Psychological safety is crucial for a healthy and effective work environment. Where employees feel safe, they can share ideas, report mistakes, and take innovative approaches without fear of negative consequences.
The Integrated Leadership Model (ILM72) provides a tool for analysing leadership style in terms of 6 factors. Exploring these factors can have an impact on the level of psychological safety in a team. These are shown below.
Note that leadership style is situational. All options can be appropriate – in the circumstance! They will each have different consequences for psychological safety.
Focusing on the task v. the person
Person-oriented leaders prioritise satisfying followers’ needs, fostering trust and openness, and creating an environment where team members feel safe to express their thoughts and opinions.
On the contrary, task-focused leaders may inhibit employees from offering their views (reducing their feeling of autonomy and mastery) which could impact negatively psychological safety.
Being flexible v. dogmatic
Flexible leaders are open to new ideas and involving others in decision-making, enhancing psychological safety through empowering people and building shared responsibility and trust.
In contrast, rigid leaders may stifle creativity and innovation, leading to employees avoiding voicing their opinions for fear of not being heard anyway and may even see offering a view as a challenge to their authority.
Centralised v. Decentralised
Leaders face a choice between centralizing control, placing themselves at the centre of all activity, or delegating control to others.
A decentralised style can boost employee engagement and accountability, promoting an environment where team members feel empowered to act autonomously and are able to express their opinions.
Centralisation can limit employees’ autonomy, leading to feelings of frustration and a lack of motivation to openly share ideas.
Reward or Punishment Oriented
Leaders have the option to motivate through praise or demand specific results.
Those who use praise-based management are inclined to recognise their employees’ efforts, which fosters a positive work atmosphere where team members feel safe and are more willing to take the initiative and share ideas.
In contrast, demand-based management focuses on achieving specific results, and failing to do so may result in negative consequences. Leaders focused on demands are more likely to create an atmosphere of fear of failure, discouraging open expression of opinions and potentially leading to a low level of psychological safety.
Focusing on the means v. the end.
Outcome-oriented leaders may be willing to sacrifice much to achieve the desired result, which can sometimes lead to disregarding processes and procedures as well as others contributions, risking psychological safety.
In contrast, process-oriented leaders place great emphasis on how the goal is achieved, ensuring adherence to standards and norms and accommodating needs such as wellbeing of followers. Psychological safety tends to be more at risk in teams where leaders emphasize outcomes exclusively.
Structured v. Organic
The final ILM72 detailed scale measures the extent to which leaders rely on acquired knowledge and models versus intuition and instinct.
Knowledge-based leaders rely on structure, analysis, and careful planning. Those who rely on structure are more likely to create a work environment where processes are clearly defined and understood by all team members. This fosters a sense of security and confidence in the team.
Those who rely on intuition often make decisions based on instinct and experience. They may respond in an agile manner to situations. This can create uncertainty and impact negatively on psychological safety. If transparent about their actions and decisions and they explain them a degree of psychological safety can be maintained.
In summary
Analysing the leadership style scales in the ILM72 shed light on their potential impact on psychological safety within a team. Each of the scales influences different aspects of the work environment. In a world where the situation influences leadership style, some behaviours associated with these leadership styles can threaten psychological safety.
As always it is self-awareness that matters. Where the leader adopts a behaviour which threatens psychological safety, the prudent leader seek to minimise this happening.
Managers who consciously understand this can actively shape an organisational culture where psychological safety is protected. This, in turn, should allow the team to achieve better results, better wellbeing and harness all the problem-solving capability in the team
Authors: Wojtek Grad and Doug Strycharczyk
