The Four Stages of Psychological Safety

Timothy R Clark in his book “The Four Stages Of Psychological Safety” describes a conceptual model of four “stages” of psychological safety that teams can move through, progressing from stage 1 to stage 4.

These Four Stages of Psychological Safety are:

Inclusion Safety – members feel safe to belong to the team. They are comfortable being present, do not feel excluded, and feel like they are wanted and appreciated.
Learner Safety – members are able to learn through asking questions. Team members here may be able to experiment, make (and admit) small mistakes, and ask for help.
Contributor Safety – members feel safe to contribute their own ideas, without fear of embarrassment or ridicule. This is a more challenging state, because volunteering your own ideas can increase the psychosocial vulnerability of team members.
Challenger Safety – members can question others’ (including those in authority) ideas or suggest significant changes to ideas, plans, or ways of working.

Of course, all models are wrong, and some are useful. (George Box)

The Four Stages model is wrong, but it can be useful. Let’s explore first how it can be useful, before we get into some of its limitations…

It’s useful in that it describes some of the different ways in which psychological safety can, and should, manifest in a team. It may be useful to describe and explore these “stages” to help people understand that psychological safety is not a binary “on/off” phenomenon, but a multi-layered dynamic that changes throughout the team’s journey.

The Four Stages model also helps us understand that when a team member’s experience significantly differs from others—to use the language of the model, when they are at a different “stage”—it can create discord. To address this, it’s important to think about increasing the psychological safety of all the team, bringing everyone one along on the journey together.

The Four Stages Diagram

Let’s get into each stage in a bit more detail:

The first stage is inclusion safety. We all want to feel included. We long to belong. We humans need to be accepted in a team before we can be heard, so the first stage is simply being comfortable being present. This stage means all members are included and welcomed – without discrimination regarding gender, age, race, social background, sexuality, neurodiversity or anything else.

The second stage is learner safety. In this stage, members of the team are able to ask questions, give and receive feedback, experiment, and make mistakes – in short, all of the behaviours that allow them to learn together. Team members at this stage will provide feedback to each other, and ask for feedback themselves.

The third stage is contributor safety. This means team members feel empowered to contribute ideas and suggestions, and raise concerns and risks without interpersonal fear. Each team member knows they have contributions to share with the team that will be listened to, because their individual skills, competencies and insights are recognised by the whole team. At this stage, retrospectives and “post-mortems” become very powerful practices.

The fourth stage is challenger safety. This means team members are able to challenge the way the team works, and come up with new ways of working. They feel safe enough to challenge the ideas of others – even the ideas of senior members. This is the most powerful “stage” of psychological safety; it not only allows new ideas to surface and enables learning from mistakes, but it can prevent potentially bad ideas from progressing. You could argue that disasters such as the VW emissions scandal, Enron, or the global financial crisis may not have occurred if the teams in those organisations had possessed challenger safety.

Limitations of the Four Stages Model

However, we said that the model (like all models) is wrong, and here’s why.

The Four Stages of Psychological Safety is a linear model applied to the non-linear, multi-dimensional phenomenon of psychological safety. The 4 Stages diagram implies that by increasing ‘respect’ and ‘permission’, teams will progress through these stages in a linear manner, only reaching the next stage once they have achieved and can build on the previous one. However, there is no empirical evidence that this happens.

Arguably, they aren’t really “stages” at all, but are perhaps better understood as ways to describe different elements of psychological safety. If we do want to stick to the term “stages”, we need to at least acknowledge that people and teams may move through these forwards and backwards, skip stages, and move into and across different “stages” in different contexts and at different times. And respect and permission are not the only factors that influence psychological safety.

It is also useful for us to start thinking about how we can create these environments of increased psychological safety and what challenges we might face in different contexts. In particular, we need to consider more how psychological safety manifests in different types of groups, cultures and environments, as well as in people with different privileges, languages, genders, sexualities, neurodiversities, socioeconomic backgrounds and more.

