Here are some ideas to move your team to be comfortable in speaking up. 

Allow equal participation for all 

A common reason that may be keeping your meeting participants from speaking up is the structure of the meeting itself. 

• Do your participants know that active participation is expected? 
• Is one team member taking up most of the time by giving long winded answers? 
• Set a time for each person to say their piece. This allows everyone to speak but gives equal weight to each person’s perspective. 

‍‍ 

Incorporate introvert-friendly strategies 

Whenever close friend groups get together, it feels natural to fall into a conversational rhythm, with the talkers doing most of the talking, while the quieter observers sit back and absorb. 

This notion holds true within workplace teams, and normally it’s a non-issue. It does become tricky, however, when one or two people dominate the meeting conversation. To make a fair playing ground for all types of people, especially the introverts in the room utilizing methods such as timed discussions, anonymous voting, choosing the right time for the meeting, and open-ended answering exercises, you can effectively encourage introvert meeting participation. 

‍ 

Increase your own vulnerability 

A fantastic way to establish team-to-leader trust is being vulnerable with your own mistakes and flaws. Demonstrating the behavior, you would like your team members to display in the hopes that they follow is a trusted method among leaders. By openly sharing mistakes and weaknesses with others, a relatableness and connection is automatically created, as well as conversation. 

‍ 

Some organizations go as far as introducing An Oops Wall, which entails creating a physical space (or virtual for remote teams) for managers to publicly post their weekly mishaps and mistakes. By sharing mistakes transparently and frequently with others, you are creating a culture of openness and honesty. Thil will invite team members starting to post their own mistakes too. 

Make the meeting a routine 

According to a study published by the European Journal of Social Psychology, it takes on average more than 2 months before a new behavior becomes a habit — 66 days to be exact. To get into the flow, open dialogue should be consistent in your meeting routine. 

Even if your last meeting was successful, if held too few and far between, your team members will likely forget the conversational feeling of that meeting. Instead of a one-time check-in following the end of a large project, make it a point to meet with the team regularly to encourage ongoing learning, contribution, and improvement. 

Learning Review 

This is the purpose of an agile retrospective. A retrospective offers teams a specific and regularly scheduled event to safely share what is going well and what should be improved. Without this, it can be difficult for team members to understand when and how they should voice their feedback and find creative ways to improve together. Choose a dedicated time in the week for this purpose. 

“Rather quickly, you’ll find teams begin to understand that things can be changed. People will have more confidence about speaking up. And you’ll have an opportunity to fix and change course on items well before the end of a project – and achieve better results as a consequence.” Mark Kirby 

Without workplace communication, relationships would be a lot more difficult, and problems would take a lot longer to solve. By implementing these practices to encourage participation and enabling voices to be heard, you can more effectively reach organizational goals. 

Encourage radical candour 

This is a philosophy based on two approaches – caring personally and challenging directly. The radical candour framework is used to guide conversations and not fall into the trap of supporting behaviours that are damaging to teams. 

Promote respect 

People don’t always agree with each other, but discussion is vitally important. Encouraging mutual respect helps to improve communication and reduce workplace conflict and stress. Reducing pettiness in the workplace and encouraging respect helps to build a trusting and fearless environment. The best way to promote respect at work is to ‘walk the walk.’ 

Welcome curiosity 

Part of psychological safety is being able to express oneself. Encouraging staff to be curious and ask questions is where real learning happens. Curiosity is vital to business performance. Ask for feedback from employees and encourage them to ask questions. Start by asking: ‘What can we do better?’ 

Acknowledge ideas and share mistakes 

Things do not always go to plan and making mistakes does not mean you are a failure. Mistakes offer helpful learnings and are often the source of major innovations. In safe environments, employees feel they can make a mistake and won’t be penalised for it.