Why Inclusion Safety Is Your Right in the Workplace
When starting a new role at a company, it is your right to be included. You don’t need to earn that right by “proving yourself” because you’re the “new sheriff” in town.
As you help all your team members feel included, you’re setting the groundwork for intentional success.
In today’s short video, I’ll share why inclusion safety is arguably the most important of the four cornerstones of psychological safety and how to lead from an inclusive workplace.
Video Transcript
0:01
Hi, everybody, I hope you're doing well today. It's a little bit cloudy out. But I thought I'd get out because the temperature is nice and I have some time to talk to all of you.
You know, with this fourth surge of the pandemic, we've been spending a lot of time lately in companies talking about physical well-being, and rightly so. And we've spent some more time not enough, really talking about mental well-being.
But one of the things we're not talking about as much is psychological safety, which is so critical for us, especially during these times of uncertainty with our teams and our companies, whether we're going back to the office or not.
I'm Cory Colton, from Inflection Point Coaching, and this is what I'm thinking about today.
So if you've read any of my blogs about psychological safety, you know that, for a long time, there's been a lot of thought leadership around the subject of psychological safety. But until recently, we haven't really had much structure around the subject, until Dr. Timothy Clark and his folks at Leader Factor came up with the four stages of psychological safety.
And those four stages are inclusion safety - making people feel welcome for who they are. learner safety - allowing people to learn and learn from their mistakes, contributor safety - which is where you take those learnings, and you bring them back to make things better, and challenger safety - where you're able to challenge the status quo without fear of repercussions.
And today, I wanted to talk about inclusion safety, which is really the basis of all of it. And inclusion, safety is really about making people feel welcome on the team and in the company just for who they are with all of their differences, and all of their experiences.
And if somebody is human, and doesn't present any harm to anyone or to the team, then inclusion safety is owed. It's not earned. It's something that just comes with being a part of the team.
So thinking about that, I was coaching a leader a while ago, who was experiencing higher than normal turnover in their team, especially within the first 90 days. And so we were exploring that. And some of the information that was coming back to us through the exit surveys was that the people didn't feel welcomed. And they didn't feel like the culture that they were promised in onboarding was actually the culture that they experienced when they got to the job.
And so I asked this leader why they thought that they were experiencing this turnover, and about some of the best practices that we know they should follow to make people feel welcomed. So we were talking about the onboarding process, and I asked how things were going with the first one-on-one meetings, and when those were occurring.
And it turns out, that this leader, was really not scheduling their one-on-one meetings with their direct reports until about two to three weeks after they come on board. And I asked why that was. And it seems that there was some sort of a shadow evaluation period that was happening on the team where some of the team members were evaluating the person for culture fit before they were included fully in the operations of the team, in events, and in meetings.
So we talked about that a little bit. And I asked the leader about that. And she said that they really wanted to make sure that people were going to be there for the long haul before they included them fully.
And as we continued to discuss, I started to ask about the recruiting and onboarding process, and I said, who made the decision to hire the person? And she said I did. And I said, Well, how was the interview process? Who was involved? And it seemed that the whole team was involved in that recruiting process. And the person was hired after they go through panel interviews with the rest of the team.
4:57
So I said, Well, why do they need to do this evaluation for this two to three week period?'' How would you feel as an employee, if you were hired for a role after all of those interviews after everybody nodded their head, and you still needed to do additional evaluation?
And it struck her that this was an issue.
What was happening is there was a shadow period where people were being reevaluated. And during that time, those new employees were feeling left out, they were feeling unwelcome, and they were feeling like they weren't valued.
And so my last question to this leader since she was a woman was, how would that be compounded for you if you experienced that? As a woman employee? And have you ever experienced that situation as a woman leader? And it seems like that's when the awareness hit.
And so I want us to think about ourselves as leaders, how do we ensure that people feel welcomed and valued onto the team from day one? How do we ensure that they are part of the process? And that they can come to the team and be welcomed and valued with all of their background with all their history? And with all of their uniqueness?
Are you at an inflection point with understanding psychological safety? If so, please feel free to schedule a meeting with me. I'll be happy to do a free consult conversation, and I'm happy to partner with you on the subject.
If you have any questions, please reach out at cory@inflectionpointcoaching.net or contact me through my website, www.inflectionpointcoaching.net.
I'm Cory Colton, executive and leader coach. And that's what I'm thinking about today. Thanks all
Practice Inclusion safety To Build Teams That Last
When it comes to inclusion safety, eliminating the need for new hires to continually “prove themselves” goes a long way. Remember welcoming someone to your team is owed, not earned.
If strengthening or creating an inclusive workplace is something you’d like some assistance with, reach out and schedule a free strategy session with me.