Influence Management training in ZurichManaging through influence in the canton of Zurich: how can you surface risks in a cross-functional project?
In the canton of Zurich, financial services, insurance, technology companies and European headquarters bring together international teams that often work at a fast pace, with English as their working language. For SHR's “Manager par influence” programme, this raises a precise question: how can you elicit useful warnings when you coordinate a project without line authority over all its participants?
1. What the literature establishes: speaking up involves risk
Amy C. Edmondson (1999, Administrative Science Quarterly) identifies an association between team psychological safety and learning behaviour. Psychological safety refers to a shared belief that a team is safe for interpersonal risk-taking, including asking questions or acknowledging mistakes. For a cross-functional project lead, this suggests treating a risk warning as a socially exposed act, rather than merely a transfer of information.
2. Openness is judged through behaviour
James R. Detert and Ethan R. Burris (2007, Academy of Management Journal) show that managerial openness is associated with employees speaking up to improve organisational functioning. Their analyses support a mechanism in which psychological safety helps explain this relationship. An invitation to speak should therefore be accompanied by consistent behaviour: listening to the concern, examining it and explaining what happens next.
3. The premature conclusion: reassurance would be enough
It would be tempting to conclude that a reassuring statement at the start of a meeting is enough to bring risks to light. Yet a general invitation removes neither status differences between functions nor the fear of delaying a launch backed by international headquarters. In a meeting conducted in English, offering a written contribution channel as well may be a practical precaution, without assuming that language alone explains silence. (our executive and employee training programmes)
4. What the evidence cannot promise
These studies focus neither specifically on the canton of Zurich nor on project leads without line authority. Their findings therefore cannot guarantee that a system for collecting concerns will reduce incidents in a banking or technology environment. The number of concerns raised is itself ambiguous: an increase may reflect greater willingness to speak rather than a deterioration in the project.
5. A practical check in Zurich
Consider a hypothetical example in Zurich: a project lead coordinates, in English, the rollout of a tool across technology, compliance and operations teams at an international insurer. One suggested exercise for practising management through influence is to collect one risk from each participant before every review, allowing “no risk identified” as a response, and then record an owner, a next action and a feedback date for each concern. Over a one-month trial, check the proportion of concerns that receive a documented response by the stated date, and record oral and written contributions separately. This measures the reliability of follow-up, not psychological safety itself or the absence of unreported risks. To go further: explore the Influence Management training in Zurich in the canton of Zurich, or browse our executive and employee training programmes in Switzerland.
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