The team of the Bachelor of Secondary Education (BASO) program at UCLL, driven by the core values “together, coherent, and strong,” shares the collective ambition to optimally prepare students for their future profession. They aim to expand and adapt the curriculum cross-disciplinarily to align with future developments.
This ambition requires a safe working and learning environment, where 80 enthusiastic lecturers feel confident to constructively share their opinions across disciplines, address one another on areas for improvement, and provide growth-oriented feedback. All of this serves to strengthen collaboration. For this challenge, UCLL turned to The Tipping Point.
“In our quest to harvest the benefits of an agile, skilled, and successful team ready to face tomorrow’s challenges, we partnered with The Tipping Point. This partnership feels natural, as UCLL’s baseline is, after all, ‘We are the moving minds! We are Teachers on the move.’ As a teacher education program, we challenge ourselves and our students to be moved, to adapt to the changing world around us, and to inspire others through our commitment to action. This way, we aim to offer and guarantee high-quality education, while also recognizing the importance of setting an example. The team at The Tipping Point quickly understood this vision.
What started as a simple request—a single inspiration session on giving feedback—evolved into a tailored program where evidence-based inspiration sessions alternated with practical exercises on future skills. The Tipping Point provided a valuable boost to the development of our lecturer team.”
Karen Nackom, Program Coordinator BASO
Creating a culture where every individual feels safe to take interpersonal risks can be a challenge, especially in larger teams. The right mindset, skills, and team agreements are also essential to make this happen.
At The Tipping Point, we identified several approaches to achieve this. After consulting with UCLL, we decided to start with a “mindshift,” followed by training in conversational skills that contribute to fostering psychological safety within a team. Finally, the team participated in an experiential exercise with an observer, allowing them to experience firsthand what sets psychological safety apart in a team and how individuals can influence it.
Over the course of four months, we collaborated with the UCLL BASO team on three team days. To kick off the program, we began with the inspiration session “The Mindshift“, which shed light on how our social brain functions and how our internal predictive model can make it challenging to give and receive feedback in a fair manner. By gaining insight into their own personal triggers and each other’s preferences, the teachers were inspired to change their perspective on feedback.
But how do you address each other constructively without being triggered? On the second team day, the entire team was divided into subgroups based on their subject areas to practice the necessary conversational techniques in interactive sessions with a simulation actor.
For the third team day, we went back to the drawing board to design a tailored day where the teachers wouldn’t just cognitively understand the concept of “psychological safety” or discuss it, but would also experience it firsthand.
In the morning, the inspiration session “The Art of Psychological Safety” explained what this team construct entails, its defining characteristics, and why avoiding the silence paradox is critical for effective teams. In the afternoon, under the motto “You only see it when you understand it,” participants engaged in a decontextualized, experiential team exercise to personally feel the impact of individual behavior on psychological safety. Based on their own observations during the exercise, the group conducted an analysis and translated their insights into their work context at UCLL: What can I do to contribute to psychological safety in my team?
To further embed these intentions into practice, the same team exercise format, with an observer and analysis, was applied during a follow-up session in their own work environment.
Throughout the program, the sessions were continuously adjusted in co-creation with UCLL to address the needs of the staff. A shared language and framework were established, enabling the lecturers to engage in dialogue and bring underlying issues—previously left unspoken—to the surface using the tools provided.
Thanks to the scientific approach to the themes and the methodology used, the team at The Tipping Point managed to perfectly align with our needs. Engaging intake conversations enabled us to co-create a tailored offering.
Specifically, the sessions inspired us to further strengthen our core business—supporting future teachers. At the same time, we set the goal of teaching our team to handle changes and challenges resiliently and effectively. Through collaboration, we fostered a shared enthusiasm to take collective responsibility, both in rethinking our curriculum and building a strong, coherent team.
Our journey with The Tipping Point has positively impacted our team dynamics, encouraging us to step out of our comfort zone...
So yes, we are already reaping the benefits of an agile, skilled, and successful team ready for the challenges of tomorrow.
Creating a culture where every individual feels safe to take interpersonal risks can be a challenge, especially in larger teams. The right mindset, skills, and team agreements are also essential to make this happen.
At The Tipping Point, we identified several approaches to achieve this. After consulting with UCLL, we decided to start with a “mindshift,” followed by training in conversational skills that contribute to fostering psychological safety within a team. Finally, the team participated in an experiential exercise with an observer, allowing them to experience firsthand what sets psychological safety apart in a team and how individuals can influence it.
Over the course of four months, we collaborated with the UCLL BASO team on three team days. To kick off the program, we began with the inspiration session “The Mindshift“, which shed light on how our social brain functions and how our internal predictive model can make it challenging to give and receive feedback in a fair manner. By gaining insight into their own personal triggers and each other’s preferences, the teachers were inspired to change their perspective on feedback.
But how do you address each other constructively without being triggered? On the second team day, the entire team was divided into subgroups based on their subject areas to practice the necessary conversational techniques in interactive sessions with a simulation actor.
For the third team day, we went back to the drawing board to design a tailored day where the teachers wouldn’t just cognitively understand the concept of “psychological safety” or discuss it, but would also experience it firsthand.
In the morning, the inspiration session “The Art of Psychological Safety” explained what this team construct entails, its defining characteristics, and why avoiding the silence paradox is critical for effective teams. In the afternoon, under the motto “You only see it when you understand it,” participants engaged in a decontextualized, experiential team exercise to personally feel the impact of individual behavior on psychological safety. Based on their own observations during the exercise, the group conducted an analysis and translated their insights into their work context at UCLL: What can I do to contribute to psychological safety in my team?
To further embed these intentions into practice, the same team exercise format, with an observer and analysis, was applied during a follow-up session in their own work environment.
Throughout the program, the sessions were continuously adjusted in co-creation with UCLL to address the needs of the staff. A shared language and framework were established, enabling the lecturers to engage in dialogue and bring underlying issues—previously left unspoken—to the surface using the tools provided.
Thanks to the scientific approach to the themes and the methodology used, the team at The Tipping Point managed to perfectly align with our needs. Engaging intake conversations enabled us to co-create a tailored offering.
Specifically, the sessions inspired us to further strengthen our core business—supporting future teachers. At the same time, we set the goal of teaching our team to handle changes and challenges resiliently and effectively. Through collaboration, we fostered a shared enthusiasm to take collective responsibility, both in rethinking our curriculum and building a strong, coherent team.
Our journey with The Tipping Point has positively impacted our team dynamics, encouraging us to step out of our comfort zone...
So yes, we are already reaping the benefits of an agile, skilled, and successful team ready for the challenges of tomorrow.
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You don’t build a strong culture of dialogue with a one-size-fits-all approach. To make dialogue work effectively within organizations, we offer various formats tailored to different needs and situations. These tools help strengthen skills, drive change, and achieve learning objectives. Discover how our formats contribute to impact and sustainable results.
To build a culture of dialogue, developing strong communication skills is essential. This serves as the foundation for organizations to make conversations work effectively. To support organizations in this effort, we deliberately focus on three powerful levers to foster a thriving culture of dialogue: Psychological Safety, Leadership, and a Feedback Culture. Each of these elements contributes to a culture where conversations drive growth, innovation, and sustainable results.
