Psychological safety at work
Psychological safety is the everyday belief that it is safe to speak up, ask questions, admit a mistake, or share a fresh idea without fear of embarrassment or payback. It is not about being nice. It is about being honest and skillful together, so performance and well-being both lift.
We help organisations build psychological safety using the Academy of Brain-Based Leadership S.A.F.E.T.Y.® model and Dr Tim Clarke’s Four Stages of Psychological Safety®. We bring the neuroscience, practical tools, and a clear path from good intentions to measurable behaviour.
Psychosocial risks made human
In Australia, WHS Act requires organisations to manage psychosocial risks just like physical risks. We help you translate the legal words into human behaviour. High job demands, low role clarity, poor support, and unreasonable behaviour all have emotional and social impacts. We show leaders and teams how to spot the signals early, reduce harm, and create conditions where people can do great work. www.leaderlab.com.au
What’s the difference between psychological safety and psychosocial risks?
Psychosocial risks refer to work-related factors that may have negative effects on an employee’s mental health and well-being due to job demands like excessive workloads, time pressure, low job control, role ambiguity or conflict, poor supervisor support, job insecurity, and inadequate support for work-life balance.
Psychological safety refers to a work environment in which employees feel valued, respected, and able to speak up. Where employees feel safe to express themselves and take risks without fear of negative consequences such as humiliation, punishment or discrimination.
What we deliver
For organisations
- Psychosocial risk assessment (with our partners aligned to WHS duties and ISO 45003)
- Psych safety strategy and roadmap with priorities, timelines, and clear owners
- Leader enablement at scale with learning sprints and reinforcement plans
- Measurement and reporting with lead and lag indicators that boards can use
For leaders and teams
- Workshops that translate SAFETY and the Four Stages into daily habits
- Team operating agreements created by the team for the team
- Feedback and tough conversation skills using compassionate candour
- Speak up pathways and meeting rituals that make contribution easy
- Extended DISC behaviour insights to reduce style friction and lift trust
For individuals
- Personal SAFETY profiles and debriefs
- Coaching to apply strategies to real situations
- Micro skills for emotion regulation, attention and recovery that actually fit a busy day
Get in touch with us www.leaderlab.com.au
The neuroscience of psych safety
Your brain runs a constant risk scan. When it senses social or emotional threat, your body shifts into protect mode. Attention narrows. Learning and problem solving drop. People play it safe and stay quiet. When your brain senses safety, your prefrontal cortex stays online. That is the bit that helps you plan, decide, create, connect and regulate emotion. Teams think better when brains feel safer.
The Academy of Brain Based Leadership S.A.F.E.T.Y.® model breaks this into six domains that commonly trigger threat or reward at work. (Security, Autonomy, Fairness, Esteem, Trust, You).
We help individuals and teams learn their unique SAFETY pattern so they can anticipate triggers, reduce friction, and design better ways of working.
The four stages of psychological safety
We use Tim Clarke’s Four Stages® model to guide the team journey
- Inclusion Safety
- Learner Safety
- Contributor Safety
- Challenger Safety
Leaders and teams move through these stages with targeted practices. Start with belonging. Build confidence to learn and improve. Make contribution clear and valued. Then enable challenge with respect so that dissent and debate become strengths.
About Us
Linda Manaena - Organisational Coach, Facilitator
Diploma Positive Psychology & Wellbeing, Accredited Practitioner for: Neuroscience of Psych S.A.F.E.T.Y™, 4 Stages of Psychological Safety™, eDISC® Behaviour Profiling, Resilience@Work®, Genos® Emotional Intelligence
Nicole Stafford - Organisational Coach, Facilitator
Diploma Positive Psychology & Wellbeing, Accredited Practitioner for: Neuroscience of Psych S.A.F.E.T.Y™, 4 Stages of Psychological Safety™, eDISC® Behaviour Profiling, EQ, HBDI®
Bullying and work pressure now drive the largest share of serious mental stress claims. These are controllable with better role clarity, fair process, and leader habits. Data.gov.au www.leaderlab.com.au
On average, work-related psychological injuries have longer recovery times, higher costs, and more time away from work than physical injuries. https://waha.org.au/managing-psychological-hazards-at-work/
Burnout remains wide. About 48 percent of workers report burnout, and when inclusion is stronger burnout is about half. https://www.bcg.com/publications/2024/four-keys-to-boosting-inclusion-and-beating-burnout
Psych safety is much more than a check-box exercise.
A dynamic and delicate variable
A dynamic and delicate variable
Psychological safety is feeling included, safe to learn, safe to contribute, and safe to challenge the status quo and not be punished or humiliated for speaking up with ideas, alternate views, questions, or mistakes.
For example, is this a place where new ideas are welcomed and built upon? Or picked apart and ridiculed?
Will my colleagues embarrass or penalise me for offering a different point of view, or for admitting I don’t understand something?
Not surprisingly, psychological safety is a dynamic and delicate variable that's hard to build and easy to destroy.
Create a positive work culture
A dynamic and delicate variable
The level of psychological safety in a team is the central measure of that team’s culture, health, and vitality.
Positive work cultures have a dramatic effect on the mental well-being of their employees and contribute significantly to workplace satisfaction. It also enables creativity, innovation, good decision-making, and better solutions.
Practically speaking, this might look like a team where people are more likely to discuss mistakes, share ideas, ask for, and receive feedback, and experiment.
Sounds like a great team! Perhaps, then, it shouldn’t be surprising that psychological safety is also strongly linked to employee satisfaction!
The bottom line is, if you can take risks without your team beating you up, you’ll be more likely to succeed.
Manage your safety risks
Manage your safety risks
The costs of NOT providing psychological safety are pretty high. Not only will you experience loss through absenteeism, but there will also likely be lost productivity, impeded business growth, and compensation claims.
As well, you run the risk of losing skilled staff (or not attracting them), your customer experience will most likely drop, and you risk damage to your reputation.
The other biggie is breaching the Workplace Health and Safety regulations.
And even more than that (yes, it gets bigger), individuals in leadership roles may also be liable for failing to exercise due diligence in a timely way when they respond to incidences in the workplace.