You don’t need a “leader” title to build psychological safety at work.
8 hours ago
“I don’t really know what the point in speaking up is. I know that it won’t make much of a difference.”
That was me, as a Mid-level Designer, staying at a job where design couldn’t make a difference. It took me a while to realize what the issue was: there was no psychological safety on the job.
I didn’t feel able to speak up, and this is a growing problem many designers face. When designers are asked to do more with less, and AI has everyone moving faster, the path of least resistance is to keep your head down and ship what you’re handed.
But even mid-level designers have the power to change this situation, more than you think.
The Conversations Designers Have to Have
In Crucial Conversations, by Kerry Patterson et al., the authors note that most hard conversations go wrong for the same reason: people don’t feel safe to say what they mean.