WALT Institute

I once received a 360 deg review I was completely unprepared for.

Nobody told me how to give feedback.
Nobody told me how to receive it.

I took it personally.
Lost sleep.
Kept replaying the conversation at 2am, at 5am, in the shower, in the car.

My amygdala was running the show.
Full survival mode.
And I had no idea that was even happening.

The work I did after that changed everything.
I learned to notice the signals before the reaction hit.
Built the pause.
Started responding from choice.

Feedback is not an annual event.
It is a living practice. And when people know how to give it and receive it, everything changes.

Psychological safety exists when leadership is authentic and proactive.

Some weeks are just hard.

Not dramatic. Just heavy in a way that is hard to explain to anyone who is not inside it with you.

You are still showing up.
Still delivering.
Still doing the thing.
And underneath all of that, something is sitting there, waiting for you to acknowledge it.

Here is what I learned.
Calling it 'as is' makes it workable.

When you name what you are feeling, clearly and honestly, your nervous system settles.
The brain stops burning energy on suppression and starts moving toward response.

BE DO HAVE starts with being. And sometimes BEing means sitting with what is real before you decide what to do next.

Call it 'as is'. That is where the next move comes from.

A few weeks ago I was supporting someone through a really difficult moment.
The whole time, I was carrying something difficult of my own.

It was not pretending everything was fine.
It was regulation.

University of Oxford researchers studied around 1,800 British Telecom workers and found happier employees were 12% more productive.
Not slightly. Measurably, consistently, 12% more.

Wellbeing is not a nice to have. It is a performance strategy.

And the single biggest variable is whether the leaders around your people are living it or performing it.

Your people do not need a leader who is unaffected.
They need one who is equipped.

There is a significant difference.



"Your people do not need a leader who is unaffected. They need one who is equipped." - Dr Elizabeth Pritchard

For years, I thought saying "yes" made me valuable.

Underneath the ambition, the commitment, the drive...
was fear.

Fear of falling behind. Fear of disappointing people.
Fear that saying "no" would make me less worthy.

One belief I carried for years: "If I say no, it will affect my career."

Byron Katie's four questions of inquiry changed everything.
Was it 100% true? In every situation?
No.

And the replacement thought became: "When I say no, it supports my career."

The reason so many of us find it hard to say no is not weakness.
It is an old pattern running on repeat.

And like all patterns, they can change.



"When I say no, it supports my career." - Dr Elizabeth Pritchard

Most hiring mistakes are not about skills.

They could do the job. The interview went well. Three months in, something is off.

What gets missed is the three-lens check.

Can they do it? Will they do it? Do they fit the team?

All three matter. Most leaders only really test the first one.

If you are about to make a hire, or you are managing a new team member right now and something feels off, let's talk. One conversation can save months.



"Hiring for skills alone fills a seat. Hiring through all three lenses builds a team." - Christine Burns

Told them once. They asked again. Told them again. They asked again.

And now you are frustrated.

Guess what?!
That is a setup problem, not a people problem.

Tell them the process. Show them what it looks like. Let them shadow someone doing it. Then let them do it themselves.

Tell. Show. Shadow. Do.

Front-load the investment. The return comes quickly, and it compounds.



"Your time investment is heaviest at the start. That is by design." - Dr Elizabeth Pritchard

You walked into the Monday meeting carrying the weekend.

A conversation that did not resolve. A decision that kept you up. You smiled, opened the meeting, asked how everyone was.

And the room gave you exactly what you gave them.

Flat. Functional. Somewhere else.

This is neuroscience, not metaphor. The person in the room with the broadest, most regulated emotional range sets the temperature for everyone else. Your team is scanning you within seconds. Safe or unsafe. Open or closed.

When you are regulated, they feel safe to think clearly and speak honestly.

Your presence is the intervention. Every single time you walk through a door.

What state are you walking in with this week?



"Your presence is the intervention. Every time you walk through a door." - Dr Elizabeth Pritchard

The new person started this week.

Keen. Bright. Wanting to get it right.

And the existing team? Already pulling back. Not because they mean to. Because settled teams have rhythms, and a new person disrupts them.

The new person is reading every signal. And what they are feeling is: I am on the outside.

That is on us as leaders to fix. Fast.

Making room for someone new is not their job to manage alone. It is yours.



"The way someone enters a team shapes how long they stay, and how much they give." - Dr Elizabeth Pritchard

Since December 2025, managing psychosocial hazards is a legal requirement for every Australian employer.

Not a policy in a folder. Not an EAP in the email footer. A documented, structured approach with the same rigour applied to physical safety risks.

Most organisations are still solving the wrong problem.

What creates impactful change is having leaders who understand that their own inner state, their regulation, their presence in a room, is the most powerful psychosocial control available.

That is the work WALT Institute does with organisations. Practical, measurable, built on Authentic Leadership and neuroscience.

If this is landing close to what your organisation is navigating, send me a DM. Lets talk.



"The most powerful psychosocial control in any organisation is a regulated, present, and authentic leader." - Dr Elizabeth Pritchard

Your people are reading you before you say a word.

The human brain has been scanning for threat since long before language existed.
Tone.
Energy.
The tension you carry through the door.

They feel all of it within seconds of you walking in.

In 2002 I was functioning, delivering, holding everything together.

What I did not know then was that I was transmitting overwhelm to every person around me.
My inner state had become everyone else weather.

This is what psychosocial safety actually looks like in practice.
Not a policy.
The daily felt experience of whether it is safe to think, speak, and contribute.

Your regulation is not a personal practice. It is a leadership responsibility.

What state are your people inheriting from you?



"Your inner state becomes everyone else weather." - Dr Elizabeth Pritchard