Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay
The Role of Nurse Leaders in Ensuring Psychological Safety to Team Members at the Healthcare Workplace
Psychological safety is concerned with individual employee perceptions about the repercussions of their actions at the workplace with regard to interpersonal interactions. The nurse leader is one of the key persons in the organization who are crucial in creating a psychologically safe work environment (Sherman, 2012). She is expected to understand that workplace safety behavior is affected by various psychological factors (Kotzé & Steyn, 2013). Creating a healthy and supportive workplace environment as through transformational leadership is therefore paramount (Arnold et al., 2011) Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay.
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The nurse executive can therefore make the case for creation of a psychological safe workplace to the various team leaders by pointing out what needs to be done. She needs to let them know that in a psychologically unsafe workplace environment, nurses may not report problems or mistakes made out of fear of the repercussions and how the news will be received. She should thus make the point by letting the team leaders know that they need to (Sherman, 2012):
- Let team members freely speak their minds at all times.
- Allow for disagreements in an amicable and constructive way.
- Not hold mistakes against the team members who make them.
- Encourage the freedom of sharing information, whether positive or negative.
- Encourage open discussion of thorny issues, and
- Allow for contrary opinions.
- Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay
Presentation of the role of team leaders in creating a psychologically safe workplace environment is going to take place through training them to adopt a healthy and supportive workplace culture (Arnold et al., 2011). They will be trained to set workplace rules of engagement, encourage open two-way communication, create opportunities for bringing employees together, encourage appreciation of diversity, and value people (the team members) more than workplace processes (Forbes Coaches Council, 2017) Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay. One of the challenges that might be faced in working with the team members to achieve this include encounters with difficult personality traits of some of the team leaders, such as the narcissistic personality trait. Overcoming this would require patience and a cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) approach to training this particular type of team leader (APA, 2020).
References
American Psychological Association [APA] (2020). What is cognitive behavioral therapy? Retrieved 16 March 2020 from https://www.apa.org/ptsd-guideline/patients-and-families/cognitive-behavioral
Arnold, I.M.F., Mulvale, G., GermAnn, K., & Baynton, M. (2011). Opportunities abound to improve mental health and psychological safety in the workplace. Healthcare Papers, 11(Special Issue), 85-90. Doi: 10.12927/hcpap.2011.22414
Forbes Coaches Council (November 15, 2017). 14 ways you can improve psychological safety at work. Forbes. Retrieved 16 March 2020 from https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/2017/11/15/14-ways-you-can-improve-psychological-safety-at-work/#6dee1ee85610
Kotzé, M. & Steyn, L. (2013). The role of psychological factors in workplace safety. Ergonomics, 56(12), 1928-1939. DOI: 10.1080/00140139.2013.851282
Sherman, R.O. (May 24, 2012). Creating psychological safety in our workplaces. Emerging RN Leader. Retrieved 16 May 2020 from https://www.emergingrnleader.com/emergingnurseleader-8/
To Prepare:
Review the Learning Resources on psychological safety. In particular, review the video resources featuring Amy Edmondson, a Harvard professor and expert on psychological safety in the workplace.
Consider the role of team leaders in creating psychologically safe environments, and based on the resources provided, the specific benefits for healthcare organizations. Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay
Reflect on your role as a nurse executive and how you would explain to team leaders and other managers in a healthcare setting their roles in creating psychologically safe environments for team members, including benefits for teams and the organization. Consider possible types of resistance from team leaders and others, and how you would respond.
By Day 3 of Week 4
Post the following:
A brief explanation of how, as a nurse executive, you would make the case to team leaders in a healthcare setting for the importance of developing a culture of psychological safety for team members. Describe how you would present the role of team leaders in creating psychologically safe environments, challenges you might face in working with team leaders on this goal, and how you would respond to overcome those challenges Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay. Cite the Learning Resources or other literature to support your post.
