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Psychological Safety at Work

When People Are Afraid to Speak Up, Everything Costs More.

Psychological safety training gives your teams the skills to catch problems early, own mistakes without fear, and do their best work — because they feel safe enough to speak up. 

  • Your people stay quiet in meetings — then vent in the parking lot.

  • Mistakes get hidden instead of fixed.

  • Good employees leave. And nobody says why.

  • You can feel the tension. You just can't name it.

This what a psychologically unsafe culture costs you.

Every single day.

Does This Familiar? 

psychological safety training - diverse team speaking up in workplace meeting

Psychological Safety Can Be Developed 

It's not about everyone just being nice to each other. Team psychological safety is about building an environment where people raise problems before they become crises, own mistakes without fear, and do their best work because they're not spending energy watching their backs.

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Research on psychological safety was conducted by Amy Edmondson, a Harvard Business School professor and a leading researcher on the topic. Google's Project Aristotle confirmed it: psychological safety is the single most important factor in high-performing teams.

 

At Culture Coach, we turn that research into practical training that works in the real world — not just a classroom. The result is a speak-up culture where early warnings get heard, errors get fixed, and people stay.

Six Behaviors That Build Psychological Safety in Your Workplace

Six Behaviors That Build Psychological Safety in Your Workplace

Blog Post: Six Behaviors that Build Psychological Safety in Your Teams

Six Behaviors. Measurable Results. 

Our psychological safety training and videos start with six specific, observable behaviors that any team can easily learn and practice. This is how to build psychological safety that lasts — through consistent daily practice.

Psychological Safety Videos Package

  • Six videos 3-5 minutes long

  • Facilitator's guide with:

    • Discussion questions

    • Action steps

    • Sample email text introducing each video

  • One time purchase price

  • Available in 100 languages 

  • Women's History Month Sale: Price $9,000- Sale! $6,000

March Sale!

Videos Packge + Customization

  • Custom avatar using a company employee as the narrator for the videos 

  • Company logo on the front page of the video

  • Price: $12,000  Sale $9,000

Building Psychological Safety_ Asking Open Ended Questions

Building Psychological Safety_ Asking Open Ended Questions

Example of the video on open-ended questions narrated by Kari Heistad, CEO of Culture Coach. ​

The narrator can be any member of your company. 

Six Behaviors

  • Active Listening

  • Respond to Mistakes Constructively

  • Show Respect Consistently

  • Hold People Accountable

  • Be Open to New Ideas

  • Ask Open-Ended Questions​

Spanish - Building Psychological Safety_ Asking Open Ended Questions

Spanish - Building Psychological Safety_ Asking Open Ended Questions

Example of the video on open-ended questions in Spanish (the narrator, Kari Heistad, does not speak Spanish)

Hindi Building Psychological Safety_ Asking Open Ended Questions

Hindi Building Psychological Safety_ Asking Open Ended Questions

Example of the video on open-ended questions in Hindi (the narrator, Kari Heistad, does not speak Hindi)

What Shifts When Psychological Safety Takes Root

Teams With Low Psychological Safety

Teams with Psychological Safety 

• Silence in meetings. Noise in the parking lot.

• Mistakes hidden until they escalate.

• Blame culture — no one wants accountability.

• High turnover, low trust, disengaged teams. 

• Leaders don't know what they don't know.

• Problems surface before they become crises.

• Mistakes become learning moments — not career risks.

• Accountability without punishment.

• Stronger employee retention and you know why. 

• Leaders have a clear, practiced set of behaviors that build trust.

A conference table has five people sitting around it not making eye contact with each other and showing low psychological safety
A retail team has a meeting before the store opens. They are smiling and engaging with each other in a way that shows they have psychological safety with each other.

Culture Coach Services
Psychological Safety Training & Assessments

Psychological Safety Videos

Short, focused videos your team can watch at their own pace. Built around the six behaviors that move the needle on psychological safety — and built to fit inside your existing training schedule. The discussion guide that comes with the videos makes the videos a great team meeting discussion tool. 

Psychological Safety Training

Live, facilitated workshops that present an overview or that that go deep — from assessment through behavior change to making it stick. Available in-person or virtual.

Psychological Safety Assessments

CEO, Kari Heistad, is a certified psychological safety faciliator through the Amy Edmondson's Fearless Organization.  She is able to provide full detailed team assessments and Culture Coach has simpler tools that allow for quick team check-ins. 

