In the last article, I introduced organizational justice and its link to psychological safety, inclusion, and trust.
One area that really stands out to me is procedural justice — whether people have trust that the processes used to make decisions are fair.
I keep coming back to this because of what I hear when I work with organizations.
Employees will tell me they do not understand why a decision was made. They are unclear about who was involved. They were asked for feedback but never heard what happened with it. Or they found out about a change that directly affected their work after the decision had already been made.
What I find interesting is that people are not always saying they expected to get their way.
A lot of the time, they are saying they expected to understand what happened.
That matters.
People do not need to agree with every decision
Leaders are going to make decisions employees do not like.
That is part of leadership.
There are going to be budget decisions, staffing changes, promotions, restructuring, new policies, changes in priorities, and any number of situations where everyone is not going to walk away happy.
The goal cannot be to make sure everyone agrees.
But people can disagree with a decision and still feel that they were treated fairly throughout the process.
They can understand why the decision had to be made.
They can see that relevant information was considered.
They can believe that the same process would have been used if someone else were involved.
And they can know that the people making the decision took the impact on employees seriously.
That experience is very different from simply being told, “This is what we decided.”
Yet that is where many organizations create unnecessary trust issues.
Asking for input is not the same as giving people influence
I see organizations put a lot of energy into creating opportunities for employee voice.
Surveys.
Listening sessions.
Town halls.
Focus groups.
Open-door policies.
All of those things can be valuable.
But creating an opportunity for people to speak is only one part of the equation.
What happens to their input once they give it?
This is where organizations can unintentionally undermine the very psychological safety they are trying to create.
Imagine being asked to participate in an employee survey year after year and never hearing what changed because of the results.
Or being invited to a listening session, sharing a concern, and never knowing whether anyone discussed it again.
Maybe leadership did take the feedback seriously. Maybe there were hours of discussion behind the scenes.
But employees cannot see what happens behind the scenes.
They can only respond to what they experience.
So when there is no follow-up, it is easy for people to conclude that their feedback did not matter.
Over time, some people stop giving it.
Then leaders begin asking why employees are disengaged or reluctant to speak.
We have to be willing to look at the entire process.
Sometimes organizations create a black box
I think about organizational decision-making as a black box in some workplaces.
Employees can see what goes into it and what eventually comes out, but they have very little understanding of what happens in between.
They give feedback.
Something happens.
Leadership announces a decision.
Or a position becomes available.
People apply.
Someone gets promoted.
Nobody really understands the criteria that were used.
Or employees hear there is going to be an organizational change.
They know discussions have been happening for months, but the people whose work will be most affected are among the last to know.
That is where stories start getting created.
“They already knew who they wanted.”
“They were never really asking for our opinion.”
“They only listen to certain people.”
“Leadership does whatever it wants.”
Those statements may not accurately reflect what happened.
But when organizations leave large information gaps, employees are going to fill those gaps with the information they have available.
That is why transparency matters.
Transparency does not mean telling everyone everything
I want to be clear about this because transparency sometimes gets interpreted as employees needing access to every conversation or decision.
That is not realistic.
There are things leaders cannot share.
There are conversations that need to remain confidential. There are decisions executives have the responsibility and authority to make. There are times when leaders will have more information than employees do.
The question is not whether you can share everything.
The question is whether you are sharing what you can share.
Can you explain how the decision was made?
Can you tell people what factors were considered?
Can you explain who had responsibility for making the final decision?
Can you tell employees where their feedback influenced the outcome?
Can you acknowledge when their feedback did not influence the outcome and explain why?
That kind of communication helps people make sense of what is happening around them.
And it becomes especially important when the decision is difficult.
Close the loop
This may be one of the simplest changes an organization can make.
If you ask people for feedback, close the loop.
Tell them what you heard.
Tell them what you are going to do.
Tell them what you are not going to do.
Tell them what still needs to be figured out.
You do not have to implement every suggestion to demonstrate that you listened.
Sometimes a leader may need to say:
“We heard this concern, and here is what we are changing.”
Another time it may be:
“We heard this concern, but we are not able to make that change right now because of these constraints.”
Or:
“We considered several options, including the one employees recommended, and here is why we ultimately chose another direction.”
That is still feedback.
It tells people their voice went somewhere.
And when people understand how their input was considered, they are much more likely to continue participating even when the answer is not always yes.
Take a look at how decisions happen where you work
As you think about your team or organization, consider:
- When we ask employees for feedback, what happens next?
- Do people understand which decisions they can influence and which decisions are leadership decisions?
- Are we asking for input early enough for it to actually shape the conversation?
- Do the people most affected by a decision have an opportunity to share their perspective?
- Do employees understand how promotions, opportunities, resources, and responsibilities are determined?
- Are our expectations applied consistently across people and teams?
- When we make exceptions, can we explain the reasoning behind them?
- Are the same people always closest to the decision-makers?
- When someone questions a process, do we get defensive or do we become curious about what they are experiencing?
- Where might employees have stopped giving feedback because they no longer believe anything will happen with it?
And one question I think every leader should sit with:
Are we expecting employees to trust a process we have never helped them understand?
Psychological safety does not end when someone speaks
This is probably the biggest connection I see between procedural justice and psychological safety.
We spend a lot of time teaching leaders how to create environments where employees feel comfortable speaking up.
That is important.
But psychological safety cannot just be about what happens before someone speaks.
We also have to pay attention to what happens afterward.
Was their concern taken seriously?
Did anyone follow up?
Did they understand what happened with the information they shared?
Were they treated differently because they challenged something?
Did they see evidence that speaking up was worth the risk?
That is what people remember.
Organizations cannot keep asking employees to bring their voices into the room while ignoring what happens to those voices once they get there.
If we want people to trust the organization, we have to give them opportunities to see how the organization works.
Sometimes building trust is not about another survey, another listening session, or another initiative.
Sometimes it starts with making the process less of a mystery.