Environments are generally fashioned by the people in charge and changing how people react and respond is not as simple as flipping a switch—or even issuing a directive. It often requires providing strong evidence that encourages a change in behavior.
For this Discussion, you will explore the process of creating psychologically safe healthcare teams by considering how you would educate others about the necessity of providing psychological safety and, specifically, how to achieve it.
To Prepare:
Review the Learning Resources on psychological safety. In particular, review the video resources featuring Amy Edmondson, a Harvard professor and expert on psychological safety in the workplace.
Consider the role of team leaders in creating psychologically safe environments, and based on the resources provided, the specific benefits for healthcare organizations Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay.
Reflect on your role as a nurse executive and how you would explain to team leaders and other managers in a healthcare setting their roles in creating psychologically safe environments for team members, including benefits for teams and the organization. Consider possible types of resistance from team leaders and others, and how you would respond.
By Day 3 of Week 4
Post the following:
A brief explanation of how, as a nurse executive, you would make the case to team leaders in a healthcare setting for the importance of developing a culture of psychological safety for team members. Describe how you would present the role of team leaders in creating psychologically safe environments, challenges you might face in working with team leaders on this goal, and how you would respond to overcome those challenges. Cite the Learning Resources or other literature to support your post.
Psychological Safety
How, as a nurse executive, you would make the case to team leaders in a healthcare setting for the importance of developing a culture of psychological safety for team members.
Psychological safety in a healthcare working environment refers to the belief that an employee will not be punished, or face humiliation for speaking their concerns, questions, or mistakes (Aranzamendez, James, & Toms, 2015). Teams that make mistakes tend to be more successful compared to those that avoid mistakes or criticize employees for making mistakes (Newman & Donohue, 2017). This is because when an organization creates an environment where people feel safe and comfortable enough to take up challenges and risks, innovation in such a workplace is enhanced. As a nurse executive, I would build a case for more innovation, creativity, and team participation through the creation of a workplace that nurtures psychological safety. Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay
Describe how you would present the role of team leaders in creating psychologically safe environments.
The first step is to let the team leaders know that the most effective way of creating a psychologically safe place is through leading by example. Team leaders will be tasked with asking for upward feedback from their subordinates; acknowledging their own mistakes; be open to listening to opinions that differ from their own; encourage reports as well as make themselves approachable to team members. The second step would encourage active listening. Team leaders can take actions that show they are actively listening to their team members such as switching off phones during meetings; repeating what a team member says to show the team leader understands; encourage more questions to be asked to improve participation, and actively asking opinions from employees who rarely speak.
Challenges you might face in working with team leaders on this goal, and how you would respond to overcome those challenges
One of the major challenges that I am likely to face with team leaders is a lack of trust (Jones & Van de Ven, 2016). Team leaders may feel they cannot trust the new change; have suspicions as to why the change is being made; or believe that their job is under question. They may also fear that one of the team members may look for reasons to complain about their leadership skills if the team member’s feedbacks are not handled o their satisfaction. To counter this, as a nurse executive I will need to reassure the team leaders that I understand their fears and proceed to help them understand that the new approach will impact the work of every staff member (Will, 2015). I will also ensure that the team leaders embrace the vision of better service delivery and how integrating the new changes would be in line with this vision. Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay
References
Aranzamendez, G., James, D., & Toms, R. (2015, July). Finding antecedents of psychological safety: A step toward quality improvement. In Nursing forum (Vol. 50, No. 3, pp. 171-178).
Jones, S. L., & Van de Ven, A. H. (2016). The changing nature of change resistance: An examination of the moderating impact of time. The Journal of Applied Behavioral Science, 52(4), 482-506.
Newman, A., Donohue, R., & Eva, N. (2017). Psychological safety: A systematic review of the literature. Human Resource Management Review, 27(3), 521-535.
Will, M. G. (2015). Successful organizational change through win-win. Journal of Accounting & Organizational Change Creating Psychologically Safe Healthcare Teams Essay.