization’s productivity. Great managers don’t happen by accident. They learn from their mistakes and invest in developing their skills. I have worked with many great managers myself, and below is what I have learned about people’s expectations from their managers.

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A List of 8 Expectations From Managers That Employees Have

While it is almost never voiced, employees have certain expectations from their managers. The following are expectations you must fulfil when managing any group of people.

1. Trustworthiness

Employees want a trustworthy manager. If you don’t measure up, you will not get their best efforts. Trust is the bedrock of any organization’s success because it makes a big part of the organizational culture. Employees are more likely to actualize goals set by leaders they trust and are honest about what is happening in the organization. The best way of developing trust is leading by example and becoming a role model. Be the kind of manager you would expect to have.

It is easy to bark orders and tell people what to do or how to behave, but you can’t get away with preaching water and drinking wine. If you expect your people to be accountable, you need to hold yourself to a higher standard. So be the first one to uphold company values and hold others accountable who don’t. And yes, don’t consider your position as a license to slack off or use company resources for your own gain.

Find Out What Great Managers Do

2. Vision

Employees expect managers to have a clear vision and know where the team is heading. This gives meaning and purpose to their work. Having a purpose motivates and inspires people to keep going in spite of the circumstances – which can be chaotic and dynamic. When faced with obstacles, they are less likely to get demotivated. Your vision, therefore, should be strong enough to carry your team through the tough times that will eventually come.

Visionary leadership provides clarity, as people will look up to you for providing direction. You need to spend time with the team regularly to discuss, revisit, or reshape the team’s purpose. Ensuring each member understands the team’s purpose and their role in the team will empower them to prioritize their tasks effectively.

Everyone wants to contribute to something bigger than themselves and make a difference. Strong leaders and great managers show people how their work impacts the customer and the wider benefits to the industry/society.

“When corporate executives get really excited, they leverage their learnings against comprehension to revolutionize English.”
― Tanya Thompson

3. Effective Communication

Effective communication leads to high employee engagement. Therefore, it is imperative to be clear, consistent, and transparent when communicating. Leaders should stop using complicated language or hiding behind jargon. Trust people and share information openly.

For instance, if you promote an employee, you might want to clarify why you made the choice. Likewise, if there has been a change in strategy, you might want to inform them how the change will impact the team’s objectives. The aim here is to filter out the unnecessary noise around the main message, which could be anything from corporate jargon that could cloud the message to a funny anecdote for the wrong audience.

Transparent communication is essential for building trust within your team. You should, therefore, communicate with your team openly and honestly. Share what you know when you know it to avoid rumors and misinformation. And when there are no clear answers, communicate the same.

You should also clarify when the information is subject to change and update it when it does. When you communicate openly and honestly, the message gets home, and employees will consider you more credible and trustworthy.

4. Psychological Safety

Make work fun by bringing the team together and creating a safe space where people can be themselves. Building a psychologically safe and inclusive team culture will encourage your employees to voice their opinions without fearing judgment. It will build stronger relationships that foster better collaboration. Moreover, it will inspire creativity and innovation. Consequently, you will have increased employee engagement and even higher performance.

You can create a psychologically safe environment in the workplace by embracing mistakes. Instead of calling out your employees when they err, give them permission to try and fail and allow them to come up with out-of-the-box ideas and solutions. This will create a culture that encourages learning from mistakes. Such freedom to experiment will also make work both educational and fun. In a safe environment, you don’t have to wear a mask and can be completely honest about what you know and what you don’t.

Strong Leaders create a strong foundation for their team to flourish

5. Career and Professional Development Support

Employees need continuous career and professional development support beyond the once or twice per year performance cycle. A year is too long a time to wait for feedback, and such evaluation is rarely based on data. Managers also often take a one-sided approach, taking it upon themselves to decide how good or bad an employee did.

Continuous career and professional development demand that you meet with your employees frequently. It is helpful to inform your employees about your shared goals and objectives and what milestones they need to reach within reasonable time frames. You may want to have frequent team meetings and one-on-one sessions.

Such meetings should be conversational. Instead of repeating what you already know, ask how the employee is fairing, and how you can help them get better. People are mostly unaware of how they can grow in their careers, and as a coach, you can help them figure this out. These conversations help provide clarity on how best to make meaningful progress.

6. Coaching

Employees don’t want someone who just expects results without providing any resources or coaching support. So if you want better results, perhaps it’s time to roll up those sleeves and start coaching. Great managers see coaching as essential to their employees’ growth and development. It helps them become a better version of themselves. Check-in with each member of your team regularly and schedule one-on-ones no matter how busy you are. Use those meetings to learn about their challenges and help people see and overcome their own blind spots.

