Part of this article was originally a series of posts for The Team Leader Community
David Rock’s SCARF Model is a framework designed to understand and manage social and psychological dynamics in interactions, particularly in workplaces or team settings.
The model is grounded in neuroscience, emphasising how social interactions can activate the same neural responses as physical threats or rewards. Leaders, managers and coaches who consider these domains can better align their strategies to foster a positive and high-performing culture.
SCARF is an acronym that stands for five domains that influence human behaviour and responses.
- Status: Refers to the relative importance or “pecking order” individuals perceive themselves to have compared to others.
- Certainty: People crave predictability and clarity. Uncertainty about outcomes or lack of clear expectations can cause stress and anxiety.
- Autonomy: The sense of control over one’s decisions and environment. A lack of autonomy, such as micromanagement, can create a threat response.
- Relatedness: The feeling of being connected and belonging to a group. Situations that create isolation or exclude individuals can be perceived as threatening.
- Fairness: The perception of equitable and just treatment. Perceived unfairness triggers strong negative reactions.
Here are five scenarios that highlight how avoid or reduce threat responses that might be triggered, based on each of the SCARF components.
Scenario 1
Sarah is managing a new team, and she notices that one of her team members, Carl, is using a new piece of software incorrectly.
She offers him some advice and returns to her work. But later, she notices that he’s still misusing it. So, she decides to sit with him until he gets it right.
Over the next few days, Sarah notices that Carl has become standoffish with her. He’s defensive when she offers him feedback, and he avoids talking to her.
Sarah is bewildered – all she wants to do is to help Carl, and she can’t figure out why he’s reacting so badly to her support.
Does this sound familiar?
This is a classic example of a response to Status; our perceived level of importance, relative to others in a group.
Sarah’s motives and intentions are good. She wants the best for Carl and for the business outcomes. But they’ve reached a position where Carl’s non-compliance to a process/system and his apparent disengagement from his manager might now mean that she finds herself leaning on formal processes, such as performance plans.
We’re social animals. We read cues and behaviours in others to help us understand our perceived level of status or importance within a social group and how we should interact.
A perceived threat to our status – something that might see us as less important or removed from the group – and create a “stress” response: fight, flight, freeze or fawn. Carl’s behaviour is a threat response that, on first review, could be a ‘freeze’ reaction: I’ll not do anything and disengage from the situation.
The threat to status can be via hierarchy (i.e., someone with a more senior label addresses you) or implied threat to competency (i.e., someone – particularly if they’re in authority – questioning your capability or providing unsolicited advice).
“Can I give you some feedback?” is an example of a type of statement that might trigger a threat response in others – just as we see in Carl and Sarah’s example.
A less status-threatening approach might be to have Carl provide his own feedback.
Sarah might ask, “How are you finding using the new system? How comfortable are you feeling about navigating around it?”
This could reduce the perceived threat and the impact, and great coaches will use this approach – having the coachee provide feedback on themselves through probing, open questions – to improve the likelihood of changing behaviour and performance.
Scenario 2
Jessica is an employee who has been working diligently on a project for several months. The project is nearing completion, and her manager, Alex, calls her into a meeting to discuss the next steps.
During the meeting, Alex says, “We might need to pivot the project direction entirely, but I can’t give you specifics yet. Leadership is still figuring out what they want. Just keep working on it for now but be ready to adapt.”
Alex feels that Jessica might even like the free time created by the reduced pressure of the project pause.
However, when he broaches the subject with Jessica the following day, she is irate and frustrated. She snaps at Alex, saying that she’s “underappreciated” and “doesn’t know why she bothers” with working so diligently on these projects if the “goal posts are going to keep moving.”
Does this sound familiar?
This is the result of a threat response to Certainty; having perceived confidence and predictability in the future.
In Jessica’s case, this is a ‘fight’ response, where an individual might become argumentative, conflict-seeking, or overbearing.
Alex has been transparent that he doesn’t know what the next steps will be. However, in doing so, he has created more uncertainty and contributed to Jessica’s psychological reaction to the context and situation.
One way that this could be reduced is to update Jessica specifically when more information will be available or, if that’s not possible, when he will check-in with her: “I can’t share any information with you at the moment. But I will come back to you on Wednesday to let you know exactly what I can at that point.”
In our contact centres, we might see similar responses when putting customers on hold.
By not providing a specific hold time – “I’ll be back to you in 20 seconds” – the caller might enter a fight, flight, freeze or fawn state. In this scenario, we can reduce the caller’s threat response by including a specific time and then keeping that promise; even if you don’t have the information required.
It’s better to come back repeatedly as promised, than to set an expectation and then not keep that word – even when we might be able to rationalise it away because we haven’t yet got the info, outcome or decision yet.
Scenario 3
Raj is a skilled and experienced team member who has been independently managing a key project. He takes pride in his ability to make decisions and deliver results without heavy oversight.
Raj’s manager, Priya, steps in and says, “We’ve got some budget issues and I’ll need to approve all decisions related to this project before you move forward. Also, I’d like to review your daily progress updates to ensure we’re aligned.”
Raj follows Priya’s instructions, providing daily updates and getting approval for all decisions. But Priya feels that Raj is just doing the what’s asked for and has stopped contributing creatively or taking initiative in resolving any issues. She’s being asked for advice and a decision on every issue and concern, where Raj would’ve dealt with previously on his own.
Does this sound familiar?
This is a threat response to an infringement to our Autonomy: the perceived control over one’s life, decisions and environment.
The example shows that Raj is having a threat response – Freeze – to Priya’s request, which is potentially perceived as removing his agency over decisions and approaches. This is a common and unintentional threat that we see when working in organisations or as part of a team.
