Several years ago, a friend was experiencing some business challenges. The challenges inspired me to write the following:
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A Safety Tip [few people know]
Despite everything you have done to meet legislation and best practices, some of your people do not feel safe at work.
Abraham Maslow and others have created pictures like this…
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…to explain human needs. Physiological needs come first and Safety needs are next. Safety is the second most-basic human need.
And your people do not feel safe at work.
This has nothing to do with workplace hazards and accidents.
Your people do not feel safe because:
- Future Shock – The pace of change is accelerating – we are experiencing the ‘Future Shock‘ Alvin Toffler wrote about 40 years ago: people know relationships in business are much more fragile than they used to be; people are more uncertain about the stability of their place at work; people are inundated with information, Attention Dilemma, etc.
- Economic Recession – The 2008 economic downturn shook people’s confidence and the fact economic doldrums linger on prove people are still shaken. Shaken means uncomfortable, uncomfortable means insecure & unsafe.
For these 2 [and some other] reasons, your people do not feel safe at work.
If you take a step back from the heat of day-to-day work, you can observe the behaviour that confirms this fact. You can observe increased ‘fight‘ and you can observe increased ‘flight‘.
Some examples of increased fight:
- increased disharmony at the leadership team level, petty squabbles
- increased rudeness, name-calling
- increased complaining
- increased aggressiveness
Some examples of increased flight:
- people failing to return phone calls
- people failing to pay bills…and stretching accounts payable
- people failing to take risks [including spending money]
- increased use of consensus decisions
Change is Constructive When People Are Comfortable.
To be comfortable…business people must feel safer than they do now.
As a business leader…
What are you doing to make your people feel safer?
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Now, as 2025 has begun with what or many could describe as some chaos, I believe this message is even more pertinent and meaningful.