The most engaged employees may be at greater risk of burnout if they’re not backed by a psychologically safe team. Highly engaged employees are also very good at keeping up the appearance all the way to the end – until they hit the wall, resign or quietly quit. On a positive note, there is also significant potential to be unlocked by teams, who don’t just settle with engagement, but are able to achieve the higher stages of psychological safety.
To really understand and drive healthy performance, we need to shift our perspective from employee engagement to the psychological safety of the teams that they work in.
There are numerous surveys, tools and programs developed to assess and promote employee engagement. However, relying solely on this approach may be dangerously misleading.
Engagement does not always mean high psychological safety
Engagement at work, is the person’s ability to bring themselves to work and to their roles physically, cognitively and emotionally. Engaged employees are dedicated, emotionally invested, and excited about their work and obligations outside of their job description. They have a positive attitude towards their workplace and its values, and have a passion for excellence. In short, engagement manifests in employees both psychologically and behaviorally. Engagement has been thought of as a significant factor in predicting talent attrition, burnout and the team’s performance.
Why is it then, that at the same time, the most engaged and highest performing employees may very well be at risk of resigning and burning out? According to research, 1 in 5 employees who meet the criteria for high engagement are at the same time identified with criteria for high burnout! High engagement may come at the cost of a healthy work-life balance. Many companies encourage behaviors that seemingly have to do with engagement, and yet unintentionally drive their employees to burn out. These behaviors can be for example working long hours, multitasking or working simultaneously on multiple big projects.
How can we know that characteristics expressed by engaged employees come from a place of security and personal interest rather than a sense of obligation and authority? Only by examining the psychological safety of the teams that they work part of and their daily behaviors working in those teams.
There are various degrees of psychological safety
According to Timothy Clark, psychological safety has stages, each of which is characterised by a set of distinguished behaviors exhibited by the team members in daily collaborations. For example, in order to reach the peak of psychological safety the employee must feel safe to 1) feel included, 2) learn, 3) contribute and 4) challenge the status quo of the team.
Inclusion and learning safety include the notions of engagement, with employees feeling included emotionally and physically and being engaged to learn with their team. However, the true difference is made on the higher levels of psychological safety. But in order to reach the level of safety where the team members feel safe to innovate, challenge, express ideas and to truly contribute, having mere engagement won’t cut it.
Inclusion and learner safety (most often associated with engagement) are characterized by engaging behaviors such as: communicating and connecting with one another, listening and sharing experiences, asking questions, asking for feedback and help, expressing appreciation, sharing knowledge, inviting others to learn, sharing mistakes, re-assessing processes.
Whereas challenger safety – the ultimate highest degree of psychological safety is associated with thriving behaviors such as: expressing vulnerability and empathy, sharing bad news, challenging decisions and opinions, disagreeing constructively, identifying biases, expressing opposing opinions even if everyone else has agreed.
If employees are engaged but do not raise issues, share knowledge, express ideas or mistakes freely, there’s a high chance that the team’s ability to innovate and overcome challenging times is compromised. Employees displaying engaging behaviors is great, but employees and teams exhibiting thriving behaviors are the ones that will endure and outperform in comparison. How do engagement and psychological safety play into each other, then? Let us look more closely.
Psychological safety is the ultimate driver of performance
Psychological safety has been shown to be the key driver of thriving teams, and fostering psychological safety directly correlates with greater work engagement. Psychological safety can be used to explain why your team members or colleagues may or may not be engaged. Likewise, a lack of engagement is often connected with lack of psychological safety. By addressing your team’s psychological safety, engagement is more than likely to improve.
Being engaged does not guarantee that the team members will feel safe to take interpersonal risks or to fully express their ideas. When one acts under the guise of instructions and expectations rather than comfort and trust, engagement can also stem from a place of fear and uncertainty.
The members of thriving teams with high levels of psychological safety are able to bring up issues and vulnerabilities, situations where they feel that there’s too much on the plate. Team members back each other, tune into each others needs, express empathy and offer resolution. No one person can consistently perform up to 100%, it’s the team that allows for its’ members to be themselves, learn and stand up from failure, and also recover between more intense periods of contribution.
Key takeaways
We may miss out on things that truly matter, if we only look at engagement metrics. Even the most engaged employees may be at risk of sliding into burnout or leaving, when they’ve had enough. Highly engaged employees may not necessarily perform at their peak or feel well in a team. By strengthening psychological safety systematically and exhibiting thriving behaviors in the team, engagement can be coupled with empowerment, enabling individuals to fully contribute in the team.
In teams with high degrees of challenger safety you’re more likely to see high levels of innovation and challenging the status quo in constructive ways. These behaviors also correlate with stronger performance. Thriving behaviors such as expressing vulnerability and empathy, are also connected with higher levels of wellbeing.
Many teams may seem engaged, but struggle to truly reach the peak state of psychological safety. If you or your coworkers are having trouble with engagement, it may be worth while also to assess psychological safety in the team. You may not be aware whether your employees are holding back or if they are speaking up. People are also often not aware of these things themselves!
You will start to see the difference, when you pay attention to the everyday behaviors your team exhibits as they collaborate.
