Psych Safety Day 2024

After the success of our last Psych Safety Day in Barcelona, we decided to do it again in 2024, in Seville!

Last Friday, the bright open-plan area of a wonderful coworking space in Seville buzzed with lively debate, laughter, and the clinking of coffee cups as practitioners and researchers from across Europe gathered for our 2024 Psych Safety Day. This intimate “conference” aimed to bring people together, share insights and experiences, and strengthen psychological safety in organisations large and small, and it delivered in spades.

Sunlight poured through the windows as attendees trickled in, exchanging greetings over cafe con leche and pastries. The opening keynote challenged the room to rethink icebreakers not as mere rituals but as genuine invitations to vulnerability and support, and to avoid harm whilst maximising impact.

Throughout the day, breakout sessions tackled everything from neurodiversity to culturally sensitive feedback loops. In an interactive workshop, participants practised mapping their organisation’s unspoken “psychological safety blind spots,” then paired up to co-design micro-interventions: simple rituals or signals that could alert colleagues to struggling teammates.

Lunch on the terrace offered a chance to sample some local flavours, jamón, queso, bread and freshly squeezed orange juice, while forging friendships. A panel discussion highlighted how Psychological Safety Ambassadors programs had been piloted in multiple countries, sparking ideas for attendees to adapt the model for industries ranging from healthcare to finance.

The afternoon brought lightning-fast “PechaKucha” presentations: ten slides, twenty seconds each. Then a fantastic Lean Coffee. As dusk fell, participants gathered in the courtyard for cava and flamenco guitar; and we reflected that when we feel heard and protected, safety, creativity and collaboration flourish.

As delegates departed, heads buzzing with new concepts, many vowed to reconvene soon, perhaps in Prague or Copenhagen, to continue building the worldwide community dedicated to psychological safety. For the Psych Safety Day, the consensus was clear: small in scale but grand in ambition, it had already sown the seeds for a safer, more inclusive and higher performing workplace culture across the world.