As an executive coach and organizational development professional, I've engaged with frontline staff, senior leaders, and every level in between. Something shows up in every encounter, whether it is said outright or shows up in their response, behaviors, and actions and that is FEAR.
“I don’t want to feel (insert undesirable feeling)”
“I don’t want to seem unprepared or God forbid as if I don’t know”
“I don’t want to fail so I must do something and do it now!”
In today’s culture of AI, the fear based comment is often,
“What if I say something about this AI tool and I look like I don't get it?'
This is what the absence of psychological safety in AI adoption looks like. Cool, time-saving tools and the best AI literacy training mean absolutely nothing without a psychologically safe environment.
Responsible AI adoption cannot happen when the workforce is quietly noncompliant, developing undocumented workarounds, or secretly holding resentment. Employees must feel safe raising concerns and expressing their opinions about AI tools. And before you schedule a town hall or develop an evergreen 2-week communication plan, know that psychological safety doesn’t happen overnight nor is it nice and neat. I've seen this dynamic play out in change initiatives long before AI entered the picture. Whenever organizations roll out new systems, processes or initiatives without creating genuine space for questions, skepticism, and pushback, adoption stalls or is abandoned. Trust begins to erode and the divide between what leadership thinks is happening and what is taking place on the ground grows wider each day.
In AI governance, psychological safety is culture work. It may look like a place where all employees feel empowered and are encouraged to:
• Question AI outputs before acting on them or ignore them altogether
• Flag tools or use cases that feel misaligned with your mission or values
• Admit they don't understand something without fear of judgment
• Participate in AI decision-making versus being told to just trust it
Organizations that cultivate a culture of psychological safety catch problems earlier, maintain stronger human oversight, and build the kind of workforce that can adapt as AI continues to evolve.
Are you a leader that's encouraging employees to push through their concerns? Is that the culture you want to create? The NIST AI RMF's GOVERN function is built on the principle of building an organizational culture that encourages responsible AI from the top. You can have the best policies in the world, but culture is where the policies are upheld.
If your team isn't talking openly about AI, what is their silence communicating? Let's figure it out together. Connect with me today and let's build psychological safety in your organization that leads to responsible and successful AI adoption.