Making Dents in the HumanDebt? is Frustrating AF

This week I wrote about our software -and any other work on Psychological Safety- being essentially the equivalent of CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) but for teams in our other Chasing Psychological Safety newsletter.

In a nutshell, the article postulates that if we can empower teams with enough data on their behaviours and give them the tools to correct the bad ones and encourage the good ones and the strategies to reframe and work on it they will and they’ll succeed. Brace yourselves today as this is an up-in-arms venting article about how it was received. These were the reactions:

• Nada. The equivalent of a digital shrug on the article itself. Little in the way of views, no comments, few likes. Worst of all, later that afternoon, I was discussing an upcoming keynote with a bank and the CHRO made it a point that they had read my article in the morning so I asked what did they think, isn’t it exciting to think in terms of effective, measurable change in our people that can be done by the team themselves they drew a long -and painfully awkward when on Zoom!- proper blank. There wasn’t any excitement for the news that transformation can be at the team’s fingertips. In fact, they simply didn’t want to even talk about the team dynamic or the stuff we have to do in terms of human interventions at all. “Can we get back to changing mindsets in the context of hybrid working, please?”
• “None of my business.” Partially hoping I’d cleanse my palate, I reached out to some of the people I thought would have been excited in other ways as they were Agile. While a handful reacted like I thought they would and we had a sanity-restoring chat, to my surprise, some sounded like they had given up. “Totally get that and the HumanDebt concept but now that you put it this way it makes me wonder - is this really my fight? I sure am not a therapist so CBT (or any other T) is not my expertise. Not to mention I’ve tried to show the organisation SO many things of the good stuff we’ve been doing within my teams to keep them emotionally well and there was no interest, no point in trying”. Unsurprisingly, to me, this one is painful because when the giving up comes from HR or even Leadership I half expect it, but seeing what I call “DevOps Heroes” do any of it -even if they haven’t admitted it themselves yet- is really disheartening if entirely understandable. I hold out hope I just caught them on one of the entirely advisable “Out of Heroic Service” down days when they are perfectly entitled to be defeated and off and self-pitying and whatever else allows them to recharge batteries for putting the cape back on. 
• “It’s not the same thing”- DUH it’s not. Any type of psychotherapy is designed for individuals - this is precisely the problem - where is the “therapy” for teams at work? Where is the stuff that changes the behaviour of the group -as done by the group itself- in order to better themselves? Who points out or even analyses the human dynamic in a team? Who even cares enough to put it on the menu? That’s why the simile is valuable and worth the discussion. “There’s team coaching” - and there is and there should be, but team coaching is to team wellbeing, what psychotherapy is to the individual - a guided, talking-based longer engagement built on systematic sharing and guided progress depending entirely on the presence of a skilled hand-holder whereas CBT is a set of “aha!” moments followed by clear and effective tips and strategies on how to improve the behaviours independently. The fish and the fishing rod. But I don’t mind this reaction, by all means, disagree! In fact, I would have hoped for much more of it! It cracks the debate wide open and that’s where our best moments come from. I’m happy to have even gotten the comparison wrong, tell me how and why and we would have both gained something! 

Needless to say, the last two reactions make a lot more sense to me and I can deal with them, whereas the first is really playing on my mind because it’s part and parcel of the HumanDebt. For one thing, it highlights the divide - the first one almost exclusively comes from “mandated people leaders” (HR, Leadership) whereas the second two come from “de-facto people leaders” (Agile folks, Tech community).

Then there’s the need to understand why it even comes about and the more I think about it the more I conclude that the first reaction of apparent complete lack of interest, from the “mandated people leaders”, is just an ill-disguised feeling of being threatened . Sheer “throne-clutching” - aka the fear of losing one’s place of importance in the organisation - “If this is true and teams can first see then sort their own negative behaviours and therefore grow their Psychological Safety and become more performant on their own thanks to these CBT-like strategies you’re on about, then what will be the point of us?!?”. 

To be very frank, it is bedazzling to me that anyone ever finds us -and by “us” I mean PeopleNotTech but also the progress the DevOps community made on human topic- threatening in general -and they so do- because they weren’t anywhere near doing these jobs themselves anyway. Let’s be honest here. What of their existent measurements of anything ever resulted in any tangible *positive* change in our work lives? Whose L&D is truly driving learning cultures instead of the Tech folks creating DOJOs and blameless spaces? Whose HR comes over once a week to check if the team is Norming or still Storming and help them recognise it? Who ensures there’s an equivalent to the Aristotle score as a KPI? Which people business partner is the Agile coach now? Who helps people understand what Impression Management is and that they need to steer away from it because Psychological Safety is super-needed in particular now?  

Doesn’t help that most of the reactions I’m detailing above happened after I’ve recorded this week’s video https://youtu.be/EQfbx7V9luE which contains an anecdote so extreme it already made me question the point of the fight.

It’s short and it contains a story I -thankfully!- only heard once, so I’m hoping is an immense fluke (and to those of you who told it to me - I SO hope things have changed already for you!) but it illustrates the size of the HumanDebt? when it comes to the road from Command and Control to Servant Leadership and the same inability to let go of the old and understand what the job at hand is.

May your HumanDebt and your blood pressure both stay low this week!

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The 3 “commandments of Psychological Safety” to build high performing teams are: Understand, Measure and Improve

Read more about our Team Dashboard that measures and improves Psychological Safety at www.peoplenottech.com or reach out at [email protected] and let's help your teams become Psychologically Safe, healthy, happy and highly performant.