By their nature, organisations and teams remove autonomy. We have to work within certain processes, policies and regulations. Our innate behaviour when part of a team is to conform. We see this in the language we use, which is different when working in a team versus being with our family or friends. The need to belong and fit in can trump our individualism.
This is part of the reason that return-to-office mandates have been met with such resistance. Instructing employees to come back to the office removes the perceived autonomy we had when working remotely, and the responses are predictably avoidance behaviours, i.e.:
- Fight = “I’m not going back”;
- Flight = “I’ll go work somewhere else”;
- Freeze = “I’ll go in just to show my face two days a week – but I’m not doing any more”;
- Fawn = “If I can stay remote, I’ll do x, y and z extra. C’mon. You know it’s better.”
We can reduce the perceived removal of autonomy by introducing things that retain some individualism.
For example, we might choose the days to return to office. We might allow choice in where they sit, how they organise their work or working space, or create more flexibility for social meet-ups and collaboration when in the office.
Scenario 4
Lisa is a new employee on a small team. She has been making an effort to connect with her manager, Tom, and her colleagues to feel included and be part of the new team.
During a team meeting, Lisa shares an idea for a new approach. Instead of acknowledging her contribution, Tom quickly moves on to the next topic without addressing her input. Later, Lisa notices Tom engaging warmly with other team members but offering minimal interaction with her.
Tom feels that Lisa isn’t contributing to the team. Her probation review is due soon, and he’s considering extending it to give Lisa more time to make an effort.
Does this sound familiar?
In our fourth example, we consider Relatedness: our sense of connectedness, safety and belonging
At its core, relatedness is concerned with one question: Am I safe?
Our sense of safety comes, in part, from familiarity. We tend to feel more connectedness to people that are like us. If you’re from Newcastle upon Tyne and your mother tongue is English, when you’re on holiday in, for example, Greece, you will naturally find yourself drawn to a stranger speaking with a Geordie accent versus a stranger with a London accent.
You might also find yourself drawn to a non-English-speaking local Greek, because they’re wearing a Newcastle United football top.
In psychology, we call these artefacts. They’re symbols and tokens that we recognise from ourselves in others. Relatedness can be thought of as the volume and importance of these artefacts that we see in others.
When we don’t see them – such as Lisa seeing a different response from Tom to her peers versus her – it is an unintentional act of exclusion. Unfortunately, our brains then tend to recognise more evidence that supports that view; our confirmation bias loves to highlight how right we are.
Ironically, Tom also spots that Lisa is displaying disengaged behaviour – Freeze – and his confirmation bias will be working hard to find additional evidence to support that Lisa’s not a team player.
Tom could have approached this differently. For example, during or after the meeting, he could explicitly recognise Lisa’s input: “Lisa, your idea about the project approach is interesting. Let’s explore it further.”
He could actively involve Lisa in team discussions, by asking for her thoughts on what’s being discussed. Tom could spend time building rapport with Lisa through one-on-one conversations: “How are you finding the team so far? Is there anything you need from me?”
Sending signals that demonstrate that Lisa is welcome, safe and valued is Tom’s responsibility – even when Tom’s biases are actively encouraging him to do the contrary.
Scenario 5
Michael and Emma are both call centre agents working in a sales-focused environment. They handle the same type of calls, have similar targets, and consistently meet or exceed their quotas.
During a team meeting, their manager, Alex, announces that Emma will receive a gift card for her “outstanding performance in handling calls.” Michael, who believes he has performed just as well, does not receive any recognition or reward.
The team claps – including Michael – but Alex notices that Michael rolls his eyes and looks deflated. After the meeting, Alex asks if he’s OK and Michael snaps back that, “He’s fed up of always smashing his targets for no one to notice”, and demands an explanation from Alex.
Alex tells him that now isn’t the time, resulting in Michael saying, “It never is. I’m going on my break anyway”, and walking away.
Does this sound familiar?
This last example is about Fairness: our perception of fair and equitable treatment
Michael’s Fight response is a natural reaction to the perceived inequality in Alex’s decision making. However, it’s likely that Alex might feel the victim in this situation, as the fight response can be threatening and irrational to an outside viewer – especially when Alex has the additional understanding of the motives behind awarding Emma the reward.
But, because Alex hasn’t been transparent with recognition criteria, others in the group with what they consider to be comparable performances might feel they have been treated unfairly.
There are several ways that this situation might have considered the threat response to perceived inequity. Alex could provide the transparency for the award: “Emma exceeded her targets last week by 20% and helped train a new agent on her break time, which contributed significantly to the team’s success.”
He might recognise Michael separately – publicly or privately – for his contributions or set more clarity around future recognition: “We’ll continue recognising top performers weekly. Let’s discuss how we can highlight your strengths in upcoming reviews.”
It’s important to recognise that equity does not mean equality. Also, fairness is about the perceived equity. Communication and expectation setting are the biggest allies in helping individuals recognise what is objectively fair and equitable.
Using SCARF
Applying the SCARF model positively impacts others by creating a psychologically safe environment that minimises perceived threats and maximises rewards in social interactions.
Conversely, neglecting SCARF principles can lead to insecurity, anxiety, and disengagement.
Threats to status, uncertainty, micromanagement, exclusion, or perceived unfairness provoke defensiveness, mistrust, and reduced morale. They can also elicit other threat responses, depending on the context and the individuals involved.
These negative effects hinder creativity, collaboration, and overall performance. By aligning approaches with the SCARF model, you can foster a culture of respect and trust, driving both individual satisfaction and collective success.
The challenge is that the behavioural reaction to the threat state happens in someone else, making it easy to dismiss our own influence and responsibility for part of that behaviour.
Considering how we impact on the recipient’s status, certainty, autonomy, relatedness, and their perception of fairness can not only help us avoid creating a threat response. It can be equally influential in creating a reward response, too.