Sometimes I Muck Up

After lots of you asked for “Safe For Work” versions of our “Sometimes I F*ck Up” stickers, we’ve created these “Sometimes I Muck Up” stickers available in our online shop!

Delivering Effective Feedback

There are still a few spaces available on our fantastic Delivering Effective Feedback online workshop on January 9th, 2025. It’s scheduled for 10am-1pm GMT. Pricing is based on affordability, from £50 to £295.

This Delivering Effective Feedback workshop builds on the foundations of psychologically safe practice in order to use feedback effectively and avoid causing harm.

In our work with teams, we’ve found that only 20%-30% of feedback that people receive is actually useful! This is often simply because the feedback is delivered less skilfully than it could be.

This workshop examines the purpose of feedback, the characteristics of good feedback, traps to avoid, models to use, and practices to employ to ensure the feedback we give is as helpful as it possibly can be. 

All attendees receive a Credly Badge, a CPD certificate of completion, further reading, materials and resources used in the session, a copy of the Psychological Safety Action Pack and a licence to use it in your organisation, and some swag! Book here.

Psychological Safety in Practice

Trust and Psychological Safety

This is one of our most cited articles, which explains the difference and interdependence between trust and psychological safety. It uses the model of cognitive and affective trust, which we find more useful in practice than other, more complex, models of trust.

Measuring Psychological Safety

This is our primary reference article for measuring psychological safety, and introduces the need for understanding our rationale prior to measuring, the dangers of relying on quantitative metrics, and the practice of both quantitative and qualitative approaches. 

Behaviours that foster psychological safety

More important than measuring psychological safety, is actually putting it into practice. Here is our ever-growing list of behaviours that foster psychological safety. This started off as 45 items, but has since grown to more than 160 different practical things to do, and includes behaviours such as:

• Sharing your own learning goals
• Distinguishing the three types of error: slips & lapses, mistakes, violations 
• Defining what is “safe to fail” and therefore “safe to try”
• Managing team and individual cognitive load
• Practising Non-Violent Communication
• Asking for and using people’s pronouns, and sharing your own
• Sharing the signs that you may be anxious, stressed, or tired

And many more.

This week’s poem is my personal favourite to start the year:

We have come to be danced, by Jewel Mathieson

We have come to be danced,
Not the pretty dance,
Not the pretty pretty, pick me, pick me dance
But the claw our way back into the belly
Of the sacred, sensual animal dance
the unhinged, unplugged, cat is out of its box dance,
The holding the precious moment in the palms of our hands and feet dance.

We have come to be danced,
Not the jiffy booby, shake your booty for him dance
But the wring the sadness from our skin dance, The blow the chip off our shoulder dance
The slap the apology from our posture dance.

We have come to be danced,
Not the monkey see, monkey do dance
One, two dance like you
One two three, dance like me dance
But the grave robber, tomb stalker
Tearing scabs & scars open dance
The rub the rhythm raw against our souls dance.

We have come to be danced,
Not the nice invisible, self-conscious shuffle
But the matted hair flying, voodoo mama Shaman shakin’ ancient bones dance!
The strip us from our casings, return our wings, Sharpen our claws & tongues dance,
The shed dead cells and slip into
The luminous skin of love dance.

We have come to be danced,
Not the hold our breath and wallow in the shallow end of the Floor dance
But the meeting of the trinity: the body, breath & beat dance
The shout hallelujah from the top of our thighs dance
The mother may I?
Yes, you may take 10 giant leaps dance,
The Olly Olly Oxen Free Free Free dance,
The everyone can come to our heaven dance!

We have come to be danced. Where the kingdom’s collide
In the cathedral of flesh
To burn back into the light
To unravel, to play, to fly, to pray,
To root in skin sanctuary.
We have come to be danced 
WE HAVE COME…