Psychological Safety: Measure, Learn, Improve

Psychological Safety as a Foundation for Lean (or for Innovation)

We can be more successful in our Lean journeys—and in any effort to learn, improve, and innovate—by intentionally working to build higher levels of psychological safety.

Harvard professor Amy Edmondson defines psychological safety as

“a belief that the environment is safe for interpersonal risk-taking.”

In other words, people feel able to speak up with ideas, questions, concerns, or mistakes without fear of embarrassment or punishment. If we want to identify waste, solve problems, and experiment our way to better performance, we need people to feel safe doing exactly those things.

This requires leaders to model vulnerable acts, such as saying things like:

“I don’t know”
“I made a mistake”
“I could be wrong”
“I have an idea for improvement”
“Let's run an experiment to see how that idea works”
“That didn't work as we expected”

Leaders must also reward these vulnerable acts when employees take the chance to follow their lead. The level of psychological safety each person feels depends heavily on whether their moments of vulnerability are met with curiosity and appreciation—or frustration and blame.

This dynamic is universal. The same principles apply in manufacturing companies, hospitals, software firms, startups, and any organization built on complex work and human judgment.

Toyota has long emphasized psychological safety—not only physical safety—as a core element of its culture. Their systems only work when people feel free to call out problems, stop the line, suggest improvements, and test ideas.

Psychological safety is arguably a necessary precondition for Lean to take root and thrive. It is also fundamental to learning from mistakes. At its highest levels, psychological safety supports a culture where:

People speak up about waste.
Problems are surfaced early.
Small tests of change are normal.
Failed experiments are treated as learning.
Teams grow more capable over time.

Lean problem-solving methods help us learn from mistakes and prevent recurrence—but without psychological safety, those conversations never start. The two reinforce each other.

The connections between psychological safety and business success are clear:
Higher psychological safety ? more learning ? more innovation ? better outcomes.

Let’s work together to measure and discuss the current state of psychological safety in your teams. Let’s use that insight—along with a robust research base—to learn and improve.

Higher psychological safety means more improvement. More improvement means more success.

Mark Graban is Certified to Help

Mark Graban is certified through LeaderFactor to help you progress through the proven “four stages of psychological safety.”

This includes:

Measurement of the current state of psychological safety in your team(s)
Debrief and discussion of survey scores and freeform responses with leaders
Educating leaders and teams on how to improve psychological safety using proven methods
Coaching leaders as they work to improve and then reassess

Contact Mark if you'd like to talk about how he can help you and your organization.

Mark can also be a speaker or trainer for your event or organization on this important topic.