“Most people have been trained for years to protect themselves at work,” Ben Swire explains of one of the biggest challenges leaders face in building trust.
Even with the best intentions—modeling vulnerability, encouraging openness—people don’t automatically feel safe to follow. They’re not just being asked to try something new, but to go against what experience has taught them.
In this Asked & Answered edition of the Creative Confidence Podcast, host Mina Seetharaman is joined by team building expert Ben Swire to respond to listener questions about psychological safety, conflict, inclusion, and connection.
Together, they explore what it really takes to build trust in real-world team environments, especially when it’s slow, imperfect, and shaped by power dynamics. Below are highlights from the conversation. Listen to the full episode for more.
Listen on Apple, Spotify, YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts.
Article Summary
What if modeling vulnerability and sharing my mistakes as the team leader isn’t working?
How should teams repair trust when harm or conflict happens at work?
What can you do if your leader avoids conflict and shuts down honest discussion?
How can you build team connection in short, everyday meetings?
What should leaders do differently to build trust in virtual, global teams?
How do you rebuild trust on a team with a history of poor leadership?
Can retrospectives or postmortems help build stronger teams?
What if modeling vulnerability and sharing my mistakes as the team leader isn’t working?
Many leaders are told to “go first” and share their own mistakes as a way to encourage openness. Ben says that instinct is right, but it doesn’t mean your team will immediately follow.
“It’s important not to judge progress on whether they mirror your degree of openness,” he explains. “You might be moving them forward in smaller increments than you’d expect.”
Part of the challenge is power. What feels safe for a leader may still feel risky for everyone else. And most people have been trained to protect themselves at work.
Make it safer for people to speak up by adding structure (like a premortem exercise) instead of hoping one brave person will speak up. When they do, thank them and act on what they share.
“Safety isn’t declared, it’s demonstrated,” Ben says. “It’s built one response at a time.”
Insight: Reset your expectations. Power dynamics influence the openness to risk, even in strong cultures.
How can you design meetings or retreats that work for different learning styles and neurodivergent teammates?
Not everyone thinks out loud or thrives in fast-paced discussion.
“If everything is fast verbal processing, then you’re just rewarding one type of nervous system,” Ben points out.
Instead, design multiple ways for people to participate:
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Silent reflection before discussion
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Small group conversations
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Whole group sharing
The goal is to create flexibility, not one perfect, repeatable format.
“Inclusion is not about equal airtime,” Ben says. “It’s about creating the conditions so that the different minds that you’ve assembled can really shine.”
Insight: Inclusion isn’t about giving everyone the same experience. It’s about giving everyone a way in.
How should teams repair trust when harm or conflict happens at work?
If teams are taking risks, missteps are inevitable. “The question isn’t how to avoid rupture,” Ben says. “It’s how to repair it in a way that increases trust instead of fear.”
That starts with normalizing repair as part of your team’s process:
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Acknowledge harm without defensiveness
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Stay curious and look for common ground
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Build regular reflection into team routines
“If repair is built into the culture, mistakes become allowed, survivable, and expected,” he explains.
Insight: Mistakes are part of the process. Repair is what makes them valuable.
What can you do if your leader avoids conflict and shuts down honest discussion?
“You can’t fix a culture when your leader is actively undermining it,” Ben admits.
But you can shape your immediate environment. Follow up with colleagues, ask thoughtful questions, and model the behavior you want to see: “Be that beacon of possibility.”
Insight: You may not control the culture, but you influence the experience of the people around you.
How can you build team connection in short, everyday meetings?
When people think about team building, they often think big: offsites, workshops, retreats. But impact happens in smaller settings too.
“A 5-minute ritual repeated weekly does add up to real change over time,” Ben says. The trick is finding the balance between easy, fun, and meaningful.
Insight: Small moments can build connection when they’re intentional.
What should leaders do differently to build trust in virtual, global teams?
Don’t try to recreate in-person dynamics online. Instead, lean into what’s unique about virtual work:
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People are in their own environments
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Digital tools can enable broader participation
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Non-verbal activities can bridge language and cultural differences
Insight: Design to leverage the strengths of each setting.
How do you rebuild trust on a team with a history of poor leadership?
When trust has been broken over time, it doesn’t come back quickly.
“Words and a couple of quick activities aren’t going to undo that,” Ben says.
Rebuilding trust takes consistency and patience.
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Lower expectations for speed
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Follow through on what you say
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Model small, real-time vulnerability
“What actually rebuilds trust is predictability, as boring as that may be.”
Insight: Trust is rebuilt through small acts done consistently.
Can retrospectives or postmortems help build stronger teams?
Retrospectives can be performative if the same issues surface, but nothing shifts.
“When that happens it erodes trust,” Ben explains.
To make them effective, focus on learning, not blame. Start with small but strategic questions, like ‘What's one thing that surprised you in this sprint?’ or ‘What's one experiment we should try next time?’ That's a lot less threatening than ‘What went wrong, and whose fault was it?’
And finally, act on what’s shared.
Insight: Reflection only builds trust when it leads to action.
Explore More Resources
Schedule a Make Believe Works Workshop
Explore Ben’s workshops and approach to building trust, connection, and creative collaboration at makebelieveworks.com. Make Believe Works partners with organizations to design team experiences that build what Ben calls “safe danger”—the emotional sweet spot between comfort and fear where innovation thrives.
Special IDEO U Community Offer
Ben is offering a special discount exclusively for the IDEO U community. Get $1,000 off a Make Believe Works session for groups of 50 or more. This offer expires May 31, 2026. To redeem it, simply reach out to Make Believe Works and tell them you heard about them through the Creative Confidence Podcast.
Get Ben Swire's Book: Safe Danger
Safe Danger dives deeper into the ideas from this conversation, with practical exercises and reflections for leaders who want to build psychological safety without sacrificing performance.
Continue Learning with IDEO U
If you want to build psychological safety while maintaining healthy friction and strong results, explore our online course Cultivating Creative Collaboration, taught by IDEO CEO Mike Peng.
Related Blog Posts
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How to Improve Team Collaboration and Inspire Creativity: A Leader’s Guide
What Is the Facilitative Leadership Style? 5 Behaviors That Bring it to Life
Listen to More Episodes
Subscribe to the Creative Confidence Podcast to hear conversations with today’s most thoughtful creative leaders and explore past episodes at ideou.com/podcast.
About the Speaker
Ben Swire
Co-Founder of Make Believe Works & Author of Safe Danger
Ben Swire is an award-winning designer, writer, and speaker who helps teams build trust, reconnect as humans, and work better together. He is the founder of Make Believe Works and the author of Safe Danger, a book about how creativity, psychological safety, and shared emotional risk fuel collaboration and innovation at work. Ben’s work sits at the intersection of team building, organizational culture, creativity, and human behavior. He is known for designing experiences that help people lower their guard, engage honestly, and practice the kind of trust and curiosity that real work requires—but most workplaces struggle to create.
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