The Agerus Method – a key to psychological safety

The concept of psychological safety is now so widely used that it needs no further introduction. It is a state where members of a group feel safe to ask questions, come up with new ideas and challenge each other in a constructive way. Both Google with Project Aristotle and Harvard professor Amy Edmondsson have demonstrated the positive effects of this through their research in the form of increased innovation, higher productivity and a good ability to handle change. Without psychological safety, silence reigns and without conversation there is no learning or collaboration.

With this in mind, it is not surprising that in recent years a lot of literature has been published on psychological safety and that LinkedIn is full of posts on the same topic. But how do you create psychological safety in a group in practice?
We at Agerus are convinced that the key to much of it lies in working from the basics of our method.

The importance of clarity

A first step in creating job security is to have a very clear mission statement that describes what is to be done and, above all, what is to be achieved. This can be described through well-defined responsibilities and clear objectives. With that clarity, we don’t have to be in doubt about what the job consists of. When we know what to do, we feel confident and when we know that we have achieved the objectives, we can feel great satisfaction with our own performance while being confident that we have met the expectations of others.

With the mission and objectives clear to us, we need to have a number of prerequisites in place to feel confident in accomplishing it. One such prerequisite is having access to the information needed to do the job. Having the right skills is another prerequisite for us to feel confident about both the tasks and the group we belong to. Having the mandate required for the job – or being able to ask for it without risking negative reactions – is also fundamental in this context. The fact that there are clear expectations from the manager and stakeholders on what is to be delivered also provides great security.

Campfires provide context

At Agerus, we like to talk about “campfires” (a simile that is described in more detail in our book, Creativity). The campfire we talk about is the symbol of the community that is created when we gather in the working group to solve our mission. Gathering around a campfire also meets our basic human need to belong and contribute in a context. A context where we are affirmed and thus also feel safe to be ourselves while daring to expose what we cannot or are worried about.
We also want to emphasize the importance of having an ongoing dialogue about what is happening in the business. Based on the concept of “conversations in progress”, we then have an approach with regular reviews and the opportunity to raise issues relating to our work situation and how it is affected by various events in a non-dramatic way.

Ability to engage in dialog

Fundamental to a good conversation at the campfire and in the ongoing reconciliation is that there is a good ability to dialog between the participants. We support this with the dialog competence model developed at Stockholm University, which helps us to speak so that others understand, listen openly and actively, reconsider when we gain new insights and challenge what we hear when the situation so requires.