Psychological safety in a learning environment

Stages of psychological safety

Building psychological safety is a step-by-step process, where the instructor or facilitator can help guide the learners through each successive stage. There are four distinct stages that facilitators and learners need to move through to foster a culture with a high level of psychological safety.

Stage 1: Inclusion safety

When learners feel safe and accepted for who they truly are, embracing all of their unique qualities, it fulfills their need to belong.

Stage 2: Learner safety

When learners feel safe to learn though asking questions, experimenting, and both giving and receiving feedback, it meets their essential need for personal development and growth.

Stage 3: Contributor safety

When learners feel secure in utilizing their skills and talents to contribute to the team, it fulfills their desire to make a meaningful impact.

Stage 4: Challenger safety

When learners feel empowered to question or challenge the status quo in pursuit of improvement, it meets their need to drive change and innovate.

Psychological safety and learner comfort

Each learner will experience lessons on sensitive content differently. Learners who hold identities that have been historically marginalized—including Indigenous, Black, racialized, 2SLGBTQIA+, and disabled individuals—may experience learning spaces as less safe due to past harms, systemic discrimination, or underrepresentation. These factors must be accounted for when fostering truly equitable safety.

Some topics may be difficult to discuss, but fostering a psychologically safer environment may allow learners to continue to learn through the discomfort. Psychological safety is not a one-size-fits-all approach - what feels safe for some learners, may be harmful for others. Facilitators should encourage open discussion with their learners about their comfort zones, monitor their well-being during learning activities, and be prepared to provide support if a learner feels it is no longer psychologically safe for them to continue.

There are three different states of psychological safety:

1. Comfortable
   • Learning is straightforward and easy, often based on having background experience in the topic
   • Learners can deepen their understanding and experience, but are unlikely to experience transformational learning that changes their perspective
2. Discomfort
   • The situation challenges learners with new thoughts, ideas, and perspectives, which can be transformational but also uncomfortable
   • Learners can become comfortable with being uncomfortable in this environment
3. Not psychologically safe
   • This topic is not safe for the learner right now or potentially ever
   • Learners will physically leave the classroom (learning environment) or mentally disconnect
   • Learners are too emotionally activated to learn and should be allowed/encouraged to leave this environment at any time

Fostering psychological safety

Everyone’s behaviours and attitudes, both positive and negative, contribute towards the psychological safety within the group. The following approaches can be used by learners, but they are especially important for facilitators to role-model and actively encourage within the learning environment.

• Encourage a culture of respect. Ensure conduct reflects the values of DND/CAF, directly address learners' comments or behaviour that are not aligned with this culture through a group discussion or private conversation with the learner. Seek assistance, when required, and support affected persons in these situations.
• Promote self-awareness within individuals and the group. Self-reflection is essential to identifying biases and/or assumptions that may be influencing team members and/or the workplace.
• Demonstrate concern for learners and their individual needs. Encourage learners to share their needs, preferably in advance of the training, and respond to their requests with empathy by offering and/or providing support.
• Encourage open conversations and new perspectives. Be open to hearing new ideas or concerns from all learners and provide multiple ways for them to share their thoughts.
• Provide opportunities for ongoing feedback. Be open to both providing and receiving respectful and constructive feedback from learners.
• Recognize learners' ideas and contributions. Value and appreciate the wisdom learners share during training and the benefits they bring to the group.
• Promote positive dialogue and a growth mindset. Embrace challenges, see setbacks as learning opportunities, and find inspiration in the success of others.
• Be precise with information/expectations and explain reasons for changes. Provide transparent and closed-loop communications, especially during periods of change.
• Be accountable for mistakes. Demonstrate humility by openly accepting mistakes, apologizing, and viewing them as learning opportunities for themselves and others.
• Promote personal well-being and healthy work-life balance. Live these values through personal example and be mindful of the impacts of their actions or the training schedule can have on the learners’ well-being.
• Encourage personal and professional growth. Reflect on their personal learning journey and identify areas where you need to continue to learn.

Psychological safety for facilitators

Ensuring a psychologically safer learning environment is equally important for facilitators as it is for their learners. Each facilitator will have their own individual comfort levels and psychological safety needs, especially when teaching lessons on sensitive topics, which can be emotionally demanding to facilitate. Facilitators should consider their own needs prior to the start of training to proactively create a safer environment.

• Scheduling: Consider the time of day or week when lessons occur, the number of sensitive content lessons in a day, and schedule time for preparation and decompression following emotionally demanding lessons.
• Boundaries: Know what behaviour will be tolerated in the classroom and the action plan if a learner’s behaviour is unacceptable. Ensure leadership support for these boundaries.
• Safety Plan: Proactively establish a trauma-informed safety plan to support learners who may become emotionally activated.

Related resources

• Conduct and culture training and education resources
• Professional conduct scenarios
• Canada School of Public Service (courses on psychological safety)
• Being a Mindful Employee: An Orientation to Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace course

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