Using Psychometrics to Measure Psychological Safety

What if you could measure psychological safety with the same precision that you measure performance?

Psychological safety is an increasingly vital metric when it comes to building high-performance teams. But how do you quantify human experience? Well, for an objective measurement, you can’t just go with a gut feeling. You need reliable psychometric data. The behavioral insights it reveals can then be used to precisely track psychological safety as a KPI, just like revenue growth and client retention.

DNA Behavior’s advanced psychometric tools can identify behavioral strengths, blind spots, and risk factors in team culture. It’s a scientific way to measure and cultivate psychological safety in your organization!

What Is Psychological Safety?

Psychological safety is a culture where people feel safe to contribute, challenge, and learn. Without measurement, it often remains a 'soft' concept. But, when properly implemented, psychometric data allows leaders to quantify behavioral drivers such as openness, trust-building, and resilience so they can build truly synergistic teams.

Learn more about psychological safety: What Is Psychological Safety?

Why Precision Matters in Psychological Safety

Many companies assume they’re psychologically safe but don’t have a way to prove it. Psychometric assessments provide data-backed insights into how individuals behave under stress, give feedback, or respond to risk. This enables organizations to pinpoint where safety is strong and where it breaks down, so they can do something about it.

See how your organizational culture measures up: Is Your Organization Psychologically Safe?

The Six Pillars of Psychological Safety

When employees feel psychologically safe, they tend to lean into their gifts, and they become more effective within their respective teams. To foster this kind of positive and productive environment, there are six core areas (or pillars) leaders should focus on.

1. Utilize Behavioral Science Tools
   Behavioral assessments reveal natural talents, providing a blueprint for how people inherently work, understand things, and communicate. Measuring whether someone is naturally cautious vs. risk-taking, for example, helps you anticipate how they’ll engage in team discussions.
2. Foster Innovation Through Behavioral Alignment
   Behavioral data can also show you how to position people in roles that maximize their contribution and balance teams. Instead of using guesswork, this information can be used to identify strengths and foster innovation through behavioral diversity.
3. Optimize Hybrid Work Dynamics
   Having an accurate behavioral profile for each employee gives you a better understanding of the impact a hybrid work environment has on them. This can help you ensure that performance is not being compromised by where people sit, and that all voices are recognized and supported.
4. Boost Client Loyalty and Employee Engagement
   Communication is key in any relationship, whether it’s with clients, employees, or others. Behavioral data can reveal a person’s preferred communication style, so you have a head start in making valuable connections. Armed with these insights, building trust and loyalty with clients and improving employee engagement will be a whole lot easier!
5. Build Leadership Resilience
   The results of psychometric assessments give leaders a better understanding of themselves. This knowledge enables intentional growth, rather than reactive leadership. They gain clarity about stress triggers and blind spots, making them more resilient to the challenges inherent to positions of leadership.
6. Model a Culture of Feedback
   When it comes to giving work performance feedback, you want to be able to provide it without sacrificing trust. Psychometric insights help leaders tailor how they deliver feedback in a psychologically safe manner, keeping it objective and based on each employee’s natural strengths and career goals.ur behavior aligns with your values and that energy, you build not just wealth, but quality of life.

Using Data to Drive the Employee Experience

Just like financials track profitability, psychometric data tracks the health of organizational culture. It acts as a compass with mental well-being at true north. By making behavioral assessments a regular part of the hiring process, leaders will have the tools to align roles appropriately and optimize team dynamics from day one. So, instead of relying on intuition, they can refer to behavioral dashboards that guide careers and long-term culture building.

How to Take Action:

• Administer psychometric assessments to get a better understanding of your team’s behavioral profiles.
• Use the results to set targeted interventions (e.g., coaching, role adjustments, ideal team creation, meeting redesigns).

Make Psychological Safety a Reality

To create a psychologically safe environment, you have to understand the natural behavioral traits of the humans in your organization. That knowledge can guide you in creating an enviable company culture.

Our groundbreaking tools get you the data you need to turn psychological safety from a concept into a reality!