How to Build Psychological Safety at Work
If you want your team to be innovative, engaged, and resilient, start here: build psychological safety.
It’s not just a buzzword. Psychological safety—the belief that people can speak up, take risks, and be honest without fear of retaliation—is the foundation of trust, collaboration, and long-term impact.
Without it, teams walk on eggshells. With it, they walk together.
So how do you actually build psychological safety? Not as a one-off training, but as an ongoing cultural practice?
Let’s break it down.
What Does Psychological Safety Look Like?
This month on the Create Forward blog, we’ve been discussing the importance of psychological safety and its role in creating a thriving organizational culture. If you have read the first two posts, I encourage you to go back and read them to get a definition of what psychological safety is and why it’s so essential to doing good work in the world.
Before we build it, we need to recognize it.
Psychological safety is present when:
People ask for help without shame
Feedback is welcome across roles and identities
Mistakes are acknowledged and addressed without blame
Disagreements are explored, not avoided
Identity-based concerns are named and responded to with care
It’s not about avoiding conflict; it’s about creating space where conflict is generative, leading to learning, increased trust, and repair when necessary.
5 Practices That Build Psychological Safety
Creating psychological safety is possible with a series of simple, intentional shifts in practice, grounded in a commitment to centering relationships over outcomes.
1. Model Vulnerability
Psychological safety starts at the top. When leaders admit they don’t know something, acknowledge mistakes, or ask for feedback, they send a clear message:
“It’s safe to not have all the answers here.”
This opens the door for others to show up with more authenticity and courage.
2. Create Feedback Loops (Not Landmines)
Don’t wait for annual reviews to talk about what’s working or not. Normalize regular, two-way feedback—especially upward feedback to leadership.
Try:
Asking: “What’s one thing I could do differently to support you better?”
Offering: “Would you like feedback, or would you prefer support right now?”
Over time, this builds a culture where feedback becomes a normative part of how you engage.
3. Establish Group Norms Together
Bring your team into a shared conversation:
What do we each need to feel safe to contribute?
How do we want to handle disagreement?
What should happen if someone causes harm?
Co-creating norms builds ownership, trust, and makes accountability more meaningful.
4. Interrupt Bias and Power Imbalances
Psychological safety cannot exist in environments where power goes unchecked or bias is ignored.
Make equity part of the conversation by:
Holding identity-affirming spaces (like affinity groups or care circles)
Reviewing decision-making structures for transparency and access
Inviting feedback on how power is held and used
Safety for some is not enough. True safety is when people can ask for what they need and know that efforts will be made to accommodate them.
5. Repair When Trust Is Broken
Mistakes and harm will happen. What matters is how you respond.
Practice:
Naming the harm clearly
Centering the person(s) impacted
Taking transparent steps to repair
Adjusting systems to prevent recurrence
Safety deepens when people know that when harm happens, it will be met with care, not a cover-up.
How We Support Psychological Safety at Create Forward
In our Thriving Culture program, we partner with mission-driven leaders to integrate safety, care, and accountability into the core of organizational life.
We support you through:
Culture Audits to assess psychological safety, mutual connection, and equity systems
Team Coaching to surface tensions, build communication skills, and align around shared values
Community Care Circles that nurture connection and belonging across lines of identity and difference
Because your team deserves more than strategies that look good on paper, they deserve a culture that feels safe in practice.
Take the First Step
Psychological safety doesn’t happen by accident. It’s built one conversation, one decision, one practice at a time.
Start with reflection: Download our free Psychological Safety Self-Assessment
Ready to go deeper?
Schedule a Culture Discovery Call and let’s build safety together.