using storytelling to build psychological safety

Psychological safety makes inclusion a reality

Over the past few years, our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion journey has evolved significantly. We have worked to promote diversity and inclusion on many levels (see our previous Best Practices Re-writing the leadership norms; Inspiring EY leaders to be accountable for creating an inclusive culture). In 2022, we take further steps toward our long-term goal of gender equality across all ranks. Our leadership team is fully committed to gender equality and to driving required changes – a great opportunity to embed even more inclusion in our organization. 

We use storytelling to engage leaders and create a psychologically safe work environment that is an important condition to reaping the benefits of diversity and making inclusion and equity a reality.

For the minority to be included, the majority must adapt their behavior  

But changing behavior is difficult, especially if the need to change is for someone else. By making the change relational, people are differently engaged and committed to change. Storytelling is one of the most powerful forms of communicating and connecting with people. Stories grab our attention, raise empathy and open new perspectives. And the stories of our female talents are compelling.

We use storytelling as a tool for these key objectives:

• To highlight barriers which still need to be removed to achieve greater inclusion, equity and diversity by raising leadership awareness of different experiences at the workplace
• To build psychological safety and encourage open and honest conversations, which – we are convinced – create an equitable and inclusive culture that naturally encourages women to pursue the upward path

To help the stories of our women to be told and heard, we embedded storytelling into our 3-part leadership development initiative: raise awareness, look through a different lens, and make building psychological safety part of leadership norms.

Action bias: Stop ‘fixing’ women, start listening to them

One of the obstacles that keeps us from achieving greater diversity, equity and inclusion is our tendency to want to fix things (action bias). Here this sought-after leadership characteristic can prove to be a double-edged sword and keep us from doing the ‘right’ things.

The tendency is to focus on ‘fixing’ people by telling them to feel differently, see things differently, act differently. We fail to listen to and understand why they feel the way they do. We rarely ask what they might need to help the situation at hand, but rather rush to provide advice, generally driven from our own experiences. What was well-intentioned leaves people feeling unheard and worse, misunderstood. As a result, they become less and less confident in expressing their opinions or sharing their feelings.

We recently held a 2-hour virtual workshop for our extended leadership team members to develop awareness around the action bias and to provide them tools and ideas on how they can adjust their reactions and behaviors when confronted in such situations.

The content of the workshop included data on diversity performance (retention, promotion), storytelling (two women and one man who shared how flexible working works for them) and role-playing (learning to listen to people, hearing them out, and understanding them rather than trying to ‘fix’ them) – an eye-opening experience according to the feedback received from our leaders. “I always considered myself a leader who embraces and promotes diversity. Hearing the stories of our people made me realize that I was often viewing the world from my perspective and not from the perspective of the other person. This workshop has given me the tools to become a more inclusive leader”, finds Andrew Gallacher, Partner, looking back.

Understanding women’s perspectives, and becoming a male ally

As a second step, we invited 20 male leaders to participate as audience members at our 3-hour virtual female leadership development event called POWER Up, where the 80 women shared their experiences and perspectives on topics such as projecting confidence, owning their careers, widening networks, elevating communication and realizing purpose. The male leaders found listening to these stories eye-opening. According to the feedback received, understanding why this really matters for female colleagues leads to a different motivation and commitment to adjust one’s own behaviors and mindsets.

Making psychological safety part of EY’s leadership norms   

We are currently promoting and creating platforms to raise awareness of the action bias and enable storytelling throughout the organization at all levels.  For example, we have implemented a mentoring program, focus group sessions, and speak-up agreements in advance of performance and promotion reviews. By doing so and by consistently applying the 3 steps for building psychological safety – as suggested by Amy Edmondson and sited in our last year’s BP, Re-writing the leadership norms being available and approachable for open discussion, explicitly asking for input and feedback, and modeling openness and vulnerability – we are able to embed leadership behaviors that transform our culture to one that values and unlocks the power of inclusion, equity and diversity.

Accessibility means that leaders overcome their action bias and become open to listening to people’s stories. Inviting input means leaders must explicitly invite women to share their experiences (women generally do not tell unless men ask). Asking for input makes the other person feel valued and respected. Modeling openness and vulnerability refers to the leader’s behavior that sets the tone for acceptable behavior within the team. For example, if leaders are reticent and their behavior indicates that certain topics are better not discussed, others will follow their lead. Explicitly showing vulnerability can help break down counterproductive barriers created by gender norms and differences.

Sneak-Peak into our Storytelling-Toolbox

Storytelling as a tool has been very well received at EY. It was an eye-opening experience for our leaders. And it also showed the importance of an inclusive choice of words. Using storytelling as a tool is something that everyone at every level can do, inside but also outside of an organization, to help women thrive and succeed. According to David G. Smith and W. Brand Johnson, authors of ‘Good Guys: How Men Can Be Better Allies for Women in the Workplace’, asking the following questions can be helpful for men:

• I am curious about some of the things women in our organization find most challenging day to day, things that I – as a man – might not notice. Would you feel comfortable sharing some of the challenges you encounter most often?
• If there was one thing you wish men/women who work here were more aware of, something they could do, stop doing, or do more of that would improve the experience of the people they work with, what would that be?
• If there was one thing, I could become more aware of, perhaps one thing I could start doing every day that might make the workplace more inclusive, what would that be?

And women, too, can accelerate inclusion, equity and diversity in the workplace through their behavior and choice of words:

• Become an ally for male colleagues. Help them see and understand female perspective by sharing your stories and share feedback in a two-way conversation.
• Success has a lot to do with confidence – help those who have less of it by celebrating their strength and backing them up in the meetings.
• Be open with other women about your setbacks and vulnerabilities. It gives them the courage to continue pursuing their goals if they didn’t make a success of something first time around.

Each of us has the power to join conversations where stories can be told and heard. Each of us can stand up, speak out, and take action for inclusion, equity and diversity. Stay tuned for more chapters of EY’s story to come in next year’s Best Practice!

Margit Vunder kindly makes herself available for an exchange to interested Advance member companies. Feel free to contact her at margit.vunder@parthenon.ey.com.

For further reading on the subject ‘Inclusion requires the majority to adapt their attitudes and behaviors to allow the minority to be heard’, find the whitepaper at MindGym.

This Best Practice was first published in the Gender Intelligence Report 2022.

read the report

#breakthebias #inclusion #maleallyship #shapetheculture