Psychological safety and feedback in the team
In many teams, mistakes and concerns are only voiced when it is too late – because nobody wants to be the first. Psychological safety describes the opposite: a team in which you can ask questions, admit mistakes and disagree without fearing disadvantages. The term goes back to the researcher Amy Edmondson. This guide shows how to encourage it in everyday work; it runs all year.
Where does the measure start?
With the managers and with fixed habits in the team. Managers shape whether openness pays off: how they react to bad news, whether they ask follow-up questions, whether they name their own mistakes. A half-day workshop makes this conscious and practises it. In the team, short, regular retrospectives help: what went well, what did not, what do we change?
How do you measure progress?
With a short anonymous survey before the start and then twice a year: how safe do you feel raising mistakes or concerns in your team? Only show results for groups above a minimum size so that nobody can be identified.
What does it take?
Time for a workshop and for the retrospectives in the team. You will find moderators for the workshop in the marketplace. Feedback goes in both directions: managers ask their team for feedback themselves.
How do you put the measure in place?
- 1Workshop for managers: what psychological safety is and what encourages or hinders it in everyday work
- 2Agree one habit per team: a regular retrospective or a fixed feedback round
- 3Managers ask their team for feedback themselves
- 4Twice a year, ask anonymously how safe employees feel raising concerns
Plan, invite, measure participation: EasyWHP, which offers WHPCompass free of charge, sets this measure up as a project, invites the workforce and shows how many people take part. How a measure runs in EasyWHP →
What do you need for it?
- Effort
- half a day
- Cost
- under €100
- Duration
- Workshop, then ongoing
- Setup
- 240 min
- ✓ Problems come to light earlier
- ✓ Feedback becomes a habit, not an event
- ✓ Managers get honest feedback
- ✓ Measurable through a short anonymous survey
Tax and health insurance: what is possible
Employer health benefits can be tax-free under § 3 no. 34 of the German Income Tax Act (EStG) up to €600 per employee per year — if they are provided in addition to the salary already owed and are either certified (§ 20 SGB V) or implemented within the company's health promotion process. Gym memberships and corporate fitness are not covered. For ZPP-certified courses (e.g. from Upfit), German statutory health insurers can reimburse all or part of the course fee to their insured members — then only the amount exceeding that reimbursement is tax-free. Projects within the company can be funded under § 20b SGB V, with no entitlement. Only your tax adviser can confirm the tax exemption.
Health insurance and tax: how to proceed →How it works in EasyWHP
This Best Practice in EasyWHP: adopt it, adapt it, measure the effect
Once adopted, the measure is ready in EasyWHP — with instructions, an invitation and surveys before and after. You adapt what fits your company and see at the end what it achieved.
Screenshots with demo data, no real people.
Adopt it for your company
Register for free — and the measure is ready to go in your cockpit: invitation, feedback survey and appointment are already set up. First cycle, first numbers for the boss.
Try EasyWHP for freeRather take a look first? To the live demo →
Contributes to
Action field
Healthy Leadership →A fitting occasion
Related Best Practices
Not sure where to start? Self-check in approx. 7 minutes →