Psychological safety is an essential component of the well-being of people across all careers. The work environment can contribute to a person’s emotional health or cause them more stress. At the Thomas Jefferson University Hospital (TJUH), the nurses working in the emergency department have a lot of pressure to perform beyond the requirements. Noteworthy, they care for more than 65000 people in the region. Moreover, in 2015, they had a Left-Without-Being-Seen (LWBS) rate of 5.7%, which is among the worst in the country (Neck et al., 2019). Although the TJUH emergency nurses have a high workload, the horizontal managerial style that recognizes the efforts of all workers in the team and a safe working environment made their sense of psychological safety high.
People with a high level of psychological safety can adopt ideas that improve their work environment, just like the emergency nurses at the TJUH. Their challenges inspired them to form the Emergency Department 2.0 initiative to lower the LWBS rate (Neck et al., 2019). Their determination was enhanced by good management and the decision to increase the multidisciplinary interdependence among team members. Thus, despite the high workload causing some strain on their sense of psychological peace, having a great team boosts their self-efficacy, enhances relaxation, and offers a sense of safety.
In addition, psychological safety is evident in the readiness of the nurses to offer ideas and respond within their area of expertise. Notably, they were leveraged and involved throughout the initiative, and the leaders listened to all their opinions (Neck et al., 2019). The inclusivity of all team members in making decisions increases pride in their work. Their performance improved as the work environment felt safe for managers and subordinates.
The level of psychological safety of the Swab Squad team of nurses from TJUH Philadelphia is average. It could have been lower were it not for the great team with good leaders. The team appears jovial as they engage. in dancing exercise which is a good way of relieving tension (TheEllenShow, 2020). The morning routine of listening and getting inspired by the level-up song helps them to have an excellent start for the day. In explaining why, they chose to dance the song level up, the site coordinator for the drive through testing explained that it relates to their current situation. Moreover, they are aware of their roles and the risk it poses to them, especially in the wake of communicable diseases such as COVID-19, which enables them to prepare psychologically.
Nonetheless, they are still scared that they can get infected because, before testing, they cannot tell who is positive. With the influx of patients, they have to work longer hours and attend to many patients without sufficient time to rest. The implication is that they can easily get burnout due to the high workload and witnessing people dying in large numbers. When one of the nurses was asked about how it felt to leave her family behind, she started sobbing. Noteworthy, when people regress to crying in a tough situation, it may indicate that they lack psychological safety.
In summary, TJUH emergency nurse teams and the Swab Squad have great teams, which helps them to enjoy work despite the high workload. However, I rate the emergency nurses higher than the Swab Squad. Their core strengths in attaining a higher psychological safety include outstanding leadership that acknowledges and encourage subordinates to speak their voices. Capitalizing on the expertise of individual members within the multidisciplinary team makes their work easier. The Swab Squad has a great team with jovial members and leaders who use music and dance to stay motivated. The only problem is that they are frontline workers amid a scary pandemic.
References
Neck, C. P., Houghton, J. D., & Murray, E. L. (2019). Chapter 7: Teams. In Organizational behavior: A skill-building approach. SAGE Publications.
TheEllenShow. (2020). Ellen’s big surprises for an exceptional group of Philadelphia nurses testing on the frontlines [Video]. YouTube. Web.