Chapter 3. I am afraid to speak up

Fifty-two percent of employees do not feel free to voice their opinions openly.

During a pep talk to the troops, a brave U.S. soldier serving in Iraq dared to ask Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld a challenging question. He asked why U.S. soldiers needed to scavenge through landfills to find armor to protect their vehicles. Speaking up in this way was shocking and received a great deal of international press attention. Soldiers are usually too intimidated to challenge their leaders.

The same holds true in many organizations. According to our Discovery Surveys Normative Database, only 48 percent of working employees feel free to voice their opinions. They feel it is safer to just keep their mouths shut. This ...

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