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Multilingualism and the development ofpsychological safety in teams: The roles of inclusive leadership and work organization practices
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School of Business |
Bachelor's thesis
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en
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33
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Today’s companies deal with increasingly complex problems that require collaboration across linguistic boundaries. This bachelor’s thesis examines how linguistic diversity affects the development of psychological safety in multilingual project teams. Additionally, it examines how inclusive leadership and work organization practices contribute to psychological safety in this context.
As global collaboration increases, teams often operate using common working language. While shared language enables collaboration and knowledge transfer, prior research also shows that it can cause misunderstandings, anxiety among less proficient speakers and status asymmetries between native and non-native speakers. The above-mentioned dynamics can hinder open communication, trust formation and learning from mistakes, which are the three prerequisites for the formation of psychological safety.
This thesis is conducted as an integrative literature review combining insights from peer-reviewed academic literature. Existing research is synthesized across multiple academic fields, organizational behaviour, international management, and linguistic research. Project-based teams form a relevant context because of their special characteristics which make psychological safety particularly important thus vulnerable.
The research shows that the core elements of inclusive leadership, openness, availability, and approachability help to reduce linguistic barriers, foster open and respectful interaction, and normalise imperfections. In turn, work organization practices further strengthen clarity, predictability, and equality in communication. These practices are especially important for those who are most disadvantaged by differences in language proficiency.
Findings in this study suggest that when supported appropriately, multilingualism can become a resource for shared learning and collaboration instead of being a source of imbalance. However, this thesis highlights the need for further empirical research on psychological safety in multilingual context.