Somebody always knew: A conversation between Amy Edmondson and Rita McGrath, Top-Ranked Global Thinkers

The topic of psychological safety has taken the world by storm as we realize that in a VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous) world, there is a huge premium on fast learning. With the recent Thinkers50 recognition of Amy Edmondson’s work, I thought people might enjoy some notes from our Friday Fireside Chat (and I’m thrilled to be right there next to her on the list!). You can listen in on the conversation at this link.

“We put the Thinkers50 recipe for the bespoke cocktail “Seeing Double Around Corners” to good use over our family holiday Thanksgiving celebrations. The verdict was that it was absolutely delicious!” — Rita McGrath

Harvard’s Amy Edmondson and I got together in early June, 2020, for a Friday Fireside chat to talk about her fabulous book The Fearless Organization. I’ll pull out a few key points of discussion here, but it’s really worth a listen if you’d like to go more in-depth. And get the book — it is really terrific.

What is psychological safety?

It is “a shared belief held by members of a team that the team is safe for interpersonal risk taking.”

What that means practically is that there isn’t the fear of bringing up ideas, concerns, questions or possible mistakes among people working together. Speaking up, in other words.

But, as we discussed, we are always calculating, often unconsciously, the benefit to cost ratio of speaking up…