Download the Psychological Safety Action Pack and Playbooks to build and maintain psychological safety in your team.

Critique of the Four Stages of Psychological Safety

While the book is certainly valuable in its content and applicability, it does have limitations. Here are some points of critique:

Lack of empirical evidence: While Clark’s model is based on real-world experiences and observations, there is a lack of empirical evidence to substantiate the four-stage framework. There is as yet no evidence to suggest that people move through these “stages” as the model implies.
Ambiguity in implementation: Clark provides general guidance on how to create psychological safety in the workplace, but readers may find the steps for implementation somewhat ambiguous. Concrete examples, case studies, specific activities and practical tools would be helpful in illustrating how to apply the concepts to specific situations.
Overemphasis on leader responsibility: While the book acknowledges the role of leaders in fostering psychological safety, it arguably overemphasises this aspect. In doing so, it puts psychological safety firmly in the domain of leadership, whereas in reality we find that the responsibility for maintaining psychological safety needs to be shared by all team members. The book could do more to emphasise the importance, and value, of each individual’s role in maintaining a safe and supportive environment.
Focus on a US workplace context: The book is primarily aimed at teams and organisations in the business workplace (particularly a Western, English-speaking, neurotypical context), which might limit its applicability to other contexts, such as education, families, or community groups. Expanding the discussion to include these other contexts would make the book more universally relevant.

Tuckman's Model and Psychological Safety

As well as the Four Stages, another useful model we can adopt to support team development is Tuckman’s Model of Team Development, where teams “Form”, “Storm”, “Norm”, and finally, “Perform”. It is only in psychologically safe teams that true performance will be reached, since this stage requires the ability for team members to admit and learn from mistakes, and to contribute and challenge ideas. Reaching this stage, as a leader of a team, is your goal. Teams may cycle back and forth through norming and storming as changes occur, such as members joining or leaving, challenges being faced or team environments changing.

Our psychological safety action pack contains practical tools and resources to help you take your teams through these four stages, empowering you to build and maintain high performing teams.

Summary of The Four Stages of Psychological Safety

In “The 4 Stages of Psychological Safety,” author Timothy R. Clark proposes a model of psychological safety where team members progress through stages of Inclusion, Learner, Contributor, and Challenger Safety. These stages reflect the increasing psychological safety of team members in being part of the team, learning and making mistakes, contributing ideas, and challenging existing notions, even those from authority figures. In reality, the progression isn’t actually linear, and teams may navigate through these stages in various orders or times.

The model has also received criticism for its lack of empirical evidence, ambiguity in implementing the stages, overemphasis on the role of leadership, and a narrow focus on Western, English-speaking, neurotypical workplace context. Despite these criticisms, the model can be useful to help surface some of the different dynamics of psychological safety in groups. Behaviours that foster these stages of psychological safety can help build and maintain high-performing and happy teams.

Our experts at Psych Safety provide psychological safety consultancy, workshops, survey design & delivery, and transformation programmes for organisations of any size. Contact us to find out about how we can help you measure, build and maintain psychological safety in your organisation.

model performance psychological safety Timothy Clark

Tom Geraghty

Tom Geraghty, founder and CEO of Iterum Ltd, is an expert in high performing teams and psychological safety. Leveraging his unique background in ecological research and technology, Tom has held CIO/CTO roles in a range of sectors from tech startups to global finance firms. He holds a degree in Ecology, an MBA, and is pursuing a Masters in Global Health at the University of Manchester. His mission is to make workplaces safer, higher performing, and more inclusive. A renowned speaker, Tom has shared his insights at major events such as The IT Leaders Summit and the NHS Senior Leadership Conference. Connect with him on LinkedIn (@geraghtytom), Twitter (@tom_geraghty), or explore his work at https://tomgeraghty.co.uk and https://psychsafety.co.uk.