Beyond Buzzwords: How Psychological Safety Transforms Our Workplaces and Communities

I’ve heard countless leaders say, “Can’t we just tell our teams they have psychological safety?” But safety—real safety—can’t be announced from a podium. It must be cultivated through consistent behavior, humility, and repair when trust is broken.

In this piece, I want to unpack what psychological safety really means—beyond the corporate buzzword—and how it can transform both workplaces and communities. We’ll look at research from Harvard professor Amy Edmondson (who coined the term), explore frameworks like the Four Stages of Psychological Safety and Kaizen continuous improvement, and examine how white cultural norms can unintentionally block the very safety we’re trying to build.

Because here’s the truth: many of us white women were raised in systems that equated being nice with being good, which often meant avoiding conflict and discomfort. But psychological safety requires the opposite. It asks us to lean into vulnerability, to examine our power, and to create environments where everyone—especially those historically marginalized—can bring their full selves without fear.

What Is Psychological Safety?

Psychological safety, as defined by Amy Edmondson in her landmark 1999 study, is “a shared belief that the team is safe for interpersonal risk-taking.” In plain terms, it’s the feeling that you can speak up with ideas, questions, or mistakes without fear of humiliation or retribution. Her research, published in Administrative Science Quarterly, found that hospital teams that reported more mistakes were actually more successful—because they were honest enough to name issues early and fix them (1).

That discovery flipped traditional leadership logic on its head. For decades, we’ve equated fewer mistakes with higher performance. But Edmondson’s work revealed that silence, not failure, is the real risk. Teams that avoid conflict or hide problems don’t innovate—they stagnate.

At Google, Project Aristotle reinforced this finding. After studying 180 teams, Google’s People Analytics group discovered that psychological safety was the single most important factor predicting team success (2). Teams that felt safe learned faster, collaborated better, and outperformed others on creativity and retention.

So why does this matter to us beyond corporate walls? Because psychological safety is foundational to healthy relationships, communities, and even movements for justice. It’s the soil from which trust, growth, and inclusion can bloom.

The Four Stages of Psychological Safety

Timothy R. Clark’s model, The 4 Stages of Psychological Safety: Defining the Path to Inclusion and Innovation (Berrett-Koehler, 2020), offers a roadmap for understanding how trust evolves over time (3):

1. Inclusion Safety – The basic human need to belong. Do people feel accepted as they are? Or must they conform to white, male, or corporate norms to be included?

2. Learner Safety – The freedom to ask questions, make mistakes, and grow. Are errors treated as learning opportunities—or as proof of incompetence?

3. Contributor Safety – The confidence to offer ideas and opinions. Are diverse perspectives genuinely valued, or tokenized?

4. Challenger Safety – The courage to question and innovate. Can people safely challenge systems, policies, or leaders without fear of backlash?

White culture often falters at Stage Four. We may encourage inclusion and learning, but when someone challenges authority—or names harm—many of us retreat into defensiveness. As Robin DiAngelo notes in White Fragility (Beacon Press, 2018), white fragility often shows up when we feel accused or uncomfortable, leading us to shut down rather than stay engaged (4). That’s why building psychological safety isn’t just about being “kind.” It’s about being accountable.

The Three Foundational Conditions of Psychological Safety

In The Fearless Organization (2018), Edmondson identifies three foundational conditions for creating psychologically safe environments (5):

1. Frame work as a learning problem, not an execution problem. When teams see their work as an opportunity to learn rather than to prove themselves, failure becomes part of the process.

2. Acknowledge your own fallibility. Leaders—and parents, partners, community members—who admit their mistakes model humility and courage.

3. Model curiosity. Asking genuine questions signals that diverse input is not only welcome but essential.

These conditions apply far beyond business. In our podcast conversation, my mom, Karen, shared a story about her classroom where she invited students to ask any question—then accidentally shamed a student for asking what she thought was a “dumb” one. That moment, though painful, became her lesson in how fragile psychological safety really is. It reminded both of us that safety isn’t built by invitation—it’s built by consistent response.

Psychological Safety Meets Kaizen: Safe Growth Through Continuous Improvement

In Japanese, Kaizen means “change for the better.” Popularized by Masaaki Imai’s 1986 book Kaizen: The Key to Japan’s Competitive Success (McGraw-Hill), Kaizen is the philosophy of continuous, incremental improvement—a mindset that encourages every employee to identify problems and propose solutions (6). It thrives only when people feel safe speaking up.

When we apply Kaizen to psychological safety, the parallels are striking. Both require humility, curiosity, and shared responsibility. Kaizen reframes mistakes as opportunities to learn, echoing Edmondson’s first pillar. It teaches us that progress isn’t achieved through perfection but through ongoing dialogue and reflection.

In my consulting work at ZGRP, I’ve seen this firsthand. When retail teams adopt Kaizen-inspired practices—like daily reflection huddles or post-project “safe space” debriefs—they don’t just improve processes; they build culture. People begin to trust that their voices matter. They start to believe that accountability isn’t punishment—it’s partnership.

