The recent revision of the guide for Boards has put the spotlight on culture and behaviours. Directors are challenged creating a climate characterised by interpersonal trust and mutual respect in which all are comfortable being themselves, speaking up, asking challenging questions, admitting errors, discussing problems and offering innovative solutions.
In some environments, people perceive the career and interpersonal threat as sufficiently low that they dare to be themselves. Boards, however, are not such an environment. The stakes for Directors are high. Directors are visible and have much to lose - their standing in society, their positioning in their industry, their perception of themselves. When there is so much at stake, the tendency is to act in ways that protect and preserve the status quo.
Directors are challenged to create an environment that allows for openness, challenge and learning. The pre-requisite for these behaviours is Psychological Safety.
Psychological Safety in the Boardroom is the shared belief of its members that the board is a safe place for personal risk-taking, i.e. a place where they can work freely without any anxiety or fear of retribution to their career, status, and self-image.
The ability to make the boardroom a psychologically safe place is the key to creating forward-looking boards. Directors can be even more successful by fully embracing the concept of Psychological Safety and consciously think about further actions they can take to contribute to making their board a psychologically safe place to be.
The evidence from academic studies is compelling. Psychologically safe environments encourage and enable people to engage in risky interpersonal behaviour and lead to greater:
- engagement, commitment and empowerment;
- performance at the individual and team level;
- learning behaviour;
- risk-taking;
- interpersonal communication;
- willingness to raise disagreement;
- knowledge sharing and highlighting of failures/ errors;
- feedback giving and seeking behaviour;
- creativity;
- innovation and knowledge creation;
- and last but not least, successful implementation of new technology.
What struck me when analysing the results of more than 85 academic studies is that psychologically safe environments bring to life all the desired behaviours and those that are highlighted in the revised guide for boards.
So how can Directors contribute to making their boards a psychologically safer place to be?
Harvard Business School, Professor Amy Edmondson’s original research in Psychological Safety, identified five elements that Directors can draw on:
- The leader’s behaviour;
- Trust and respect between team members;
- Organisational support;
- Set of habits and routines that members of a group develop amongst themselves;
- The opportunity for the board to practice and improve their tasks off-line without an immediate impact on their actual work.
In high performing boards, I have observed behaviours that inspired the list of behavioural tweaks, and actions Directors can take. I have organised them under the five elements that affect psychological safety.
The leader’s behaviour:
- Expose some of your imperfections.
- Cultivate a curious attitude.
Trust and respect between team members:
- Invest in understanding and acknowledging the strength of each board colleague.
- Draw out the perspectives and opinions of all members of the board.
Organisational support:
- Make time in your annual calendar for social activities with your board colleagues.
- Ask for and make use of access to key people and teams in the organisation.
Set of habits and routines that team members develop among themselves:
- Rotate the role of the devil’s advocate
- Support brave action and encouraging field outings.
The opportunity for the board to practice and improve their tasks off-line without an immediate impact on their actual work:
- Ask for and make use of any personal development opportunities for board members.
- Encourage experimentation with desired behaviours outside the boardroom.
Psychological safety is not just a concept for teams at the bottom of the hierarchy but paramount for forward-looking boards. All Directors can contribute to making their board a psychological place to be and by doing so create the pre-requisite for a forward-looking board.
Author
Dr Sabine Dembkowski
Better Boards Limited
About
Dr. Sabine Dembkowski is Founder and Managing Partner of Better Boards in London. Sabine is credited for having identified the seven hallmarks of effective boards. She and her team created an innovative online tool and have taken Board Evaluations and Reviews to the next level. Her clients include FTSE100, FTSE250, PE-backed and private organisations.
