From Wikipedia: Fear is an emotion induced by perceived danger or threat, which causes physiological changes and ultimately behavioural changes, such as fleeing, hiding, or freezing from perceived traumatic events. Fear in human beings may occur in response to a certain stimulus occurring in the present, or in anticipation or expectation of a future threat perceived as a risk to oneself.
I assume nobody wants to work in a team where people flee, hide or freeze when issues arise. This behaviour isn’t conducive to high performance and typically occurs when culture is driven by fear: humiliation, unreasonable redundancies or public reprimands are some of the ways to inject fear in an organisation.
It is incredibly important for high-performing engineering teams to thrive in a culture where psychological safety is provided. Otherwise, all you've got is the fastest car racing on the worst road.
Some of the results generated by fear in engineering teams are:
- Poor decision-making: nobody is going to dare taking risks if a bad outcome of your decision is going to lead to terrible consequences.
- Poor communication: if mistakes are made or issues appear, engineers may decide to remain silent if they feel that doing so would outweigh the fact that they may be told off.
- Creativity is curtailed: people will naturally follow the known, predictable route to success to avoid taking risks and, ultimately, to fail. Your organisation may be missing out on many opportunities to do things better this way.
- Accountability is removed: engineers that aren't motivated to try the best route (but rather the predictable and potentially less effective one) to solve problems will not easily feel connected to that decision, as it comes from the need of surviving, rather from the internal motivation to thrive and do your best.
- Productivity is low: with such an environment where problems are hidden, communication is not clear, goals are not public and solutions aren't effective, your organisation will not be able to get too many things done in the right way.
- Dissatisfaction is high: this is not an enjoyable place to be. Do not expect your engineers to feel happy about it. It is frustrating to see an organisation that does not work correctly, but it's infuriating to learn that you're not allowed to help and fix it either. So people just give up and stop caring.
When the situation is reversed and fear is removed from your teams, however, the outcome is more like this:
- Empowered engineers: when people are involved in resolving the company issues without fear or blame at stake, they get more engaged and push harder since their own ideas are being considered and they feel like part of the solution.
- Problems resolved faster. If people are empowered because no fear is threatening your team, problems tend to be resolved faster and from the root.
- Higher quality decisions. Better communication and transparency (which aren't seen in opaque organisations driven by fear) help people make better decisions, more aligned to the overall goals.
- Faster learning. Because you've removed fear in favour of a culture based on freedom and responsibility - where failing fast and cheap is supported - you encourage your teams to learn their lessons. The more your team needs to learn (because they fail from time to time) the easier and faster it will be to solve the hardest problems. The habit of learning compounds.
- More time unlocked: Once teams understand how to deal with failure, how to reflect on mistakes and learn by themselves, managers will stop firefighting and spending time on things that don't provide real value. Removing fear releases time.
- A higher level of happiness: working in a culture where mistakes are allowed as long as lessons are learnt is highly motivating. It allows people to thrive, to try new things, to find new ways to solve problems and to grow whilst being challenged.
Generating a good ambient and a great culture based on collaboration and communication (where failure is allowed, learning is encouraged and fear is removed) is paramount to deliver the psychological safety that your team need to thrive and do their best whilst enjoying and growing at the same time.