Compliance is not enough

Monday’s ABC Four Corners program "Don't Speak" has cast a spotlight on the critical issue of workplace bullying and the harmful culture of silence that persists in many organisations. People sometimes ask for clear examples of the kind of behaviour that the Psychosocial Hazards updates to Work Health and Safety legislation cover. The 4 Corners “Don’t Speak” program gives many clear examples across the full spectrum. It serves as a stark reminder of the devastating consequences when these risks are ignored, including severe mental health impacts and, in the worst cases, loss of life. We need to do better!

Organisations are already starting to see action based on the new laws. But guess what - changing legislation on its own, won't change behaviour. 

As in physical safety, exemplar organisations have already embedded culture which supports speaking up, asking questions, encouraging diversity, respect, and valuing contribution. They go way beyond compliance, embedding psychological safety and responsibility as key ingredients of high performance.

There’s many practical ways to do exactly that. What does your organisation do about it?

If you’d like a hand with it in your teams, let me know I’d be delighted to assist.

Musk making it safe

mage of Starship explosions tweeted by Musk"

Elon Musk has an unusually high appetite for risk compared to most entrepreneurs. There have been many times over his many business ventures when he has risked an ‘all-in’ bet on something that was far from certain. On some of those occasions, Musk himself has stated that the most likely outcome will be a company ending failure. He’s also known to be demanding, setting very high expectations and seemingly impossible timeframes. He’s not shy when it comes to firing people. So how does he create psychological safety, which is an important ingredient for success in a high performance environment:

• Clear vision - for all of his companies there is a single line summary of purpose (except Twitter now X perhaps). SpaceX is “Make humanity a multiplanetary species to ensure the survival of consciousness.” While this is lofty, it also drives real world-decisions. Musk moves fast, because the goal is not just a moon shot, or orbit, but a Mars colony. Whatever you think of the vision, there’s no ambiguity in it.

• Delete, Delete, Delete - Musk is on a relentless drive to delete anything unnecessary from his companies and the rules governing them. That would normally lead to people feeling at threat, but Musk’s mantra “if we don’t end up adding back at least 10% of what we deleted, we didn’t go hard enough” sets the stage. There’s an inherent understanding that some of the deletion experiments will fail. That’s both expected and encouraged.

• Accountability - If someone says “It's an engineering requirement”, Musk will ask, “who from engineering said so?”. There’s a name attached to everything. It stops people hiding behind departments or processes, and gets people to own their decisions. It also means things can be discussed. Much harder to have a conversation with ‘engineering’ than with Steve from engineering. That this is framed as an expectation so that deletion conversations can be had faster, rather than as a blame point for failure makes it safer. Steve would still be sweating when the spotlight turns to him, but it’s very different from a blame game or witch hunt. Steve will be prepared to answer challenges on the calls he made.

There’s no doubt Musk drives himself, his people and companies harder than I think is ideal; however these and other clear elements make it very obvious what people are signing up for. As a result he attracts, driven, focussed people who want to change the world we live in. There’s no denying the incredible list of achievements.

Next time we’ll look at some of the ways Musk damages psychological safety and what we can learn from that.

If you want some insight into one of the most controversial and significant “movers and shakers” of our time, I’d highly recommend “Elon Musk”, by Walter Isaccson. It’s current up to 2023. The book was the catalyst for this series.

How quickly will we evolve?

The recent formalising of Psychosocial Hazards in Australian Work Health and Safety legislation is a fantastic evolution. We have been aware of the risks to people’s well being (Both mental and physical) from Psychosocial Hazards for a long time, and it’s taken a while for it to be seen as a hazard that needs to be actively managed.

Early in the industrial age accidents and fatalities were an accepted and expected outcome in work environments. The attitude was largely “You know the risks, so the responsibility is on you. By the way, it might not end well”. Over time safety and risk became the subject of increased awareness and responsibility for employers, transitioning through cultures dominated by compliance/policy/procedure and ultimately growing to deep safety cultures. The exemplars of this are zero blame cultures where safety is prioritised over production. Everyone is empowered to call a halt if something seems unsafe, and there are continual conversations about how it can be made more safe.

We are just emerging from the equivalent of “you know the risks” in PsychoSocial Hazards. You can track it in laguage like:

• Stress is part of the job, suck it up

• Go to the hardware and buy a bucket of harden up

• Your emotions have no place at work

• Everyone is busy, deal with it

• Yes he’s a bully, but he’s also a great performer we’ll all just have to put up with it

These are fading, but they haven’t gone away. We now have a regulatory environment. How quickly can we evolve to cultures of deep responsibility where we are encouraged to call out unsafe practice, hold each other to account, educate rather than blame? We have a road map in the physical WHS space that has been a roughly 200 year evolution. Let's not take that long on psychosocial hazards. The clock has been ticking for a while.

Over the next few weeks, I'll be exploring some of the hazards named in the excellent Worksafe “CODE OF PRACTICE - Psychosocial hazards in the workplace” and especially how these contribute to a high performance culture as well as one free from harm. Just like physical safety, it makes sense regardless of what metric you measure.

The way things are done around here

Most sectors are experiencing higher than normal turn over at the moment. Coupled with already high workloads for many, this adds load and fatigue. Under those circumstances it can be challenging to welcome new team members and set them up for success. A couple of clients have intentionally paused to plan beyond the formal induction process. Together we have explored creating a really warm welcome for their new team members, giving the best chance of rapidly reaching high performance together.

If you are in a similar situation here are some elements you might like to consider:

• How your team works together - What holds the team together, creates momentum and cohesion?

• What is important to the team? - Are there values, targets, standards, expectations or priorities that set/maintain direction?

• Are there significant things to know about the organisation and its status right now?

Are there significant things to know about the organisation and its status right now?

Also consider whether there are any challenges for people that have been on the team for a while. For example, they may be feeling disappointed at the loss of previous team members, or a ‘bit over’ inducting yet another person. Ideally, the team doesn't want these ‘past facing’ issues rubbing off on new staff.

It can be challenging carving the time out to make sure people are welcomed well. It’s more essential than ever in the current market.