You Can’t Solve Your Way Out of a Culture Problem

I’m just going to say it: I don’t love the term psychological safety.

Not because I disagree with what it’s trying to describe. I think every person in every organization deserves to work in a culture built on respect, clarity, gratitude, and accountability.

But the term has gotten so loaded that half the room tunes out the second they hear it, and the other half thinks it means something it was never meant to describe. So I’m not going to use it.

What I am going to talk about is what has to be true in a culture before your teams can do hard things…

Name the real issue. Sit in an uncomfortable conversation. Tell you what’s broken instead of what’s safe to say.

Without that foundation, your issue-solving process is working with incomplete information.

The Part That Gets Skipped

There’s a tool in EOS called the Issue Solving Track or IDS™ (Identify, Discuss, Solve). It’s one of my favorites, and teams rush the first step.

They grab the first thing that looks like the problem, call it identified, and move to solve. I get it. I’m a fixer too. My brain wants to go: got it, got it, got it, done.

But the real work is getting to the root cause. That means asking why more than once. It means someone in the room saying, “I don’t think that’s actually it yet” — and a culture where that’s not only allowed, it’s expected.

 Where Culture and Issue-Solving Meet

If people don’t feel respected, if expectations aren’t clear, if no one’s been investing in them as humans, they’re not going to name the real thing. They’re going to name the comfortable thing. And you’ll solve that instead.

I use a gas tank analogy for this.

➡️ If I’ve been consistently filling that tank — real recognition, clear expectations, honest conversation when things are going well — then when I need to give hard feedback or push on a tough issue, I’m not hitting empty. There’s something to draw from.

➡️ If instead I skip the deposits and go straight to withdrawals, I’m running on fumes. And in this case, that looks like a team member who shuts down, gets defensive, or tells me what I want to hear instead of what’s true.

One Thing to Sit with This Month

If the same issues keep showing up in your leadership meetings, it might not be a process problem.

It might mean you haven’t yet built the culture where people feel like they can tell you what’s actually going on.

And let me be clear, that doesn’t mean your people aren’t good. They probably are.

The foundation just has to come first. That’s worth a conversation. I’d love to have it.