Aden Date’s Post

I sometimes think the whole problem with 'Psychosocial Safety' is we let the lawyers and lawyer-types frame the conversation. Here's how it went down - 👉 Someone had a (genuinely) bad thing happen to them. 👉 We all agreed bad things shouldn't happen. 👉 We created rules and legislation to (try) and prevent bad things. 👉 We needed someone to enforce those rules and legislations. 👉 We put lawyers and the more hard-headed HR types in charge. And, voila, psychosocial safety and wellbeing suddenly became the providence of the hard heads rather than the soft hearts. Psychosocial safety is about behaviour - it's a shared responsibility, not one to be left to certain kinds of professionals. Sure - meet your legislative requirements and don't break the law. But if that's your main frame for understanding Psychosocial Safety, you've missed the point entirely. #psychosocialsafety #teamwork #play #creativity #collaboration 👋 Hey, I'm Aden. I'm here to make teams psychologically brave. I write a newsletter on a roughly fortnightly basis, and it's pretty good: https://lnkd.in/gfzNkp7Q

Thanks for having me, Canberra ✈️ With people that are comfortable with improvisation training, we'll sometimes put on a performance after a workshop. Most of these folks have been learning improvisation for at least a few months - some a few years - and so we had a workshop followed by a performance. If you want to assess someone's performance, it can be helpful to invite them to quite literally perform. If you can do something under pressure, in front of a crowd, you have a good sense that you can do it in normal day-to-day environments. If you can improvise in front of 200 people, speaking your mind in a meeting or having a difficult conversation with a colleague is much easier. So, it was a pleasure to not only run a workshop but host a performance with these fabulous Canberrans (Canberrites? Canberreans?) last week. #play #training #improv #workshops #performance

🧠 My brain: "Whenever I don't respond to an email, it's because I'm busy." 🧠 Also my brain: "If you haven't responded to my email, it's because you secretly hate me." A lot of what we call 'Psychosocial Safety' (or lack thereof) lives in our heads. It tells us there are many things we think we absolutely cannot do at work: 👎🏻 Decline a requested meeting without an explanation 🛎️ Send a light nag over email ⏰ Knock off 20 minutes early unannounced We don't do these things because we imagine we'll offend someone, be seen as unproductive, or become some kind of office pariah. Yet we often can do these things without consequence, because really, no decent person cares about these things*. So, give it a go: Decline the meeting. Send the nag. Go pick up your kids. As the filmmaker Adam Curtis said: "There Is a Policeman Inside All Our Heads: He Must Be Destroyed." --- 👋 Hey, I'm Aden. I'm here to make teamwork suck less. I write a newsletter on a roughly fortnightly basis, and it's pretty good: https://lnkd.in/gfzNkp7Q * To be clear and stem off any 'yes, buttery' - Yes, there are toxic teams/workplaces where all of this isn't true!

Bad training only provides information. Good training teaches new skills. Excellent training provides opportunities to practice being a better person. I reckon "being a better person" is what we mean (but rarely make explicit) when we talk about "transformation." And, I believe, one of the ways we transform is by acting as if we have already transformed. #play #training #creativity #transformation. 🧠 I'm going to expand on this idea a little bit in my newsletter on Monday. If you want to read ALL THE THOUGHTS, you can sign up here: https://lnkd.in/gfzNkp7Q

A psychologically safe organisation feels like riding a roller coaster. Let me see how deeply I can abuse this metaphor. *cracks knuckles* 🫳 You must be this tall to ride (clear boundaries ensure nobody gets hurt). 🎢 You're never fundamentally unsafe: just uncomfortable. 🤝 You feel closer to people for having done something challenging together. Psychosocial safety means providing folks with opportunities to explore manageable discomfort - this builds the interpersonal trust required to do difficult, challenging, creative work together. --- 👋 Hey, I'm Aden. I write a newsletter that tries to change your mind at least once a fortnight. You can sign-up here: https://lnkd.in/gfzNkp7Q

If you'd like to: 🏀 Rediscover play 🌟 Explore some safe discomfort 💵 Spend zero dollars My theatre company, Only the Human, is running a couple of free trial classes next week. One's on October 5, the other on October 8, and they're both in North Perth. You can register here: https://lnkd.in/gZCa3ac4

Most L&D/OD assumes that providing information changes behaviour. But very few behaviour problems are information problems - Occasionally, information does change behaviour in a pretty direct way ("Don't drink that, it's poison!"), but more often it's kinda useless ("Here are the five characteristics of a high-performing team, now go become one.") Good training needs to provide opportunities to practice behaviours directly, rather than describe desired behaviours and hope for the best. -- 👋 Hey, I'm Aden Date. I help teams looking to shift out of old behaviour patterns into better ones. If you've got a team, you might find this quiz handy: https://lnkd.in/giAJGdad

Longshot, but let's try - If you swing by Bunnings East Vic Park on Sunday, come say 'Hi' as I'll be on the wrong side of a barbecue selling snags. Some folks will know that in addition to my teamwork training, I'm the Chair of a non-profit that is building a community around improv theatre. So, in addition to all my LinkedIn hustle, I also flip sausages so we can get some dollars and cents to make what I've learned from improvisation accessible to everyone. --- If you want to learn more about that half of what I do, or you might want to come take a class with me, check out www.onlythehuman.com.

Safety is not the same thing as comfort. A psychosocial safety strategy built around "no bad things should happen" is like buying a gym membership and only using the massage chairs. Just like a healthy body needs movement, a healthy mind needs creativity, risk, challenge and even conflict. Good training gets people out of their comfort zone whilst ensuring their fundamental needs for safety, belonging, and dignity are met. Is creativity and challenge a part of your approach to psychosocial safety? --- 👋 Hey, I'm Aden. I write a newsletter that aims to change your mind at least once a fortnight. You can sign up here: https://lnkd.in/gfzNkp7Q

Would you rather a credentialed employee, or an uncredentialed one? 🥼 I'm reminded of an old Nassim Nicholas Taleb thought experiment where you're given a choice of two surgeons: 🎓 One surgeon has a degree from Yale, dresses and presents well, and speaks deliberately and articulately. They look like a surgeon. 🍗 The other looks like a butcher. They're slovenly, overweight, and speak mostly in inarticulate grunts. ❓ Which do you choose? Taleb argues you should pick the butcher. If the butcher has become a successful surgeon, you know it's because they're actually good. The very things that signal their incompetence are, paradoxically, what prove their competence. They've succeeded against the odds. Treat credentials with skepticism. Meeting someone else's idea of competence rarely suggests genuine, creative and innovative thinking. Succeeding despite a formal education, however, suggests actual genius. #creativity #play #innovation #expertise 👋 Hey, I'm Aden. I write thought provoking things like this. Follow me for more (or don't, I'm not the boss of you).