What causes employees to remain silent? Sometimes personal motives are involved, such as keeping information to oneself in order to protect a colleague (pro-social silence) or to obtain personal benefit (opportunistic silence). Pro-social and opportunistic silence are individual-level phenomena in which a shared, collective element is lacking. In contrast, shared perceptions of fear and futility may give rise to organization-wide silence known as corporate silence.
Silence out of fear for the consequences of speaking up is called quiescent or defensive silence. It is often triggered by managers who respond negatively to critical questions and suggestions. Such responses can be explicit, a public berating for example, or more subtle, like a quick frown, and may happen in public or during private conversations.
Another common reason why employees remain silent is that they feel their suggestions are not valued. “Why bother, if nothing happens when we voice our concerns anyway?” This is called acquiescent silence.
The role of managers
Managers and team leads often play an important role in emerging silence, directly and indirectly. Managers often fear receiving negative feedback, especially from subordinates. Research shows that managers often implicitly believe that employees are self-interested and untrustworthy, that management knows best and that unity is good and dissent is bad. This obviously causes them to discourage upward communication.
Does this sound incredible? Remember that most of this kind of thinking takes place in the realm of the subconscious. Ask any manager and they are likely to support the idea of employee voice and autonomy. Are managers then the sole causes of silence? Probably not, it seems likely that group dynamics play a role here as well but so far I have not found any research to support that.
The impact of silence
Corporate silence is extremely damaging to organizations and the well-being of employees. When employees collectively feel it’s unsafe to speak up, this erodes their (self)confidence and trust. They are also less likely to identify with their work and employer. As a result they will feel less engaged and less open to collaboration. It gets worse. Silence can exact a high psychological price on people, generating feelings of humiliation, pernicious anger and resentment. In time this contaminates every interaction and shuts down creativity.
A climate of silence thus hurts an organization’s ability to generate ideas and suggestions, making it less competitive. Indeed, research consistently shows a correlation between an open climate and improved performance. Finally, silence signals a lack of trust in the relationship between an organization and its employees. In time, this lack of trust is likely to be reflected in a deteriorating workplace reputation and employer brand.