Trauma-Informed ≠ Accountability-Exempt
You've probably heard the phrase "we want everyone to feel safe here" tossed around in team meetings, onboarding manuals, and leadership retreats. Maaaaaybe you’ve even said it yourself.
And that’s not a bad thing—safety SHOULD be at the heart of any mission-driven organization. But let’s be real: in a lot of workplaces, especially in ones focused on helping the community, “safety” has become a buzzword. A placeholder. A soft, well-intentioned promise that doesn’t always hold up when the real stuff hits the fan.
That’s because true psychological safety isn’t a *vibe*. It’s a system. It’s not about how nice your leadership sounds, or how many ✨wellness webinars✨ your staff has access to. Psychological safety is about how predictable, accountable, and structurally sound your culture is. It's how your team feels in the moments that actually matter, when stakes are high and you’re tired and annoyed and burnt out. If you’re serious about trauma-informed care, equity, and inclusion, then your definition of safety HAS to expand beyond a cutesy word you throw around. Because most people won't tell you when they feel unsafe. Butttttt they WILL show you. Sooo, this blog is going to talk about how to notice (and fix) what’s actually going on.
Mistake 1: Conflating Satisfaction with Safety
Let’s start here, because this is where so many well-meaning people get it wrong. Feeling "happy" is not the same as feeling safe. Someone can love their coworkers, enjoy team bonding, and feel proud of their orgs mission AND still be constantly anxious every time they have to speak up, set a boundary, or ask for help.
👏🏽👏🏽Safety isn’t about how things feel on the surface.👏🏽👏🏽
It’s about how your nervous system responds in real time. Safety shows up when people can:
Say something uncomfortable without being ostracized
Ask for what they need without being shamed
Try something new without fearing punishment
Make a mistake and still feel like they belong
Most of the time, you won’t know that your staff doesn’t feel safe until something happens. Why? Because people who’ve been hurt before (read: most people) are often experts at looking "fine" while quietly suffering. That’s why if you’re only measuring job satisfaction (or worse, if you’re assuming no news is good news) you’re missing what really matters.
Mistake 2: Open Door Policies
Let’s talk about a common but often ineffective office strategy: the open door policy. On paper, it sounds great. "My door’s always open!" But in practice… it feels like a trap, because:
If I don't trust that my feedback will be heard, respected, or acted on… I’m not going to walk through your door (open OR closed)
If an org has no track record of applying feedback - especially from people with less *positional* power - then the message to me is clear: providing feedback is for you to feel heard, not for us to actually listen to.
If people don’t know who to go to, or what kind of issue is "worth bringing up," OR if they’ve never seen someone successfully navigate a concern like theirs? They’re not going to take the risk. (Why would you????) So, they’ll internalize it, potentially leading to burnout. Or they’ll keep it to themselves, and then they’ll leave.
Safety is NOT about having access to leaders. It’s about knowing that the systems around you are clear, responsive, and not dependent on the moods or preferences of one person.
Mistake 3: Focusing on Softness Instead of Structure
Another misunderstanding many leaders have about safety is that “safety” is code for being "nice" and not hurting people’s feelings. Spoiler: it doesn’t. Sometimes, the safest thing a leader can do IS to challenge someone, or speak the truth when it’s hard or call out a pattern or set a limit. What matters is HOW that’s done, and whether the foundation beneath it feels fair, consistent, and transparent.
Safety doesn’t come from avoiding conflict or coddling discomfort. It comes from creating a culture where people know what to expect, how decisions get made, and how to recover from harm. That means:
Owning your mistakes
Creating space for repair
Naming when harm has happened
Following through on accountability
Welcoming disagreement without retaliation
If safety in your organization means “no one ever gets uncomfortable,” you’ve built comfort, not care. And those are not the same thing.
How to Audit Your Org’s Safety
You can’t repair what you can’t see. And many of the signs of psychological (un)safety are subtle, systemic, and easy to overlook, especially if you’re in a leadership role. Here’s some things to reflect on:
Written communication: Are emails filled with urgency, vague expectations, or passive-aggressive language? Do staff feel pressure to respond immediately, even after hours?
In meetings: Who speaks the most? Who never talks? Who interrupts? Are meetings actually being used to think through and make decisions, or are they there just for performance? Does anyone ever ask clarifying questions—or are they too afraid to look confused?
Time Off: Is PTO something people feel guilty for taking? Are sick days viewed as a nuisance? Is taking time away from work framed as a lack of commitment, or something that’s used only after you burnout?
Accommodations: Do staff feel safe disclosing what they need? Or do they worry it’ll be seen as "too much"? Are accommodations formalized, or is it up to the individual to ensure their needs are considered?
Creativity: Do staff offer ideas freely, or do they wait to see what leadership thinks first? Are mistakes treated as part of the process, or disastrous missteps?
Body Language: Who tenses up when certain topics come up? Who checks out when a specific person speaks? We can gain a LOT from looking at HOW people communicate, and not just WHAT they communicate.
These are ALL sources of data. And they’re more honest than a staff survey will ever be, because they are happening in REAL TIME, without prompting.
6 Signs People Need More Safety
Here’s what it can look like when someone doesn’t feel safe, even if they’re not saying it:
They stop offering feedback
They downplay their needs
They say yes when they mean no
They defer to authority even when they disagree
They avoid meetings, conflict, or visibility
They take on extra work to avoid being perceived as “difficult”
This doesn’t mean you need to go confront your staff and demand they explain the lack of perceived safety. DO NOT CONFRONT YOUR STAFF AND DEMAND THEY EXPLAIN THE LACK OF PERCEIVED SAFETY. If you notice these signs with any or many of your staff, it probably means your culture is suggesting that the consequences for being authentic are worse than pretending. If you want to start shifting the culture, you need to start shifting the conversations.
8 Questions That Will Actually Get You Real Answers About Your Organizations Safety
If you want to understand how safe your team feels, don’t just ask, “Do you feel safe?” 🙄 That question never works, and they’ll probably just tell you what they think you want to hear. Instead, try one of these:
When do you feel like speaking up about a concern at work would not be well received?
What would make you feel unsafe on this team or any time at work?
What could I do differently that would better support your success at work?
What would need to be different for you to feel supported to do your best at work?
If you were being bullied at work, how would you want people to respond?
What is the most significant challenge you face to getting your job done well?
If you were the head of this organization, what would you do differently?
How would you describe our organizational culture?
The magic isn’t just asking these questions— it’s in listening, understanding them, and responding to them. Asking questions without taking action only reinforces that nothing will change. And if you’re not ready to do something about what you hear, you shouldn’t ask.
The Bottom Line
Most of the time, you won’t know that your staff doesn’t feel safe until something happens, because safety isn’t about how nice people are, or never making anyone uncomfortable or by throwing up a “safe space” poster and adding the words “trauma informed” to your website.
Safety is what allows people to show up fully without fearing they’ll be punished for it.
It’s in the structures of your organization. It’s in how you make space for and respond to the emotions. It’s about being aware and intentional in how power is used. And most of all, it’s observable in what people do, not just what they say.
Sooooo if you want to know how safe your team really feels?
Stop talking about safety. Start listening for where people are protecting themselves and holding back. That’s where the real work begins.
