How to Build a Team That Embraces Risk and Innovation

Contributed by Beth Rush

Every good leader wants their team to thrive. While you might help employees grow with valuable resources like training modules and raises, they should also feel comfortable learning from mistakes while trying new things. Learning how you can encourage risk-taking and innovation among your team could make everyone more successful. The company may also thrive if you reshape the professional culture into one that’s more supportive.

Why Positive Work Environments Make Businesses Successful

Creating a psychologically safe environment for your team makes a significant difference. People need to know that their manager has their back. They should feel secure in messing up without fearing for their job or standing in the workplace.

Innovation has four key phases within a successful framework. If an idea will succeed, a person must clarify their intentions, ideate their goals, develop a framework and implement those steps. Each phase requires stepping into the unknown because you’re inventing something new. People aren’t going to embrace that vulnerability if their supervisors reprimand or fire workers for making errors.

Ways to Encourage Risk-Taking and Innovation

Changing the workplace culture is challenging. Help your team feel more comfortable with trying new things by implementing strategies that build psychological safety.

1. Talk About Your Mistakes

Leaders gain respect when they follow their own rules. Lead by example as your team explores what it’s like to take risks. Discuss the moments when you mess up, and explain what went wrong and how you can do better next time. If you’re non-judgmental toward yourself, you’ll show you can be that way toward others.

If you feel shy or embarrassed while practicing this step, remember that your efforts could improve the workplace long after the conversation ends. Letting psychosocial hazards develop — like being afraid to mention mistakes in a team setting — can create physical and mental health effects like burnout, fatigue, and injuries. Showing that you can learn from errors non-judgmentally is part of learning how to encourage risk-taking and innovation.

2. Hosting Brainstorming Sessions

People won’t try a crazy idea if they don’t believe it’s welcome. Schedule recurring brainstorming sessions where anyone can pitch their ideas, big or small. They don’t have to commit to anything, either — the goal is to get them comfortable with the vulnerability to dream out loud. Welcome your team’s thoughts, point out their strengths and let everyone have space to innovate without reproach.

3. Set Helpful Parameters

Your team members might have great ideas but avoid chasing them. The workplace might have taught them there are too many ways to make career-defining mistakes. Your leadership can change that.

4. Create a Support Network

Define the types of risks that you want to encourage, then address some professional boundaries. Good risks have goals, promote growth and solve unaddressed problems. Bad risks lack actionable steps, neglect safety nets and avoid constructive criticism. You’ll give everyone a framework that prevents risks from feeling reckless.

When someone’s ready to develop the framework for their idea, they’ll need support along the way. Arrange one-on-one meetings where they can discuss their challenges and successes, create solutions alongside you, and ask questions if necessary. Personal support goes a long way. Private conferences also prevent team members from being creatively vulnerable exclusively in big meetings.

5. Invest in Resources6. Celebrate Every Success

You could even give them resources to build essential soft skills through off-the-clock personal development. If they get better at time management or problem solving, they could achieve their idea more easily.

Ask what your employees need when they’re ready to act on their ideas. Would a specific software or new office tool make their goals easier to reach? Maybe they could use scheduling support. Help them carve out more time in their daily schedule for their idea so they can practice time management more effectively. Your efforts show your commitment to their growth, which makes them feel more psychologically safe.

As you study how to encourage risk-taking and innovation, remember to save time to praise each team member’s accomplishments. Cheering everyone on when they have big or small successes is crucial. Innovation involves both.

7. Resolve Any Team Conflict

When people respect progress in all forms, they’ll see their growth more easily and appreciate their journey. They can also build more self-esteem, which makes mistakes less scary to reflect and learn from.

Tension may arise as some staff watch others succeed. Conflict could even occur when people don’t experience the same amount of growth together. Addressing those challenges is your job as the team leader. Remain quick to talk with people in private meetings to work through any negativity that could hinder workplace innovation.

8. Avoid Helicopter Managing

Listen to each person’s perspective, summarize what they disagree about and create a plan to work on the conflict. You’ll build trust by promoting empathy and collaboration. Each person will feel supported in their journey, which could be the key to resolving jealousy.

Some leaders develop micromanagement habits, even if they have the best intentions. While you might have the skills to help someone pursue an idea, you have to remember that your goal is building psychological safety through trust. If you’re hovering or telling staff how to bring their projects to life, you’re telling them they can’t do it through your actions.

Give people the space to take ownership of their work. Their successes will be sweeter, and their mistakes could become easier to own. Your team might also feel free to pursue ideas if they have room to explore by themselves. Every other effort you make to encourage innovation lays the groundwork for them to reach out if they need help. They’ll know you have their back, even in failure.

Foster Innovation With New Management Strategies

Learning how you can encourage risk-taking and innovation is simple. Gather the strategies most necessary in your workplace and practice them a little every day. As they become helpful leadership habits, you’ll become an effortlessly innovative leader with a team that follows in your footsteps.

by Beth Rush • Managing Editor at Body+Mind

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