Best questions for employee survey about psychological safety

Here are some of the best questions for an employee survey about psychological safety, plus tips on how to create them. If you want to build your own, you can instantly generate a survey with Specific and see how it works.

The best open-ended questions for employee survey about psychological safety

Open-ended questions give us genuine insights by letting people express how they really feel, rather than squeezing them into predefined boxes. Use them when you care about stories, opinions, and what you don’t know to ask. Moments like this are especially valuable in areas like psychological safety, where nuance matters greatly and where surface-level answers can hide what’s truly going on in your organization.

Teams with high psychological safety are 50% more likely to innovate efficiently and see a 27% reduction in turnover—open-ended conversations get us there by encouraging honest feedback. [1]

1. How comfortable do you feel speaking up about problems or mistakes at work?

2. Can you share an example of a recent situation where you felt safe (or unsafe) sharing your views?

3. What actions do you wish managers and colleagues would take to make your work environment safer to express ideas?

4. When have you hesitated to ask for help at work? What made you pause?

5. How does your team respond when someone voices a challenge or brings up a potentially unpopular opinion?

6. Are there particular topics you avoid discussing at work? Why?

7. Describe a moment where you felt your input was valued. What happened?

8. What could your team do to make you feel more included in decision-making?

9. How confident are you that mistakes will be treated as learning opportunities here?

10. If you could change one thing to make people feel safer sharing honest feedback, what would it be?

Best single-select multiple-choice questions for employee survey about psychological safety

Single-select multiple-choice questions bring structure and let us easily quantify how people feel—spotting patterns and prioritizing follow-ups. They work well for quick check-ins or when you want to get a pulse before digging deeper.

Sometimes, these questions lower the barrier to entry. Not every respondent wants to write paragraphs, especially if they’re busy or uncertain what to say. Respondents can provide a baseline that you can explore with follow-ups or open-text questions.

Here are a few examples you can use:

Question: How safe do you feel sharing new ideas or suggestions with your team?

• Very safe

• Somewhat safe

• Neutral

• Somewhat unsafe

• Very unsafe

Question: When you make a mistake at work, how does your team respond?

• Supportive and constructive

• Indifferent

• Critical or blaming

• Other

Question: Which of these factors most impacts your willingness to speak up?

• Fear of negative consequences

• Lack of support from leaders

• Unclear expectations

• Previous negative experiences

• Other

When to follow up with "why?" We almost always ask “why?” when someone selects an answer that suggests there’s an underlying issue. For example: If someone selects “Somewhat unsafe,” follow up with, “Can you share more about what makes you feel this way?” This often uncovers the real drivers hiding underneath a simple selection—which is where the richest insight lives.

When and why to add the "Other" choice? Add “Other” when your question might not cover every possible situation. The follow-up (“Can you describe your experience?”) can reveal blind spots or unique challenges that wouldn’t otherwise surface—with survey automation, it’s effortless to capture these insights and explore further.

NPS-style question: Does it make sense?

You might not think of Net Promoter Score (NPS) in the context of psychological safety, but it’s surprisingly powerful. It helps quantify a sense of advocacy—how likely are employees to recommend their company as a place where people feel safe sharing ideas and concerns? The classic NPS format (“On a scale of 0-10, how likely are you…”) provides a benchmark to track over time, illuminating whether efforts to cultivate psychological safety are working or not.

If you want to try a ready-made NPS survey for psychological safety, you can use this template to get started.

The power of follow-up questions

Great surveys go beyond first answers. Automated follow-up questions, like those built into Specific’s intelligent follow-up feature, are game-changers for real employee insights. They allow you to clarify, probe, and understand deeper context—right as people are sharing their thoughts.

Specific’s real-time AI reads what an employee says, then asks the right next question on the spot—just like a skilled interviewer would do live. It means we get the full context without ever sending a string of back-and-forth emails. This improves data quality and saves huge amounts of time. Conversation flows naturally, making people more comfortable (especially on sensitive topics like psychological safety).

• Employee: “Sometimes I feel uncomfortable speaking up in meetings.”

• AI follow-up: “Can you give an example of a meeting where you didn’t feel comfortable sharing your thoughts? What made you hold back?”

How many follow-ups to ask? Two or three are usually enough—you want detail but you don’t want to overwhelm. If the AI gets a clear answer, it should automatically move on to the next topic. Specific lets you control this, so you collect just the right amount of context every time.

This makes it a conversational survey—not just a questionnaire, but a two-way exchange. That’s key for trust, comfort, and more authentic responses.

AI survey response analysis is no longer a hassle—even if you end up with a mountain of rich, qualitative feedback. With AI tools like Specific, analyzing open-ended responses is effortless: the system clusters common themes, identifies trends, and lets you dig deeper using chat-like queries. See our guide on how to analyze employee survey responses for practical steps.

Automated, smart follow-up questions are new and different—give it a try, generate a draft survey, and see the conversation in action.

How to get AI survey questions: prompt ideas for GPT

Want to create a high-quality employee survey but don’t know where to begin? Here’s how to get the most out of ChatGPT or other AI survey makers by writing simple but powerful prompts:

Start with a direct prompt like this:

Suggest 10 open-ended questions for employee survey about psychological safety.

The AI always works best when you provide extra context. For even better results:

Suggest 10 open-ended questions for employee survey about psychological safety. The team is hybrid (remote and in-office) and has experienced a recent reorganization. I want people to share both positives and negatives, and I care about actionable feedback, not just generic answers.

Once you have a candidate list of questions, take it further:

Look at the questions and categorize them. Output categories with the questions under them.

Then, review the resulting categories—pick the ones that fit your organization best or identify issues you want to dive into, and prompt again:

Generate 10 questions for categories “team dynamics” and “leader support.”

AI survey creators such as Specific’s AI survey builder can also handle this entire workflow, helping you iterate in real time.

What is a conversational survey?

A conversational survey is exactly what it sounds like: instead of a rigid, impersonal form, the survey feels like a human conversation. This is where AI shines—it adapts to responses, asks clarifying questions, and gathers deeper insights than a static, one-size-fits-all questionnaire.

Here’s how it stacks up:

Why use AI for employee surveys? The main advantage is depth—AI-driven surveys make it easy to ask tailored follow-ups, surface deeper drivers, and present findings instantly. In fast-moving workplaces, this puts truly actionable insight within reach and supports a culture where everyone is heard.

If you’re curious about getting started, see our practical guide on how to create an employee survey about psychological safety. AI survey examples let you try templates or build from scratch. Specific’s strong user experience makes the whole process—from creation to analysis—smooth and engaging, whether you’re reaching hundreds or thousands of employees.

See this psychological safety survey example now

Ready for better feedback? See exactly how conversational surveys expose hidden blockers, drive real change, and make it simple to act on what you learn—so your team becomes safer, more engaged, and more innovative, starting today.