This mindset extends beautifully to our personal lives. Imagine bringing a Kaizen approach into friendships or family relationships: small, intentional check-ins, curiosity instead of criticism, and grace for each other’s humanity. That’s psychological safety in action.

White Culture, Power, and the Discomfort of Safety

It’s important to acknowledge that psychological safety doesn’t exist in a vacuum—it exists within power structures. White-dominant culture, shaped by perfectionism, control, and individualism, often undermines the very safety it claims to value. Tema Okun’s White Supremacy Culture Characteristics (1999; updated 2021) describes traits such as urgency, defensiveness, and fear of open conflict that stifle dialogue and learning (7).

Many of us were raised to avoid tension, prioritize harmony, and reward politeness over truth. But that “peace at any price” mentality (as Karen and I discussed in our earlier episode) often silences marginalized voices.

In diverse spaces, white women’s discomfort can become the barrier to others’ safety. For instance, when a colleague of color points out bias in a hiring decision and we respond with defensiveness or tears, the focus shifts from the harm named to our own emotional distress. As Layla F. Saad writes in Me and White Supremacy (2020), this pattern reinforces white comfort as the norm (8).

True psychological safety asks us to reverse that dynamic—to decenter our comfort in service of collective truth. It’s not just about feeling safe; it’s about creating safety for others.

Building Safety in Community Spaces

Not all of us are corporate leaders, but every one of us shapes the culture of our communities—book clubs, friend groups, neighborhoods, churches, and beyond. So how do we foster psychological safety outside of work?

Here are a few tangible practices:

1. Practice “BRAVE” listening. The word BRAVE comes from a framework we developed on the podcast to help us approach tough conversations with clarity and compassion (9):

Breathe before reacting—to ground yourself in the moment.

Reflect on what’s being said and what emotions are surfacing.

Acknowledge the other person’s perspective, even when it challenges you.

Voice your values over your need for victory—speak honestly but kindly.

Exit (and Reenter) with intention—know when to pause and when to come back to the conversation after reflection.

When someone shares a hard truth, resist the urge to explain or fix. Listen to understand, not to defend.

2. Establish community agreements. Shared language around confidentiality, accountability, and repair helps people know what to expect.

3. Normalize mistakes and repair. When you misspeak or cause harm, name it, apologize, and commit to doing better. Apologies are not weakness—they’re the foundation of trust.

4. Share power. Rotate facilitation roles, invite diverse voices to lead, and avoid centering whiteness or hierarchy.

5. Model grace and feedback. Jonelle’s former department used a “purple flag” system—adapted from the inclusive dialogue model introduced by Kim Scott and Trier Bryant’s Just Work framework, which uses a non‑accusatory signal to surface bias or tension in real time—a tool to pause tense conversations and reframe them respectfully. That kind of structured feedback turned tension into growth.

These tools might sound simple, but they require practice—and humility. They invite us to see safety not as the absence of discomfort, but as the presence of courage, accountability, and love.

As Dr. Brené Brown reminds us, “Clear is kind.” When we communicate directly, we reduce confusion and increase trust (10).

A Call to Action

If you’re reading this as a white woman—especially one in a position of influence—ask yourself:

• When was the last time I admitted a mistake publicly?

• Who in my circle feels safe challenging me—and who doesn’t?

• What am I willing to unlearn to create more trust?

Psychological safety isn’t a leadership trend; it’s a path toward healing the fractures of hierarchy, bias, and fear. It’s how we turn awareness into action—at work, at home, and in our shared humanity.

As I said on the podcast, safety isn’t built through slogans or statements—it’s built through how we respond when someone takes the risk to speak.

So, let’s keep reentering the room. With intention. With humility. And with hope.

Stay curious, be open and keep waking up!

-Jonelle

References

1. Edmondson, A. C. (1999). Psychological Safety and Learning Behavior in Work Teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44(2), 350–

383.

2. Google re:Work. (2015). Project Aristotle: Understanding the Key to Team Effectiveness. Retrieved from https://rework.withgoogle.com.

3. Clark, T. R. (2020). The 4 Stages of Psychological Safety: Defining the Path to Inclusion and Innovation. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.

4. DiAngelo, R. (2018). White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism. Beacon Press.

5. Edmondson, A. (2018). The Fearless Organization: Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for Learning, Innovation, and

Growth. Wiley.

6. Imai, M. (1986). Kaizen: The Key to Japan’s Competitive Success. McGraw-Hill.

7. Okun, T. (1999, updated 2021). White Supremacy Culture Characteristics. Dismantling Racism Works.

8. Saad, L. F. (2020). Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor. Sourcebooks.

9. Zimmerman, J., & Gutowsky Zimmerman, K. (2025). White Women Wake Up Podcast: Ep 43: BRAVE Conversations: Finding Meaning

in the Mess. Zimmerman Group LLC.

10. Brown, B. (2018). Dare to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts. Random House.