A Brief History of Psychological Safety

Last week, I dusted off my Henley Business School Master’s dissertation and revisited the fascinating evolution of psychological safety - a concept that’s central to high-performing teams, yet still widely misunderstood and, at times, misused.

Long before it had a name, legendary thinkers were describing its essence. From Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (safety, belonging, self-esteem) to Carl Rogers’ idea of unconditional positive regard, the foundations of psychological safety have been present in human development theory for decades.

It was Edgar Schein and Warren Bennis in 1965 who coined the term in a management context. They described psychological safety as the reduction of interpersonal risk in a group and how essential it is for people to feel secure enough to change their behaviour. In 1990, William Kahn built on this, defining it as the ability to “employ or express oneself without fear of negative consequences to self-image, status, or career.” His research in a summer camp and architecture firm laid the groundwork for what would come next.

Enter Amy Edmondson, whose pioneering research in the late 1990s and beyond gave psychological safety structure, language, and evidence. Her studies in both hospitals revealed that high-performing teams actually report more mistakes - not because they make more, but because they feel safe enough to speak up and learn from this. Her books, The Fearless Organization (2018) and The Right Kind of Wrong (2023), have since become essential reading for leaders, coaches, and culture shapers.

In 2016, the concept started to seep into the mainstream thanks to Charles Duhigg's article in The New York Times introducing the world to Google’s Project Aristotle, a two-year study into what makes teams effective. The top factor? Psychological safety, alongside other critical dynamics including the impact and meaning of the work, clear structure, and dependability.

Yet, despite this growing awareness, psychological safety is still often misunderstood. It’s not about being “nice” or avoiding conflict. As one client recently put it to me just last week, it’s about being comfortable with being uncomfortable. It’s about creating environments where people can challenge ideas, admit mistakes, and take risks - without fear of embarrassment or reprisal.

Done right, psychological safety is a performance driver. It leads to:

·       More informed and in turn better decision-making

·       Stronger creativity and innovation

·       Faster learning from mistakes (because we will make them, we are human after all)

·       Greater inclusion, motivation, and engagement

Authors like Patrick Lencioni and Margaret Heffernan may not use the term explicitly, but their work speaks directly to its principles. Lencioni’s Five Dysfunctions of a Team highlights the dangers of avoiding conflict and lacking trust. Heffernan’s Wilful Blindness explores how false harmony and unspoken truths can derail organisations. And Dr Sam Mather who was so supportive to me during my final year at Henley, put it brilliantly "we can speak our minds and it will not be weaponised against us". 

Today, thanks to tools like the Fearless Organization Scan, the Caerus Change accreditation, and own instant diagnostic tool, psychological safety can be measured and developed - just like any other key business metric...in minutes.

So given this concept only started to really seep in to corporate language since Duhigg's article in 2016 and Edmondon's first book in 2018 - it is perhaps not surprising it is not fully understood. This means the opportunity now is to move beyond buzzwords and embed psychological safety into the DNA of our teams and organisations.

Make it as tangible as your share price or market share—because the cost of silence is too high.