Coach people first before offering advice. Coaching enables long term behavior change, while advice is short term. The truth is people already have the answers to their challenges within themselves. Your only task is to help them learn how to find theirs. As a manager, you can see coaching as a tool to empower your people – helping you to take a hands-off approach. Coaching creates a space for people to express their feelings and validate their ideas. It says to them: I see you, I hear you, and I value you.

“If you focus on people’s weaknesses, they lose confidence.”
― Tom Rath

7. Strengths-Based Development

Too often, managers focus on an employee’s weaknesses. However, this approach drains people, and research has proven that strengths-based management works better. Understandably, no employee appreciates it when a manager highlights their weaknesses while ignoring their strengths. At the end of the day, people expect recognition and praise. Accordingly, you have to identify your employee’s talents and passions and focus your energy on improving them.

You can start by delegating responsibilities based on strengths. When your employees are doing what they are good at, they will be intrinsically motivated, and their performance will improve as a result. When evaluating this performance, center your performance review conversations on their strengths and how to better them. Also, do not forget to encourage them to align their goals with their strengths.

Focusing on weaknesses creates friction which leads to demotivation. Everyone has weaknesses. Who doesn’t? Stop making everyone into the “perfect” this or that. Accept people for who they are. Fixing people takes an “I know better” attitude. Instead “care” for your people. Great managers work together with people to see where learning is needed, rather than imposing their own standards. Focussing on strengths lead to work becoming more fun, in addition to enhanced productivity and employee well-being.

Strong Managers Know What People Expect From Them

8. Autonomy in Work and Decision Making

A modern employee wants a leader who can coach them and not someone to tell them what to do. Micromanagement often kills motivation and engagement. Checking up on your team members at every chance you get lets them know you lack confidence in their skills and abilities. So instead of telling them what to do, let them take the lead on tasks. And when they get stuck on a project, guide them to figure out the solutions by themselves instead of providing all the answers.

If you hope to inspire your employees to be the best they can be, allow them to make decisions for themselves. For instance, let them decide how best to get their work done. At the end of the day, all that matters is that they create value for the company. Allowing your people to do what they do best without interference will, however, lead to better results in the long-run.

In an environment where people are free to make mistakes and failure is embraced as a learning opportunity, employees feel comfortable when trying new things. Give them ownership, so the work is theirs, not yours. This makes their tasks, their projects, and their responsibilities more meaningful.

Conclusion

When you are a manager, there is an initial belief that your team will naturally respect you and follow your lead, but nothing could be farther from the truth. On the contrary, it is your actions as a leader that will lead to high productivity, respect, and trust.

If you can’t live by your ideals and your company’s values, you will lose their trust and respect. While management isn’t about you, you must be able to manage yourself first before you can manage others. Ultimately, you want to inspire people and expand their capacity beyond what even they think is possible.

Dec 10, 2020
How To Create Psychological Safety At Work
People perform best when they feel safe and don’t have to watch over their shoulders. These days, uncertainty looms in almost every element of our lives. Hence, creating a safe workplace for people is in the best interest of any organization.

At work, the greatest threat people perceive these days is harm to their psychological identity – which stops them from sharing their opinions and ideas. For this reason, it’s important for leaders and managers to create psychological safety in the workplace.

When people have to wear a mask at work and can’t be who they really are, how can you expect any creative thinking or productivity? It is simply not possible to do your best in a place where you have to watch over your shoulders all the time.

What Is Psychological Safety?

The term was coined by Amy C. Edmundson, a researcher at Harvard Business School, and author of The Fearless Organization: Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for Learning, Innovation, and Growth.

She calls Psychological Safety “A shared belief held by members of a team that the team is safe for interpersonal risk-taking,” adding that, “It describes a team climate characterized by interpersonal trust and mutual respect in which people are comfortable being themselves.”

Psychological Safety is achieved when people feel they will face no negative consequence for expressing themselves fully. An organization that does not attempt to create psychological safety will risk creating an unsafe environment with low trust and engagement.

Why Is Psychological Safety Important?

Psychological Safety makes it easier for the thinking and feeling parts of our brain to stay active without triggering the amygdala. The amygdala is the most primitive part of our brain, which controls our flight or fight response, and is activated when we feel fear.

