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The New Manager Stack |
If you’re new to management in the last year, we’ve got the skill stack for you: |
May 27 (free): Managing Up With AI (From Super IC to Trusted Leader) |
June 4 ($500): Build Your AI Chief of Staff (w/ Your MGMT Second Brain) |
June 9 ($950): MGMT Fundamentals (The 80/20 Management Skills & Systems) |
See why 1,500+ leaders have said our programs are worth 25x what they paid. |
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Productive Discomfort |
We got a call last week from one of our partners. “Can you run a workshop on psychological safety?” |
I dread this call because 95% of the time, they’re at one of two extremes: |
Loveable B-team: Our team is really nice but we’re not getting the results we need Toxic A-holes: Our team is crushing it but a bunch of miserable jerks to each other
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And that’s because Psychological Safety (PS) has been quietly hijacked. |
Amy Edmondson coined the term to describe a team where people speak up, admit mistakes, and challenge each other openly. |
Lately it's been bent into something else: Be nice. |
No hard conversations. Don't push back. Some leaders now use PS as cover, using their “safety” to defend against any sort of conflict or challenge. |
High-performing teams don’t just welcome conflict. They cultivate it. |
Edmondson's response, in her May 2025 HBR piece, agrees: that is the opposite of what it means. PS exists so feedback can flow. Not so it can stop. |
"Nice is the easy way out of a difficult conversation.
Kind is being respectful, caring, and honest." |
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I’m on a crusade to help more managers stop confusing nice for kind. We don’t have to protect feelings at the expense of the team's standards. We can offer respect AND the opportunity to make real impact. |
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The 2x2 |
Standards and safety aren't a tradeoff. They're a 2x2. |
Edmondson's matrix: |
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The two axes are independent. You don't pick one. You max out both. |
Comfort Zone is where the pop-PS movement lands you. Everyone is happy. Nothing ships. Anxiety Zone is where most "high performance" cultures actually live. Fear, hidden mistakes, burnout. Learning Zone is the only one that compounds. High candor, high standards, both on purpose.
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The "nobody pushes back" team isn't safe. They're comfortable. There's a difference. |
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The Proof |
If you're still tempted to treat PS as soft, the data ends that argument. |
Google's Project Aristotle studied 180+ teams. PS was the #1 differentiator of high performance, ahead of seniority, education, and team composition. Their top-PS teams reported 19% higher productivity and 27% lower turnover. |
Edmondson's original hospital study is even sharper. The best teams reported more errors than the worst. Not because they made more. Because they admitted more. |
In the operating room, one dismissive response to a safety concern can silence a teammate for months. In a survey of 7,465 clinicians, 70% had experienced incivility on the job. If that's the cost in the OR, the parallel to your team missing a forecast or shipping a bug should be immediately apparent. |
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The Crux |
Now the question that trips most leaders up: |
How do you have the accountability required with high standards and not push everyone into the anxiety zone? |
1. Co-author the standard, not just the verdict. |
Most accountability is solved before the consequences enter the conversation. If you and your direct report agreed up front on what "excellent" looks like, feedback is never a surprise verdict. It's a evaluation against an agreement you both signed. |
Secret expectations are how anxiety sneaks in. |
2. Watch your first four words after a problem surfaces. |
"How did this happen?" is pre-loaded with blame. "Thanks for raising that,” treats the human as a partner. And welcomes the follow-on of, “What do we do now?" |
Same data. Different next conversation. The learning lives in those first four words. |
3. Name the type of failure out loud. |
When something goes wrong, sort it publicly. |
Was it carelessness? Sanction it. A complex system breakdown? Investigate it. An intelligent, hypothesis-driven bet that didn't pay off? Celebrate it.
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Most leaders blur all three and either punish every failure or celebrate every failure. |
Delusional positivity and toxic pessimism both kill the team. |
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The Test |
Here's the modern test of where your team stands: |
Can you talk about AI honestly? |
Whose job is under pressure? Who is using it well? Who is using it badly and pretending they aren't? If those questions live underground, you don't have PS. You have surface-level harmony with an undercurrent of fear. |
AI is the amplifier. It pulls a high-PS team forward, because they share what's working and stress-test what isn't. It crushes a low-PS team, because nobody admits what they don't know. |
Practically, just build a five-minute slot into your 1:1s. "What's working with your AI tools? Where are you seeing implications that scare you?" |
You can test PS with easy questions that keep the hard conversations out in the open. |
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The Close |
The opposite of psychological safety isn't disagreement. It's silence. |
Your job isn't to make your team comfortable. It's to make speaking up the standard. Normalize productive discomfort. |
That might sounds harsh on the page. |
In the room, it's actually the opposite. You've told them: |
I heard you I considered your reasoning I'm overruling you, here's why, here's my logic You're encouraged to fight me on it if I’m missing something big
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That last part is the safety. Not "you’re entitled to being right" but "you're encouraged to help us get to the best answer." |
People can handle being overruled. They can't handle being silenced. |
Lead on,
Dave & Mar |
PS. Reminder, we’re running our free Managing Up With AI (From Super IC to Trusted Leader) Lightning Lesson on May 27th at noon ET. High-performing teams aren’t just about leading your people, they’re also about managing your boss. |
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Ways To Work With Us |
MGMT Accelerator: A live cohort-based leadership development program. MGMT Fundamentals: A two-week training program for new managers. Custom Programs: Workshops built and delivered for your company. 1:1 Executive Coaching: C-suite leaders looking to scale. Keynote speaking: Leadership lessons for your event or offsite.\
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Learn about them all at: davekline.com |
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