Psychological Safety Behaviors Matrix

Based on more than 20 years of work creating inclusive and effective teams, Culture Coach developed a matrix of more than 30 behaviors that help to create and sustain psychological safety on teams. 

Only 26% of leaders currently exhibit the behaviors that create psychological safety at work.

— McKinsey Research

Your Team is Worth The Investment

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Whether you're starting from scratch or rebuilding trust after a hard season — we have a path for you.

 

Our psychological safety training programs are customizable, evidence-based, and designed to create real, lasting behavior change.

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Our videos can be used for self-led employee education, incorporated into training programs or used a team meeting discussion tools. 

Frequently Asked Questions About Psychological Safety 

What is a definition of psychological safety?

The definition of psychological safety in the workplace is the shared belief among team members that it is safe to speak up, ask questions, admit mistakes, and offer ideas without fear of embarrassment, punishment, or retaliation. In essence, do people feel that they can speak up. The concept was popularized by Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmondson. Psychological safety is widely recognized as the foundation of high-performing teams.

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How do you build psychological safety on a team? 
Psychological safety is built through consistent, practiced behaviors over time. The most important behaviors include how leaders and team members respond to mistakes, whether people feel genuinely heard, and whether accountability is applied fairly and consistently. 

What Is psychological safety in the workplace training?

Psychological safety training includes education on what psychological safety is and why it matters, how psychological safety is developed (or broken), and skills development focused on specific behaviors — such as active listening, responding constructively to mistakes, and asking open-ended questions. Culture Coach International offers training in video, workshop, and microlearning formats.

What Is psychological safety training for leaders?

We can create training programs for teams and for leadership. When training leaders, we will include information about the benefits of creating psychological safety for your organization, what to expect when starting a psychological safety initiative and examples of what they can do as leaders to help to develop and support psychological safety in their teams and across the entire organization. 

How can I build psychological safety? 

Psychological safety is built within a context. This could be between two people or among many people. It is something that needs to be supported and developed in an on-going manner. If you want to build psychological safety in your interactions with others focus on being trustworthy, keeping your word, being accountable, be respectful and open to new ideas and practice good communication skills such as active listening and letting people finish speaking before offering your ideas.  If you are a leader, people will be watching how you interact with others and particularly how you handle mistakes. Handling issues and mistakes with grace and focusing on solving the problem and not laying blame on the person shows others around you that you know that mistakes happen and that bringing them forward when they are small makes them easier to deal with than waiting until they are much bigger. 

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How to build psychological safety In teams? 

Psychological safety in the workplace is the shared belief among team members that it is safe to speak up, ask questions, admit mistakes, and offer ideas without fear of embarrassment, punishment, or retaliation. To build it on teams takes proactive focus and attention to how team members interact with each other. Focusing on the six behaviors we have identified as being foundational to building psychological safety is a great place to start.  Providing training to team members so that they know what psychological safety is and why it is important to them helps to gain their buy-in. Then, focusing on behaviors that are part of your daily interactions and that are easy to do will begin the momentum of building psychological safety on your team. As the team develops more skills in how you interact with each other, you can branch out and deepen the safety of the team based on the foundation that you have built. 

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How long does it take to develop psychological safety on a teams? 

Most teams see measurable shifts within six to twelve weeks when leaders are actively practicing new behaviors and the training is reinforced regularly. Sustainable culture change typically takes six to twelve months. Our programs are designed with both timelines in mind — offering quick-start tools alongside longer-term development pathways.

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How is psychological safety different from a 'nice' workplace culture?

Psychological safety is not about making work comfortable or conflict-free. It is about creating an environment where people can take interpersonal risks — speak up about a problem, challenge a bad decision, admit a mistake — and know the response will be constructive rather than punishing. High psychological safety teams are often more challenging, not less, because honest conversation is the norm.

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Can psychological safety training be customized for our industry?

Yes. Culture Coach International has worked across many industries and we can tailor a training program specifically for your industry and organization. We have worked in construction, healthcare, hospitality, pharmaceuticals, corporate, and other industries. We use industry-specific language, scenarios, and delivery formats to ensure the training is relevant and credible to your workforce.

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Ready To Get Started?
Get In Touch With Us Today! 

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