Ep. 135: Is speaking up always a good thing for safety?
The Safety of Work
Intro
Drew Rae and David Provan introduce the episode and pose the question about speaking up and safety.
Drawing on Edmondson's extensive psychological safety research, the episode provides practical guidance for safety leaders seeking to improve workplace conversations. The framework reveals that effective safety communication requires more than encouraging people to speak up—it demands deliberate leadership to create environments where contributions are productive, silence is reflective rather than fearful, and meeting goals are clearly articulated. The findings offer significant implications for safety professionals working to enhance organizational communication and change management capabilities.
Discussion Points:
- (00:00) Background on psychological safety and employee voice
- (04:05) Introducing Amy Edmondson's reflections paper
- (08:00) Why workplace meetings are often unproductive
- (11:13) The four-quadrant model of workplace conversations
- (16:44) Withholding when productive silence becomes problematic
- (19:49) Disrupting and the challenge of unproductive voice
- (26:33) Contributing through productive voice and disagreement
- (30:05) Processing the importance of reflective silence
- (35:53) Practical takeaways for leading better meetings
- Like and follow, send us your comments and suggestions for future show topics!
Quotes:
"The employee voice and silence literature is a lot more precise because it's looking at a specific question: what do people speak up about, when do they speak up, who do they speak up to, what do they say?" - Drew Rae
"A good meeting is when all participants are either contributing or processing with minimal withholding or disrupting." - Drew Rae
"It's not just that disruptive people take up time and space, they raise the threshold for others to speak up." - Drew Rae
"Where there's diversity in the room, race or gender, it can make this a little bit more difficult because people might feel personally vulnerable." - David Provan
"We want an environment that promotes productive conversations, and that environment is more about when and how we speak up ourselves." - Drew Rae
Resources:
Resource Link: https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/profile.aspx?facId=6451
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