What happens at work should not trigger our primitive biological fear and flight response. However, it often does. In my experience leading teams since 2008 across different continents, I have learned that managers can take the below 6 steps to create psychological safety in their teams:

Psychological Safety Comes Before Performance

1.) Begin With Trust And Respect (Not Suspicion)

Imagine entering a space for the first time to meet people who view you with skepticism. A good example is a job interview. If the interviewer sends the signal that you are unskilled until you prove otherwise, you can easily feel threatened, even frightened. This is on top of the nerves you are already carrying to the interview.

Now, think of it in reverse. Imagine an interviewer who projects immediate trust and respect. They thank you for the opportunity to interview you, compliment your achievements, and note some highlights from your resume.

Naturally, that will put you at ease and help you relax. At the same time, the interview will also go more smoothly, as the interviewee is relaxed and able to interact sincerely.

Let’s take another example. Consider that you are a team leader at the beginning of a project. If you begin by assuming everyone in the room have the skills to achieve the goal (trust), and you project that everyone’s role is valuable (respect), the team will feel safer. The project can begin with freshness and excitement.

Conversely, if you view people with suspicion before work has even started, it will create a culture that is neither psychologically safe nor productive. If you start a project by reviewing previous mistakes, stressing the importance of achieving an outcome, or risk being penalized, you communicate a lack of trust and suspicion.

The Neuroscience of Trust, And Treating People Like Adults

The latest neuroscience research has found that the hormone oxytocin reduces fear and increases trust and empathy in the workplace. If you are wondering why trust is important, it leads to 74% less stress, 106% more energy at work, 50% higher productivity, 13% fewer sick days, 76% more engagement, 29% more life satisfaction, and 40% less burnout.

Beginning with trust and respect is not only a more effective means of creating psychological safety, but it also improves your chances of success. Below are 6 simple ways I have found to foster trust and improve performance. This is especially important if you are in a managerial position.
1. Give recognition immediately after a task well done
2. Give people autonomy to decide how they do their work
3. Flexible job responsibilities based on people’s strengths and project requirements
4. Transparency in communication
5. Caring about the whole person, and not just the employee
6. Being vulnerable and sharing honestly
You cultivate trust by setting a clear direction, giving people what they need to see it through, and getting out of their way. It’s not about being easy on your employees or expecting less from them. High-trust leaders hold people accountable but without micromanaging them. They treat people like responsible adults.

“Too many companies believe people are interchangeable. Truly gifted people never are. They have unique talents. Such people cannot be forced into roles they are not suited for, nor should they be. Effective leaders allow great people to do the work they were born to do.” – Warren Bennis

2.) Listen Empathetically

Your people will have concerns. They will have questions that are not only related to a project or task but also questions coming from a deeper search for security. You need to be aware of this in order to practice empathetic listening.

To create Psychological Safety, you must demonstrate that you care for the entire human being before you, not just the role they play in the organization. And this requires empathy.

Empathy is the ability to understand and step into the shoes of another person. It requires listening not just for what information an employee lacks, but also to infer what emotional security they need.

For example, you can ask “You don’t seem yourself today. Would you like to take a break and chat?”, or “I would hate to see you burn out. Are you taking care of yourself? Is there anything I can do?”. Simple statements like these can go a long way in showing your care for people as human beings.

A few words, said at the right time, can make a world of difference. And we all have the power to make a difference by practicing empathetic listening and noticing emotional cues. You never know what your support at the right moment might mean for someone else.

Can You Be Yourself At Work?

3.) See Conflict As An Opportunity To Find Out What People Care About

Conflicts are a natural order of life, and if we step back and see the bigger picture, there is nothing unexpected around them. They are inevitable when we work with people who think differently. If you don’t see any conflicts, perhaps people are not speaking up enough, and that is a bigger problem for any society or organization.

Conflicts are about different perspectives, and each perspective is valid for the one holding it. A perspective becomes right or wrong only when we get attached to a particular point of view. The only question is – Can we channel the energy in conflicts into productive conversations that can lead to creative solutions and better results?

Don’t Rush. Use Disagreements To Strengthen People

Yet when conflict arises between employees or within a team, you might look at it as an obstacle in need of a quick resolution so that the “real work” can continue. This approach can do more harm than good, as it can keep you from listening empathetically with respect and trust.

Use conflict and disagreements to go deep into what people care about, and bring it out in a way that builds self-awareness and strengthens people. Disagreements occur because people care about their work. Keep the focus on the “care”, not on the “disagreement”.

Attack The Problem. Not Each Other

Instead of criticizing each other in a conflict, begin by communicating that you notice how much they care. This will allow you to confront the problem, not each other.

Help people understand that different perspectives are natural. Promote mutual respect and flexibility. Clarify confusion by stressing the need for healthy friction and working towards shared goals and values.

