TRUST, A Timeless Investment

Executives often ask us for advice on how to build trust with their employees. Often times, those asking for assistance are hoping for a quick fix, when in fact, building trust is a serious long-term commitment and investment, which starts from the senior leadership and cascades down to each single leader within the organization.  Building trusting relationships is vital, particularly in hard economic times when we are asking our employees to do more with less.  

Planting The Seeds of Trust In Your Organization

As an executive, your challenge is to create a significant level of trust and engagement among people you rarely see - or may never meet.  Unless you have the trust of your workforce, your communications, your message will be lost or twisted.  Communications need to be your focus and priority - the frequency, the appropriateness, the depth (the "what" and "why").  As importantly, you must be diligent and consistent in demonstrating your integrity and holding yourself and others accountable.

As a manager, you are critical to achieving alignment and commitment among individual employees.  Your effectiveness is determined not only by what you do, but also by who you are.  Employees must trust your abilities and expertise, but as importantly, they must also trust your character and understand your motivation.  To successfully match individual passions and proficiencies with organizational priorities, you must talk to your people and get to know them.  Understand not only their special talents but also their unique engagement drivers.

Trust in Action

Communicate With Intention

The two keys to trust-building communication are  1) committing to find win/win strategies even if the starting point is clearly not trust, and 2) arriving at defined, accountable outcomes.

Keep Your Word

Your word is one of your greatest assets. Please, use it wisely, keep it clean and don't abuse it, if not, you will regret it for a long time. Follow this advice and you will become a reliable person and, thus, you will build trust in any kind of relationship (customers, readers, boss, partner, friends, and so on). Why? Because they can count on you, they know how important it is for you to keep your promises. They trust you because they know that your word is worth to you more than a fortune.

Be Transparent

Tell the truth and be yourself.  Don't be afraid to show who you really are with no deception or tricks. Avoid artificial roles or actions. If people realize that you aren't being yourself they will distrust you. Regarding trust, natural prevails over unnatural. So, be sincere and talk with your own voice.

Be Committed and Consistent

Persistent people who work hard and keep their promises are respected, valued and trusted. Keep working towards your goals despite the obstacles, difficulties or discouragement. Persistent people don't like to let anyone down. You know that you can count on them to do what they say they will do. Most committed people are trustworthy because of their competence. Commitment shines through persistent work. Hence, if you want to build trust you need to be persistent and consistent with your actions.

Extend The Trust You Seek

"The only way to make a man trustworthy is to trust him." ~ Henry Stimson

Extend trust to others, this  will encourage them to reciprocate and extend trust to you and draw out the best in them and inspire greater performance.  

There is risk in trusting another person, because they might take advantage of you or let you down.  But there is also risk in not trusting them. As a leader, if you don't trust your people how can you expect them to trust you? The downside of "withholding trust" is the loss of enthusiasm, engagement and collaboration.

Encourage and Practice Accountability

The level of accountability is directly related to the level of trust, engagement and ownership that exists within an organization.

Without trust and engagement no performance measures and rewards will be particularly effective over the medium to long term.  Focus on creating a sense of ownership and commitment to the role each individual plays towards achieving common goals.

Reflections

As you reflect on whether your employees are fully engaged and trust senior leadership, also consider what you are modeling at the top with your leadership team.  Are they fully engaged as a team?  Do they trust you?  Do they trust each other?

This Issue Leadership Advice  

"Trust is the foundation of leadership" ~ John Maxwell

John Maxwell, in his book "The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership: Follow Them and People Will Follow You" tells us that trust is the glue that holds organizations together.  In order to build trust Maxell asserts, leaders must consistently ex�emplify competence, connection, and character. If your followers see your ability to lead varies from day to day, they will begin to lose faith in you as a leader.

Some Findings...  

• In an earlier Watson Wyatt Worldwide study, the findings showed that companies with high integrity-a measure based on employee assessments of senior management's consistency, communications and other trust-determining behaviors-generate financial returns (in excess of the cost of capital investments) that are twice those of companies with low integrity levels.  

• The BlessingWhite Employee Engagement Report 2011, indicates that Trust in executives appears to have more than twice the impact on engagement levels than trust in immediate managers does. Trust, communication and culture  rated as the top areas of opportunity for improvement for executives,   specifically in demonstrating consistency in words and actions, communicate a lot (and with a lot of depth), and align all business practices and behaviors throughout the organization to drive results and engagement.

• Right Management 2006 survey notes that trust motivates employees to perform at their highest potential and helps increase their loyalty and retention.  Among other things,  the results identified the top ways that managers and executives lose employees' trust:

             *    Lying or telling half-truths ... 64% 

              *    Acting inconsistently in what they say and do ... 61%

             *    Withholding information ... 36%

             *    Displaying a demeaning attitude ... 22%       

             *    Failing to develop subordinates ... 19%

             *    Seeking personal gain above shared gain ... 18%

             *    Rigid and inflexible behavior ... 14%

             *    Being close-minded ... 14%

             *    Unpredictability ... 13%

             *    Arrogance ... 13%

• Fortunately, the Right Management survey, Trust in the Workplace Stabilized in Past Two Years, released September 26, 2006, also identified the top ways for managers and executives to build employees' trust:

             *    Showing respect for people as equal partners ... 57%

             *    Being honest ... 52%

             *    Maintaining integrity ... 47%       

             *    Engaging people in vision and strategy ... 36%

             *    Sharing information transparently ... 30%

             *    Being committed to develop people... 21%

             *    Doing the right thing  ... 17% 

             *    Focusing on shared goals.......15%