Most leaders want their team members to speak up, share ideas, and raise concerns. But in many workplaces, people stay quiet. They hold back questions, avoid disagreement, or wait for others to speak before sharing their own views. Silence feels safer than honesty, even when they have something valuable to contribute.

Inclusion is one of the most powerful leadership capabilities today. It fuels trust, collaboration, innovation, and performance. It shapes whether people feel they belong, speak up, and choose to stay. Most leaders agree that inclusion matters and many believe they are already inclusive. But the real challenge is that inclusion is often spoken about rather than practised. It appears on value statements and workshop slides, yet doesn’t always show up consistently in everyday moments at work.

Psychological safety has become one of the most important parts of modern leadership. More leaders now understand that safe and included teams speak up more, share ideas more openly, learn faster, and perform better. But there is a big difference between knowing that psychological safety matters and leading in ways that actually create it. A lack of safety is most visible in everyday interactions, especially in team meetings and 1:1 conversations.