Help People See Different Perspectives

Look at any problem or dispute as an attempt to build a bridge between two sides of a river. Perhaps one employee wants it of wood while another wants metal. Both of these employees share one thing in common: the desire to build a bridge.

Perhaps the one who wants wood has material costs in mind, while the employee who wants metal is thinking about longevity. Neither employee wants a bad bridge, and neither employee wants the bridge to fail.

This is important to note. The conflict is part of the process of building a bridge. It is not an obstacle to bridge building. The same thing is true of any project you might undertake: disagreement is inevitable, and can result in a better end result.

People feel psychologically safe when their ideas are heard as possibilities versus obstacles. When disagreements are managed in the context of completing a project collaboratively, the end result is often better than what anyone side could come up with.

Disagreement can lead to innovation, especially if you tell people, “Ok, I see we are worried about cost and longevity. Is there a way we can use to build a bridge that is both cost-effective and durable?”

This question does not dismiss the core of the idea presented by people. Instead, it shows that employees’ concerns are valued, and it encourages the kind of thinking that can lead to an even better bridge.

The focus is not on “winning” or “losing” an argument. It is on seeing conflict as a bedrock upon which great successes and deep relationships can be built.

4.) Embrace The Unique Creativity of People

The fact of the matter is that most people are risk-averse and biased against creativity. When confronted with unique ideas, people’s natural biases, regular habits, and old expectations can lead them to dismiss a valid, innovative idea simply because, at first glance, it seems weird.

“Let’s make a cartoon about a mouse that drives a steamboat.” Foolish!

“Let’s sell cars entirely on the internet.” It will never work!

Among the greatest obstacles to building Psychological Safety comes from trying to fit or mold employees into particular roles, especially when these roles don’t allow for flexibility.

Accountants calculate, lawyers argue, and coders program. At the same time, coders calculate, accountants argue, and lawyers program much more often than most would think.

Give people the flexibility to bring their own unique skills and experience to the table. Do not dismiss a marketing idea only because it is coming from an engineer, or vice-versa. You might have engineers and marketers, but do not chain them in their roles that you ignore valuable ideas when people express their unique selves.

Can You Be Yourself At Work?

5.) Provide Feedback More Often

Yearly and half-yearly performance reviews are of limited value and usually stressful. By their nature, they can stress your employees in ways similar to a job interview. This is especially true when an employee has received little to no feedback in the rest of the year, has worked on a project that may not have turned out as expected, or found oneself in the middle of a disagreement that saw one of their ideas rejected.

Giving feedback regularly (every few weeks) gives people an accurate understanding of how they are doing at work, and what needs to change/improve. In our fast-changing and dynamic world, you need to give people continuous feedback to stay on top of things.

Ongoing feedback reinforces the right behavior soon after it happens, rather than waiting for the end of the year. It is more casual, and people are more at ease, in comparison to a yearly process which is also tied to compensation.

It helps clear expectations on a regular basis, and allow for any course-correction sooner than later. This reduces stress, prevents waste of energy and repeated work, and improves productivity and employee confidence.

The feedback they receive will be more applicable to their immediate work, and increase employee engagement and hence productivity, instead of causing stress and burnout.

6.) Coach by Asking Questions

During one-on-one meetings or informal conversations with employees, be curious and ask questions – about their lives, desires, and ambitions. Powerful questions allow people to think deeply and come up with original answers.

Questions that go deep help connect people with their intrinsic motivation and their values. “I’m wondering what inspired you to think of the idea you presented at the last meeting.” These kinds of curious statements show leadership is listening and paying attention.

Asking questions creates space for people to express their feelings and validate their ideas. It says to them: I see you, I hear you, and I value you. Powerful open-ended questions take longer to answer, but they often end up revealing something important about yourself which you were not aware of before.

Some examples of powerful questions are :
1. What is “on hold” in your life? What do you want to do someday? What are you waiting for?
2. How do you hope to personally and professionally benefit from working on this project?
3. Define what your perfect day would look like?
4. What is your best experience in life so far? What is your worst?
Conclusion

The best work happens in an environment of trust and respect for people who are different and think differently. People feel valued not only when their success is celebrated but also when they’re acknowledged for their humanity and ideas.

A disagreement is not an obstacle to work but part of work. Employees who sense that disagreements are welcome at work will feel safer and offer insights more often.

When employees’ creativity peaks, they form meaningful connections and do their best work. Their happiness increases, as does their productivity. And the key to unlocking employee happiness is Psychological Safety.
Nov 5, 2020