I've been working at Container Solutions for two years, but I'm not technical. I went to journalism school and worked in a newsroom for many years.
It's a fun job, and most of the time, you're surrounded by smart, curious people, and you're learning something new every day. When deadlines don't bring you panic, they give you an endorphin rush, which is always a good time.
The thing about journalism, though, is that it's full of journalists.
Don't get me wrong. I like journalists, even if most of the public doesn't . Reporters and editors are interested in the world and are usually good at explaining it. They tend to be hilarious, especially if your sense of humor is dark. They'll even buy you a round of drinks - rare, but some cases are documented.
But journalists aren't necessarily a tribe that embraces the concept of "psychological safety." In fact, I had never heard the term before I came to work on the marketing team at Container Solutions.
And now that I've had the opportunity to experience a psychologically safe environment, I can't imagine a better way to operate in any organization where work involves creative thinking and problem solving. In other words: For every organization, it's a better way to operate.
minefield of humiliation
The newsroom -- the environment I was in before Container Solutions -- can be a very creative place. But that's not by design. Newsrooms are designed for competition and speed: be the first in your market to publish a story, be the first in your newsroom to spot it and capitalize on it.
Also, the flip side of some journalists' intelligence is arrogance. It's not pretty, but it is what it is.
An environment in which people compete with the outside world and with each other, and are sometimes overconfident in their own intelligence, does not reliably produce moderate individuals who seek and value everyone's opinions.
I've been to some great, generous, productive newsroom brainstorming sessions when everyone showed up excited and eager to start work on a new project. But I’ve also experienced humiliating meetings where co-workers sniff, roll their eyes, look at their phones, or sigh impatiently at ideas they don’t like. This is not a recipe for free discussion.
In these organizations, there is no guiding principle that values psychological safety - the notion that no one will be punished or sidelined for speaking up, or even for failing, as long as the lessons are learned from experience, without malice.
humble feeling
When I started working as Editor-in-Chief at Container Solutions, I started hearing references to "psychological safety", and I was a little bit dumbfounded myself. This seems like a well-intentioned but naive idea. This idea never lasted in the environments I've worked in.
But I learned more from the blogs of Andrea Dobson-Kock , a psychologist who leads our people team, and Helen Bartimote, our chief psychologist. More on this concept. It's an idea that's been around for a while, but in recent years it's gaining traction in organizations , especially among technology teams. Google's Aristotle Project found that psychological safety was the most important factor for high-performing teams , at least at Google. Research shows that if people feel they can trust each other, they can put all their intelligence to work on solving problems. They can take risks.
I also learned a lot about the cloud-native world and why a modicum of humility is essential in understanding cloud-native.
Cloud native technologies are very, very new. It's only been 10 years since microservices were named; half the time since Kubernetes was introduced. Everyone in this field is learning , always learning . If you are too arrogant and dismiss other people's ideas too much, you will miss something important. You will be left behind. (Not to mention, you'll piss people off and no one will want to work with you). The cloud native community is small and somewhat gossip).
test values
So how does it all work? This is not always easy to achieve. Our team -- formed mostly a year and a half ago, before the pandemic -- struggles a bit with this concept at times. It's not because we're pushing each other's ideas. Quite the opposite: we were a little too nice to each other and didn't provide the rigorous feedback we both needed to continue improving.
We had a few intervention sessions with Andrea and Helen, and we quickly became more comfortable with each other and shared ideas more freely. Our team has reached a point where we can now provide candid feedback, respectful and constructive, but not so kind as to point out that the tone of a message is off, or that a design looks too busy, or that a certain This job needs to be iterated one or two more times. We have found a balance.
Mental safety has helped our entire company get through 2020 , a year when Covid-19 shook everyone's carefully crafted plans like an etched board. Creativity explodes as we work to reshape the organization and rethink its services to meet current needs. So, this year is going to be a bright one for container solutions.
I'll be watching the company's progress from a distance: This spring, I'll be joining The New Stack as an editor. But I do know that psychological safety is something I will take with me from the organization I am leaving. In my case, it is an essential part of my toolbox from now on.
