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18 insights about Psychological Safety

“With what theme can we help Agile teams take a hit?” In the middle of the lockdown, we ask ourselves that question as Agile Coaches, Scrum Masters, Agile Trainers, Product Owners and Leadership Coaches at Scrum Academy. Soon there are more than 10 post-its stuck to the wall with “Psychological Safety. With current events like ‘Omtzigt position elsewhere’ and the ‘gluurapparature of employers’, we learned beautifully in the following months how not to handle Psychological Safety. But how should it be handled? In this article I give you an overview of all our articles, tips, tools, videos, models and insights that will help you build Psychologically Safe teams.

In addition, we discuss the following topics in this article:

Recognizing pitfalls best avoided

Chances are you recognize your team(s) in one of the following situations. This is not a disaster, it is the beginning of a new upward trend. Recognize your pitfall, deal with it and follow a Masterclass in Psychological Safety, for example. The most common pitfalls in Psychological Safety are:

  • Saying it is psychologically safe, when in reality it is absolutely not. Pretending, in other words. Thus, they no longer recognize what is safe and what is unsafe, causing team members to behave in a wait-and-see manner.
  • Openly burning down dissenting opinions. This makes team members think twice about sharing their opinions again. Result? You are selling yourself short as a team and not highlighting all perspectives of an issue.
  • Punishing mistakes. In doing so, you beat the creativity out of a team, when it is much smarter to learn from mistakes made.
  • Ignoring or not giving feedback. Not giving your opinion or completely ignoring it creates a lack of participation that you need precisely to create a safe climate.
  • Poor exemplary behavior.


Do you doubt whether your team is psychologically safe and would like to measure it? Good news. Get started with this free online tool that Scrum Academy developed to zoom in on the Psychological Safety in your team.

The theory behind Psychological Security

Psychological Safety does not immediately ring a bell with everyone. But perhaps you on the team are doing super well with Psychological Safety, without consciously working on it. What could you tell? Team members are accepted, you feel the inclusiveness, there is room to learn, everyone is allowed to contribute and the prevailing view in the team is regularly challenged. That all sounds very nice and inspiring, of course, but what kind of theory is behind it? Trainer Martijn van Asseldonk likes to give you a very clear explanation of Timothy Clark’s theory in this inspiring vlog and this enlightening blog.

“Psychological Safety is a condition in which you feel (1) included, (2) safe to learn, (3) safe to contribute, and (4) safe to challenge the status quo – all without fear of being embarrassed, marginalized, or punished in some way” – Timothy Clark

Will you discover where your team stands with this unique tool? Keep building confidence in your team.

Psychological Safety for Scrum Masters & Agile Coaches

The great challenge of many Agile teams is that of the job to be done, they often know more not to know, than they do. So all those teams love to experiment and give feedback. At least that would be the ideal climate for those teams. The climate where all team members feel free enough to experiment and keep learning. As an Agile Coach and Scrum Master the task of coaching teams to create and monitor this safe climate. How? You’ll know with the vlogs and blogs below.

Psychological Safety for Product Owners

Managing stakeholders, developing vision, cutting through knots, ensuring return on investment. That fills the day of the Product Owner. And many a Product Owner experiences quite a bit of pressure. After all, as a Product Owner you know that you work with super creative teams, you want them to excel in inventive solutions. And yes…. that can and will fail sometime. Just then, keeping your cool is an art. It helps enormously if you know, even in the heat of the moment , what you can contribute to Psychological Safety. You always win in the long run!

In conclusion

I enjoyed covering this important topic and also got to learn from other experts myself. Thanks for all the great comments on the socials and even on the street I have been asked several times about the inspiring vlogs and blogs. The fact that many people recognize what is going on at work underlines the importance of our well-timed theme month. With so much working from home and all the corona measures, we in many teams have become a bit disconnected from each other. At least with the Psychological Safety theme, we have provided a lot of tools to reconnect. Take advantage of it!

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