What if the key to unlocking bold ideas, honest feedback, and high performance wasn’t talent or experience—but psychological safety?

In this special episode marking Cosmic Centaurs’ 5th anniversary, our founder Marilyn Zakhour is joined by two remarkable guests: Sandra Salame, founder of Siira, and Sander Hoeken, co-founder of the Fearless Organization Scan and collaborator of Prof. Amy Edmondson (Harvard Business School), the pioneer of psychological safety.

Together, they demystify psychological safety—not as a soft skill, but as the soil in which high-performing teams grow. Drawing from lived experience, regional insights, and global data, this episode covers:

• 🧠 The origin and evolution of psychological safety, from Amy Edmondson to Google’s Project Aristotle
• 📊 Why psych safety isn’t just a feel-good concept, but a measurable driver of performance (50% more revenue in some sales teams!)
• 🧩 How psychological safety is often misunderstood in hierarchical or fast-changing environments—and how to reframe it
• 🔧 Practical behaviors, team rituals, and leadership habits that build safety and trust, without sacrificing accountability
• 🌍 What makes psychological safety different in culturally diverse and rapidly transforming regions like the GCC

💬 Whether you're a seasoned leader or an individual contributor, this conversation offers tools, stories, and insights you can start applying tomorrow. Because building a better team starts with creating a space where people feel safe to speak up—and strong enough to challenge the status quo.

✨ Bonus: Hear how Cosmic Centaurs, Siira, and the Fearless Organization are partnering to bring a localized, evidence-based approach to psychological safety across the region.

🔗 Don’t forget to:

• Try the Fearless Organization Scan for your team (linked in the episode notes)
• Download the Cosmic Centaurs psych safety brochure

What if the key to more engaged employees isn’t a new incentive program, but something much more human?

In this episode, Marilyn Zakhour and Dr. Constance Noonan Hadley take you behind the scenes of their three-year research journey on team rituals—work that led to their widely read Harvard Business Review article.

Together, they unpack the data that proves rituals boost team commitment, psychological safety, and job satisfaction—and they share personal stories from the research process, including what surprised them most along the way.

From childhood traditions to corporate rituals that actually work, this conversation is both insightful and deeply personal. Plus, don’t miss the rapid-fire round, where Marilyn and Connie challenge each other with unexpected questions about their collaboration.

Tune in to learn:
✔ What makes a team ritual truly meaningful
✔ How rituals shape human connection at work
✔ The hardest part of researching and implementing rituals
✔ What Marilyn and Connie really think about certain team traditions

If you’ve ever wondered how to build a culture of trust, engagement, and connection, this episode is for you.

In the closing session of The Cosmic Conference, Marilyn Zakhour is joined by Jose Santos, Affiliated Professor of Practice in Global Management at INSEAD, to explore the intricate art of managing polarities in leadership.

Jose challenges conventional wisdom, shedding light on the importance of distinguishing true polarities—those interdependent tensions that sustain systems—from false dichotomies or oversimplified trade-offs. Through rich examples, he delves into situations where polarity thinking fails, such as contexts demanding radical decisions or cases where the interplay of whole systems and their parts is misunderstood.

The conversation also addresses how leaders can integrate systemic and multilevel thinking into their strategies to avoid oversimplification and foster long-term resilience. Jose reflects on the global implications of polarity thinking, offering insights into governance, innovation, and managing cultural diversity in multinational enterprises.


Jose Santos is an Affiliated Professor of Practice in Global Management.
After spending 20 years in the managerial world, Joe moved from Italy to INSEAD and devoted himself to scholarly work, a dream from his youth.
Joe’s research and teaching focuses on the management of multinational enterprise, particularly on the management of global integration, and global innovation.