Intervention Model PowerPoint

This assignment involves two phases: first, interviewing a leader who has experienced a psychologically unsafe work environment, and second, using that leader’s scenario as a basis for creating a trauma-informed leadership model that may have been effective in the described situation. This PowerPoint assignment should include four key components:

1. Transcript of an interview with a leader sharing a story of experiencing a psychologically unsafe environment. The leader should remain anonymous unless they give written permission to reveal their identity. The PowerPoint should include key quotes and/or soundbites from the interview.
2. Your summarization of the leader’s scenario and experience
3. What the literature says about the described issue
4. Your proposed intervention model to address the described issue
5. How this intervention model may be relevant to other contexts and settings

Building a culture
of productive
feedback
A conceptual process for addressing
leader self-victimization
Overview
When a leader takes everything personally,
their team feels unsafe about offering
feedback. To address this, we must:
Identify why leaders self-victimize
Propose a model/process for accepting
productive feedback
Deploy model with frequent follow-up and
assessment
Interview
subject
SOURCE: BEHAVIORAL HEALTH LEAD
• Reports to manager of behavioral health
• Has worked for clinic for five years
• Clinic serves an underserved area of
south Minneapolis
Issue
identification
Lack of a feedback loop
due to leader selfvictimization
Primary challenge: Leader
self-victimization
”The message that she sends is, ’I don’t want to do
this job. You’re an inconvenience.’”
• Subject can’t share concerns about team and
department management
• Subject’s manager responds to all feedback by
playing victim card and acting defensively
Lack of safety in sharing critique leads to
distance
”When I give her feedback, her response varies
between being completely detached, saying ‘I’m doing
the best I can’, or she takes it personally and seems to
be a victim in the process.”
Why do leaders
self-victimize?
Leaders who are insecure in their
roles, or have established learned
helplessness over time, are likely to
act defensive when challenged.
• Subject’s manager has held a directorlevel role for five years, but does not
demonstrate willingness to perform
all related tasks
• Mentioned in recent off-had comment
that she’s only doing the job for the
pay
• Dismissive of subject’s feedback,
choosing to avoid confrontation
Rizvi, Y. S., & Sikand, R. (2020). Learned Helplessness at the Workplace and Its Impact on Work Involvement: An Empirical
Analysis. Global Business Review, 0972150920976693.
Yang, Wang, Y., Tan, L., & Lu, H. (2020). Too Insecure to Be a Leader: The Role of Attachment in Leadership Emergence.
Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 571401–571401. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.571401
How does leader-self
victimization affect
followers?
Without a productive, healthy
feedback loop, issues are avoided,
emotions become charged, and
followers leave.
• Subject’s clinic has had difficulty
filling new roles because of slow
director progress
• Subject is often ignored in team-wide
communication on office changes
• Subject’s team feels left out of
department news and information
Clarke, & Mahadi, N. (2017). Mutual Recognition Respect Between Leaders and Followers: Its Relationship to Follower Job
Performance and Well-Being. Journal of Business Ethics, 141(1), 163–178. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-015-2724
Fehn, & Schütz, A. (2020). What You Get is What You See: Other-Rated but not Self-Rated Leaders’ Narcissistic Rivalry Affects
Followers Negatively. Journal of Business Ethics, 174(3), 549–566. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-020-04604-3
Model
proposal
Identifying processes that
encourage safe feedback
loops
The four stages of psychological safety
• Created by Timothy R. Clark
• Developed a path for organizations to
follow in developing psychologically safe
workplaces
• Four distinct phases:
⚬ Inclusion Safety: Members feel safe to belong,
aren’t excluded, part of the team
⚬ Learner Safety: Members feel safe to learn and
ask questions, experiment
⚬ Contributor Safety: Members feel safe to
contribute ideas without embarrassment or
ridicule
⚬ Challenger Safety: Members feel safe to
question other ideas, including those in
authority
Clark, T. R. (2020). The 4 stages of psychological safety: Defining the path to inclusion and innovation. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.
The four stages of psychological safety
• Based on subject’s interview and
assessment, current leader challenges
limit levels to Inclusion Safety at best
⚬ Learner, Contributor and Challenger
Safety not present because of leader
self-victimization
”It makes me feel unsafe, and in the past, I
overcompensated by doing the things that
should have been her responsibility because I
wanted to see them get done. Recently I have
taken a task of just not doing anything.”
Model
application
Applying psychologically safe
practices to limit selfvictimization
Inclusion safety
People want to feel like they belong.
Leaders should instill the feeling that
each team member is part of
something bigger than themselves.
Steps to encourage inclusion safety for
subject’s organization:
• Recurring affirmation of group identity
• Acceptance of each member into team
discussions and dynamics
• Avoid alienating or ignoring team
members
Learner safety
People want to learn, advance and
ask questions. And be able to make
mistakes along the way.
Steps to encourage learner safety for
subject’s organization:
• Affirmation of ability to ask questions
and learn processes
• Admittance that leader doesn’t always
have the answers
• Providing confidence that problems can
be addressed effectively
Contributor safety
People want to provide insight,
participate and make suggestions
without feeling embarrassed or
ignored.
Steps to encourage contributor safety for
subject’s organization:
• Affirmation of follower autonomy to
make their own decisions for teams
• Reduction of micromanagement and
contradictions
• Encourage participation among normally
reclusive followers
Challenger safety
People want to challenge the status
quo without being ostracized from
the group.
Steps to encourage challenger safety for
subject’s organization:
• Disconnect follower concerns from
personal traits or actions
• Avoid censuring or punishing followers
for sharing concerns
• Encourage innovation and disruption to
existing power dynamics
Summary
Psychologically safe workplaces
depend on leaders avoiding the
pull of self-victimization
Summary
Subject needs better support from
manager to inform/lead her team
Manager plays victim card from
feedback
Concrete steps needed to establish
learner, contributor, challenger safety
Disassociate feedback from personal
traits and feelings
Subject and manager should set
reasonable short-term expectations
Thank you!