How to create Psychological Safety
- Author: Ryan Jenkins
Read the news article
Here are six ways to create psychological safety to re-engage and reassure today’s anxious, disengaged and lonely workforce.
Teams can be lonely places. People can feel vulnerable and exposed if they believe their teammates don’t support their ideas or appreciate their work. These interpersonal struggles intensify for remote workers who lack the support of a nodding ally across the table.
Amid the increased importance of workplace equality and allyship and the growing loneliness and isolation among virtual teams, it’s never been more critical that leaders create psychological safety among their teams.
Workers who feel that they can freely raise concerns, questions and ideas without repercussion are benefiting from psychological safety. Psychological safety pays off in increased creativity, trust and productivity among a team and is the single most important quality that determines a team’s success.
Here are six ways leaders can create psychological safety for their teams.
Psychological Safety
1. Listen to understand
Active listening is a hallmark trait of psychological safety. Too often leaders selectively listen for information that reinforces their view or strengthens their argument.
2. Speak last
When leaders share their thoughts about a topic and then ask for the team’s opinion, it’s too late.
3. Identify blind spots together
When leaders invite others into helping identify blind spots, it’s an admission to not having all the answers.
4. Productively address problems
Instead of blaming or expressing frustration when a team member brings up a problem, instead be appreciative of their insight and dedication to solving the problem.
5. Connect contributions to value
Humans have an innate desire for their contributions to be valued by the community. For centuries humans have found safety in numbers.
6. Switch video on and off
Seeing people’s faces during a video call can create engagement and provide helpful visual cues and non-verbal agreement.
Article written by Ryan Jenkins a Millennial generational speaker
However, it’s challenging for leaders to create psychological safety, because by virtue of their role they have power, and power is a barrier to psychological safety. In order to counterbalance the weight of their powerful role, leaders have to go out of their way to intentionally and strategically build psychological safety.
Speaker Listing
Further articles you may enjoy:
- (2)
Corporate Event Trends 2026: What Conference Organizers Are Prioritizing in Speakers, Formats, and Audience Engagement The brief is changing. According to analysis of 1,568 corporate events published by The Motivational Speakers Agency, 68% of keynote briefs now begin with a business objective before a speaker name is mentioned. That single data point captures the most […]
- July 9, 2026
- (2)
Why Artificial Intelligence Speakers Have Become a Strategic Event Investment Something changed in how corporate event planners book AI speakers, and the numbers make it hard to ignore. Inquiries for artificial intelligence speakers grew 237% year-on-year in 2026, according to major U.S. bureau tracking data. More telling: 68% of those requests now arrive with a […]
- July 7, 2026
- (5)
Zack Kass: The AI Futurist Who Believes the Future Is Brighter Than You Think Most conversations about artificial intelligence begin with fear. Job losses. Algorithmic bias. Existential risk. The dominant narrative in boardrooms and conference halls has been one of anxiety, and that anxiety has a cost: organizations paralyzed by uncertainty, leaders unable to make […]
- June 30, 2026
- (2)
The Best Innovation Speakers and Entrepreneurs for Your Startup Conference Booking a keynote speaker for a startup conference is one of the highest-stakes decisions an event planner makes. The right speaker can crystallize a theme, energize a room of founders, and send attendees home with frameworks they actually use. The wrong one leaves a crowd […]
- June 24, 2026
- (5)
Why Your Last Keynote Speaker Didn’t Engage the Audience (And How to Fix It Next Time) You spent months planning the event. You negotiated the contract, handled the logistics, and built the agenda around a keynote that was supposed to set the tone for everything that followed. Then the speaker walked off stage and the […]
- June 23, 2026
- (6)
How to Book a Keynote Speaker Who Actually Moves the Needle Most keynote speaker booking guides start with logistics: check availability, confirm the fee, sign the contract. That advice isn’t wrong, it’s just far too late in the process to matter. The real decisions that determine whether a keynote succeeds or fails happen weeks before […]
- June 22, 2026
- (2)
How to Choose the Right Keynote Speaker for Your Event How to Choose the Right Keynote Speaker for Your Event which can make the difference between an event that attendees quickly forget and one that inspires action long after the final applause. Whether you’re organizing a corporate conference, leadership summit, sales meeting, or association event, […]
- June 19, 2026
- (4)
In today’s business environment, organizations are facing unprecedented challenges. Hybrid workplaces, rapid technological change, economic uncertainty, employee disengagement, and evolving customer expectations have transformed the way leaders operate. Amid all this complexity, one factor continues to determine whether teams thrive or struggle: Trust. Trust is no longer simply a “soft skill” discussed in leadership seminars. […]
- May 21, 2026