Organisations Owe Their People Structure and Clarity

NOTE: This is Monday's Newsletter on a Tuesday (and therefore no short one with a video) because LinkedIn had yet another glitch but here we are. Anti-Impression Management and Clarity practice: I wrote a book called “People Before Tech: Psychological Safety and Teamwork in the Digital Age” and you can find a discount for it at the bottom of this page., Also, we make software that measures and improves Psychological Safety in teams. If you care about it- come talk to us.

We’re currently running a 4 weeks license-free trial promotion!

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One of the things that Google names in Project Aristotle as the cornerstone to high performance is having “Structure and Clarity” and by that, they mean that “team members have clear roles, plans and goals” but the value of having these two in our work-life extends well past the team and can not be underestimated. It’s why, once in a while, we at PeopleNotTech sound like a broken record and tell you all again things you most likely already know. 

Part of that, the “Did you know?” feature that we have designed in our software that ensures that once in a while, the user gets a splash screen with a tidbit of information concerning the human work that forms the foundation of the science behind the need for their efforts when it comes to Psychological Safety. 

It will be anything from a piece of research, some testimonial from other teams, a stat as to why we need the people-work and so on. The type of thing that the advocates had been saying over and again when talking about these things. The type of things that will remind our users to stay on track and lean into this uncomfortable work because they now remember why it’s worth the effort.

When building the feature we struggled -as ever- with balancing the needs of the super-users for whom showing this elicits an eye-roll and a DUH and of those who are newly arrived at the concept who only got the one presentation or email chain and thought it was yet another “fluffy Friday afterthought” topic so didn’t pay that much attention. 

As an interesting insight, in our design session about the “Did you know?” feature we decided we’ve investigated if a “Yeah I did know”/ “Had no clue”/“Don’t care” sort of options are applicable responses in lieu of a simple “Okay, take me back to my Dashboard/questions” button. 

It sparked quite the journey of discussion on the principles of learning, the needed quantity of repetition when it comes to new and unfamiliar actions -such as the need to do the human work- etc. It also prompted us to consider our users’ state of mind as created by the existent HumanDebt? once again - how willing are people to admit they didn’t know something however inconsequential and how would that make them feel? Would they Impression Manage against looking ignorant even while using a completely anonymous piece of software? Would they believe they knew something and imply they are firmly familiar with it even though they only had it as secondary and fleeting information re-triggered by the visual? Should we phase out the data that they consistently report as “known”? Should the enterprise reward its people for knowing these things? Will they simply click on “knew that” hoping they would? Should we maybe quiz them and check? 

All unanswered, exploratory questions at this point but as ever, we love bringing you into our design process when we can. Fascinating work that is now going to be brought to conclusion with the help of direct feedback as we are -as ever- starting with the MVP (minimum viable product) of the feature and bringing it to our client teams to get their actual feeling of it before we proceed with refining the feature. Meanwhile, the MVP itself will take some pressure off the advocates and superheroes and help the team stay on track because it brings the blessed “clarity” of why we are doing the Psychological Safety work. 

Just like we’ve spent some time considering what Clarity we owe, everyone should try it. There’s so much right now that is “up in the air” that, no matter how resilient our people have become and how they have increased their capacity of being flexible and of facing uncertainty, there’s no reason to ask them to apply that resilience to things that can and should be clarified. 

Here are some blunt questions in some people’s minds that also could do with extreme clarity to help with this work:

• What really IS Psychological Safety? Is it truly different from the confused attributed meaning of job security or mental wellbeing? 
• If it is a group behavioural norm or a team dynamic is it super important to our performance or is it just a “nice to have”?
• Can we get more Psychologically Safe as a team intentionally?
• What is the difference between a team and a workgroup?
• What is our unifying purpose as a team, what impact do we make?
• Why should we do any of this people-work?
• When and how should we do it? What *precisely* can be done in human work?
• Does the organisation want us to do this? Do we have true “organisational permission” or is this yet another “let’s make you happy” 3 weeks wonder project?
• Are there any risks for me as an individual team member if I open up 100% or if I experiment and fail? Are there any rewards?

Before all those though, here’s what we need to answer first and foremost in a firm, caring way that’s devoid of uncertainties: “What will work look like from now on? FOR US.” 

For the swathes of people living with the uncertainty that this debate on hybrid versus a return to office brings, none of the questions above will even matter as they are trying hard to keep their cool, continue working hard and wait for the enterprise to communicate what the future should look like or if they are permitted to build their own. Essentially, they are waiting to be told about the “Structure” part of the “Structure and Clarity” concept that Google name in their study quoted above. 

As an organisation or a decision-maker reading this - you owe your people this structure and clarity and firm, clearly articulated non-wishy-washy-cumbersome-policy-driven answers and you owe them fast and on repeat. 

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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.

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