Why Is It Important?

Culture refers to shared customs or behaviors among members of a group of people. Open culture refers to the custom of defaulting to open principles of transparency, collaboration, community, inclusivity, and adaptability. Studies have shown that high-performing teams need psychological safety, and open culture reinforces the behavior patterns that allow for this.

What do we mean by psychological safety? William Kahn introduced this term in 1990,1 explaining Psychological Safety was experienced as feeling able to show and employ one's self without fear of negative consequences to self-image, status, or career. Dr Amy Edmondson provided further explanation in her 1999 paper,2 where she stated, Psychological safety is a belief that one will not be punished or humiliated for speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns, or mistakes. This was taken from her 1999 paper that got picked up by the Google Project Aristotle in 2013. That Google study found that...