Archive note:
Originally published on LinkedIn on June 15, 2025. This article is preserved here as part of the evolution of our thinking on employee voice, psychological safety, trust, and the network structures that determine whether people are heard or remain silent.
How many times have you had an idea, a suggestion, or a concern, and decided to stay silent? Or maybe you spoke up… and hit a wall of silence. No reaction. No follow-up. No acknowledgment.
Eventually, you learn the unspoken rule: Silence feels safer than disappointment.
But what happens when that rule is learned by dozens of employees? When “employee voice” becomes a whisper, and that whisper never travels?
In those moments, the organization doesn’t just lose feedback. It loses its pulse.
And the worst part? It doesn’t even know it.
The problem isn’t just individual behavior- it’s the structure of relationships. And that’s where a different lens becomes essential. By analyzing relationships, communication patterns, and informal influence structures, ONA reveals what formal hierarchies and engagement surveys often miss: where voices disappear, who is disconnected, and why psychological safety is fractured.
If voice is intention, and trust is the permission to speak - the network is the space where it all either lives or dies.
When Silence Spreads – Why Do People Stop Speaking Up?
Psychological safety isn’t a buzzword - it’s a prerequisite for innovation, quality decision-making, and organizational resilience.
Research shows:
85% of employees withhold valuable input due to fear of negative consequences or perceived futility. (Milliken, Morrison & Hewlin, 2003)
Psychological safety - the belief that one can speak up without risk of embarrassment or punishment - is foundational to high-performing teams. (Edmondson, 1999)
Yet, silence is often misread as consent or satisfaction. In reality, it’s frequently a rational response to unspoken organizational norms.
Without visibility into how ideas, concerns, and influence flow through a network, leaders are left blind to where the system is breaking down.
Not All Voice Is the Same: Promotive vs. Prohibitive in the Network
Employee voice is not a single behavior - it comes in different forms, each with a different impact and network pathways. According to organizational behavior research (Liang, Farh, & Farh, 2012), there are two core types:
Promotive Voice
– Expressing suggestions for improvements, innovations, or new ideas. – A future-oriented behavior aimed at enhancing the organization.
In ONA, promotive voice often flows through innovation networks -individuals who bridge across departments, spark creativity, and influence multiple teams. When these connectors become isolated or overloaded, the flow of new ideas silently slows down.
Prohibitive Voice
– Expressing concerns about harmful practices, inefficiencies, or emerging risks. – A protective behavior aimed at preventing damage.
This form of voice typically relies on trust-based micro-networks where individuals feel safe enough to raise uncomfortable truths. When those ties weaken, early warnings vanish—and organizations only notice when the problem becomes visible and expensive.
When Voice Gets Stuck in the Network
ONA allows us to detect structural weaknesses where employee voice behaviors become suppressed or diluted:
Bottlenecks for promotive voice → Innovative ideas don’t reach decision-makers due to hierarchical barriers or a lack of influence.
Suppression of prohibitive voice → Concerns are filtered out or ignored due to fear of repercussions.
Gatekeeping → A few highly central individuals dominate communication flow, creating organizational “choke points.”
In such systems, silence is not a lack of engagement. It’s a systemic outcome.
From Insight to Action: Making Voice Work with What You Already Have
Organizational Network Analysis (ONA) doesn’t just visualize relationships - it shows where action is needed.
Here’s how organizations can turn insight into impact without advanced technology:
Use ONA to identify voice bottlenecks - teams or roles where feedback never reaches decision-makers.
Track shifts in network position, such as experts moving from central to peripheral roles over time, which often signals withdrawal or disengagement.
Overlay voice data with HR processes - like pairing ONA insights with 360 feedback, team health assessments, or onboarding feedback loops.
Facilitate structured conversations - targeted check-ins with network “silences” to understand context, not just collect data.
Train managers on relational intelligence - helping them recognize where trust is missing and how to rebuild safe pathways for feedback.
With ONA, professionals don’t need futuristic tools to strengthen voice. They need better visibility into the system and the discipline to act before silence becomes resignation.
What Leaders Can Do
Creating a culture where voice is heard - and acted upon - requires intentional design. It’s not about having an “open-door policy.” It’s about engineering open networks.
Three strategic steps:
Map the flow of voice, not just the source. Use ONA to see who speaks up, who listens, and where the signal stops.
Reinforce pathways for both promotive and prohibitive voice. Don’t just ask for ideas - create psychological safety for critique.
Close the loop with action. AI-enhanced ONA dashboards can make voice visible and actionable in real time - not six months later in an engagement report.
Designing for Voice, Not Just Collecting It
Employee voice isn’t broken - it’s blocked. At times, deliberately, but often quietly, through the structures, we stop questioning.
Too many organizations celebrate “speaking up” while silently building systems that discourage it.
Voice doesn’t fail because people don’t care. It fails because networks collapse, safety disappears, and nobody sees the pattern.
Employee voice is not just a behavior. It is a networked phenomenon.
And it’s time to treat it as such.
References
Milliken, F. J., Morrison, E. W., & Hewlin, P. F. (2003). An exploratory study of employee silence: Issues that employees don’t communicate upward and why. Journal of Management Studies, 40(6).
Edmondson, A. (1999). Psychological safety and learning behavior in work teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44(2).
Liang, J., Farh, C. I. C., & Farh, J. L. (2012). Psychological antecedents of promotive and prohibitive voice: A two-wave examination. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 118(2).
Morrison, E. W. (2011). Employee voice behavior: Integration and directions for future research. Academy of Management Annals, 5(1).
Detert, J. R., & Edmondson, A. C. (2011). Implicit voice theories: Taken-for-granted rules of self-censorship at work. Academy of Management Journal, 54(3).