Elizabeth is a former corporate criminal defence lawyer with 17 years’ experience working in a top 10 global law firm, defending large organisations against serious health and safety investigations and prosecutions. After completing a Masters in Psychology, she now provides specialist consultancy and training services on psychological safety and leadership behavioural integrity. She also delivers witness interview training to EHS and HR professionals responsible for conducting workplace investigations, with a focus on ‘witness memory: the psychology and neuroscience’. She works with a broad range of clients across various sectors, from PLCs to medium-sized businesses. 

TOP TIPS

 Most workplace fatalities and serious incidents don’t come out of the blue. They are often preceded by warning signs: safety concerns, smaller incidents or near misses that were never reported. Under-reporting not only undermines the accuracy of safety data but, more importantly, it prevents organisations from properly identifying, investigating and remedying issues. This, of course, presents a serious and real risk to both employees and organisations. 

So how do we encourage employees to raise safety concerns and report incidents? Simply asking employees to ‘speak up’ is not enough. Research in the field of psychology shows that employees are more likely to speak up when they experience higher levels of psychological safety with their line manager and when their line managers ‘walk the talk’ on safety and take safety conversations seriously. 

But what is psychological safety? Harvard Business School Professor Amy Edmondson defines psychological safety as a “shared belief that it is safe to speak up without fear of embarrassment, rejection or punishment”. In a health and safety context, this means creating an environment where employees feel confident raising concerns, reporting near misses and incidents, or challenging unsafe behaviours, without fear of negative consequence. 

Psychological safety is built through everyday leadership behaviours and conversations. Here are five steps organisations can take to improve psychological safety and incident reporting: 

1.  Create regular opportunities for employees to speak up.

Speaking up shouldn’t depend on employees finding the right moment or having the confidence to initiate a conversation. Give line managers the tools to actively invite input as part of everyday interactions. For example, instead of asking, “Do you have any near misses to report?”, try asking, “Is everything as safe as you’d like it to be?” Give people time to think, actively invite quieter colleagues to contribute, and never assume that silence means everything is fine. Alongside these day-to-day conversations, create structured opportunities for employees to raise concerns and share their views. Round-robin discussions in toolbox talks, anonymous feedback channels, one-to-ones and regular ‘Start, Stop, Continue’ retrospectives can all give employees different ways to contribute.

2. Respond productively.

How a manager responds when an employee raises a safety concern or reports an incident can significantly influence whether that employee, and those around them, will be prepared to speak up in the future. Aside from what is said in response, if someone is met with visible frustration or negative body language, employees may be dissuaded from speaking up again. Equally, if a manager appears distracted, dismissive or simply disinterested in the safety conversation, employees may conclude that speaking up is not valued. 

 Train line managers to understand how their behaviour can significantly influence whether a direct report will speak up to them and how to respond productively when concerns are raised, even when the news is difficult or inconvenient. This includes managing their immediate reaction and body language, giving the conversation their full attention and thanking employees for speaking up. 

3. Avoid a blame culture.

Safety incidents often have multiple contributory factors. Helping managers understand this encourages them to ask “What happened?” before “Who’s responsible?” when an incident is reported. This not only supports better incident investigation but also reduces the fear of blame that can discourage employees from reporting concerns in the first place. Phrase ‘near misses’ as ‘good catches’. 

4. Model vulnerability.

People are less likely to admit mistakes, report near misses or challenge decisions if their leaders never acknowledge their own errors. Encourage leaders and line managers to model the behaviour they want to see by openly sharing lessons learned, decisions they would approach differently or occasions when they didn’t get something right. By demonstrating that learning matters more than appearing perfect, managers can help create an environment where others feel safer admitting mistakes, asking questions and speaking up when something doesn’t seem right. 

5. Close the loop. Trust is quickly eroded when people raise concerns but never receive feedback on what steps were taken. If employees believe nothing changes, they’ll eventually stop speaking up. Always close the feedback loop. Let people know what action has been taken, what’s still being investigated, or why a different decision has been made. Even when you can’t act, explain why. People don’t expect every concern to result in change; they do expect to know they’ve been heard. 

Written by Elizabeth Hyde

Please note, the views expressed by the original article author are theirs alone and do not necessarily represent those of Washingtondowling Associates Ltd or The SHE Show and therefore we take no responsibility for the content or accuracy of this post.