Psychological Bravery

The trope of “psychological bravery” crops up a lot.

But what does it mean? Typically, “psychological bravery” is an attempt to reframe: instead of focusing on creating psychologically safe environments, we should simply encourage individuals to be braver.

In other words, instead of us doing the work of lowering the real and genuine risks of speaking up, it’s on other people to “be courageous” and take the risk anyway.

This is an individualistic lens on a collective phenomenon – which may explain why we see the idea resonate more in more North Atlantic, Western, individualistic cultures like the US, and less in more and collectivist contexts and cultures. It also emerges generally from a place of privilege, which may be invisible to the person with the view – it may be tempting to think that because I feel like I can be “psychologically brave” enough to speak up, so should others.

Now, I get it. The “bravery” angle often springs from the valid recognition that even in the safest teams, speaking up can still feel risky. It still takes some courage, which is true. It would be a massive overreach to believe that working on psychological safety means creating a space where people don’t need any courage to speak up, or where speaking up incurs zero risk. Not only is that not true, it’s impossible. There is no such thing as a zero-risk interaction. Speaking up always incurs some level of risk, and always demands a little, or sometimes a lot, of courage.

As Erving Goffman wrote in “The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life” (1959, p243):

“…there is no interaction in which the participants do not take an appreciable chance of being slightly embarrassed or a slight chance of being deeply humiliated. Life may not be much of a gamble, but interaction is.”

So yes, the risk is there, and the need for courage is real. But when we demand “psychological bravery” instead of fostering psychological safety, we shift responsibility back to individuals instead of the collective work of reducing the risks.

The stakes of speaking up are higher for some than others.

We have to recognise that the risk we’re asking people to take is far greater for some than others – folks from under-represented groups, people with speech differences, those with less formal power, those for whom the group language is not their native language, folks from less financially secure backgrounds, and many more. Myriad factors come into play in regard to the risks of speaking up, and for some, the stakes are very high. A team is only as safe as the least safe person – and we’ll rarely know who that person is.

Of course, speaking up verbally may be near-impossible for some, so “speaking up” must include other ways of taking interpersonal risks, such as email or text, sign language, writing on a note, speaking in another language, or speaking through an advocate.

Of course, we should ask that people speak up when necessary. We need people to speak up about danger, injustice, harm and inequity. That responsibility to speak up about issues big and small in order to prevent harm is very real. But to frame it as simply a matter of “psychological bravery” ignores the context in which speaking up happens.

Psychological safety isn’t just about reframing – the real-life consequences of speaking up can be life changing.

Every day people lose their jobs, careers, or liberty as a result of speaking up, especially against power. To call that a matter of “psychological bravery” is to imply that not speaking up in the face of such risks is cowardice.

Framing speaking up as “psychological bravery” is so inaccurate, it’s verging on offensive.