2. Building Trust in Organizations
”Trust men and they will be true to you;
treat them greatly, and they will show
themselves great.” --Ralph Waldo
Emerson
10. Integrity
”The glue that holds all relationships together –including
the relationship between the leader and the led is trust,
and trust is based on integrity.”
--Brian Tracy
Good afternoon, I am Jack Gelman and hope you will Trust me for the next 30 minutes or soI have been interested on the impact of fostering trust in organizations for quite some time. Actually I am writing a book about it. Stay tuned? Yesterday one of my clients vented to the Vistage CEO peer group I run about the lack of trust in his company. He felt that his employees were in it just for themselves. There was little teamwork and everyone’s general attitude was CYA Sound familiar?On the other hand another of my clients shared how he had built a culture based on shared trust. He used words like vision, inspiration, shared goals. Do these things resonate for any of your businesses?Today I want to explore why creating and fostering a trust based organization can generate better results – better bottom line for you and your business
Good afternoon, I am Jack Gelman and hope you will Trust me for the next 30 minutes or soI have been interested on the impact of fostering trust in organizations for quite some time. Actually I am writing a book about it. Stay tuned? Yesterday one of my clients vented to the Vistage CEO peer group I run about the lack of trust in his company. He felt that his employees were in it just for themselves. There was little teamwork and everyone’s general attitude was CYA Sound familiar?On the other hand another of my clients shared how he had built a culture based on shared trust. He used words like vision, inspiration, shared goals. Do these things resonate for any of your businesses?Today I want to explore why creating and fostering a trust based organization can generate better results – better bottom line for you and your business
I trust Those people who have befriended me and demonstrated their competence. I trust my wife and a higher spirit. Actually, I start with the premise that everyone is worth trusting. Yes, I may be proved wrong on occasion but coming from trust yields so much more than the occasional cost it creates.
Well how about believability For most of us when it comes to religion it is faith based.. Blind trustWhen it comes to trusting people and organizations we trust when we believe in them.For example: My Navy pilot – Vietnam story
But except for God, most of us have a different set of criteria for whether or not we will give trust to others
The important thing to remember is that Creating Trust in an organization starts with the Leader, the owner , the CEO. You must model trust-based behavior and inspire your colleagues and associates in the company to embrace simllar behaviorsEarly in my career I worked for Rex Reade, the CEO at Rustoleum. I was a new division President .. Rex asked me if I was ready to present my business turnaround plan to the whole company -700 people, I had never spoken in front of such a large group before. I told Rex about my concerns. He told me that the reason he had hired me was that he new I could and would be an inspirational leader. He empowered me to be better than I though I could be. es, he took a risk – that’s part of trust. But the end of the story is – I did pretty good. The icing on the cake was when a little folded note ws passed to me after I finished and took my seat. It said “I am proud of you, Rex”. From that day forward I trusted him totally. I believed in himLet me tell you more
To be trusted usually means that the people around you and your whole organization believe in you,Believe in the rightness of your leadership,Believe in you as a personBelieve that you will do right by themSo how do you ensure that the folks you work with believe in you?By modeling the behaviors that empower them to exceed their own expectations –And then, letting them know how they did
I believe A GOOD START to being more believable is BY BEING AUTHENTIC in all you doWhat do I mean by Authenticity?Authenticity means that your words and your actions are inalignment. You do what you say and say what you doOnly then will others feel that you are fully transparent as to your actionsHere is an example of someone who most-likely won’t engender trust because authenticity is lacking. A vendor of life insurance cold calls me when I was in my 40,s. I am a prime prospect in his eyes. Wife, two teenage kids, little in savings, living the good life, spending most of which I make. I need life insurance to take care of my loved ones if something were to happen to me.So here is how that meeting went. Insurance guy “ I want to help you with all your insurance needs. “ We talk on. He promises to send me quotes for a speciifc policy we have decied on. A day later, he quotes me domething completely different, more expenseive and not fitting my needs. Do you think I trusted him aftter that? Would you?
So what about SINCERITYThat’s pretty important too. If your words echo hollow, if you appear to be just saying what is expected people will read you as insincere, manipulative, or worseLISA STORY One of the board members for an organization where I am the Chairman after hearing that I had surgery a few weeks ago called to see how I was doing. We talked. I told her what was going on, and how hard it was for me to be confined largely to bedrest as I recovered. Lisa, asked me how I was spending my time. I replied, reading and thinking about how precious life is She asked what I liked to read and what else I might do during this time for pleasure. I told Lisa I loved to play scrabble but since the kids had grown and flown the coop I didn’t play much if aqt all anymore Lisa wished me well and sid she would be in touch.She called a few days later and we agreed that I was well enough for her to pick me up and take me out for coffee the folliwing morning. When we got to Panera’s the next day Lisa handed me a book – a mystery (I had told her I liked to read that genre for relaxation. And there was more – she pulled out her scrabble set and right there at the restaurant we playd a game. The best part – she let me win! Lisa has my trust. It’s more than the fact she is a highly competent board member, Lisa is sincere, she built the empathy between us to a higher level.
I don’t think we need to spend a lot of time on the importance of being honest and demanding honesty throughout your business. Without that nobody will trust anyone else. Your job is to model honesty in all you do. If you take a shortcut – you well may have started your firm down the slippery slope that says “if it is ok for the boss to do, then it’s ok for the rest of us. When I worked at Arthur Anderson, one of my partners – Lou Salvatore – lived by the firm’s Golden Rule “Think Straigh. Talk Straight”. He was an inspriational leader. When he had an opportunity to get a piece of business on other than a totally ethical basis, he walked away from it. He modeled a culture that we all embraced. Yes, Arthur Anderson failed 10 years ago because a few of our other partners at annother office lost their way. They started down a slippery slope that ended in disaster
Competence -Hey, if you don’t know how to do your job, you are doomed. So make sure you are good at what you are supposed to be doing. And if you have issues around that, get some further training or hire someone who has the skill set you lack.Nothing can kill trust faster than a group that believes it has a weak link in terms of competency that can hurt their total effort
So to be more Trusted , be more Believable And to do be more Believable - model a culture of Authenticity, Sincerity, Integrity and Competence
Lencioni suggest that by having a higher level of trust in an organization:1. Conflict will be created: GOOD CONFLICT -=- the kind that leads to better decisions because by having trust present people will feel empowered to PUSH BACK, CHALLENGE EACH OTHER AND NOT JUST DO THEIR YOBS BY BLINDLY FOLLOWING ORDERSTHIS “GOOD” OR POSTIVE CONFLICT WILL CREATE GREATER CLARITY, AND COMMITMENT, OF WHO IS DOING WHAT AND WHYWHICH WILL ENSURE THAT MEMBERS OF YOUR TEAM WILL HOLD THEMSELVES ACCOUTABLE FORBETTER RESULTS
Lencioni suggest that by having a higher level of trust in an organization:1. Conflict will be created: GOOD CONFLICT -=- the kind that leads to better decisions because by having trust present people will feel empowered to PUSH BACK, CHALLENGE EACH OTHER AND NOT JUST DO THEIR YOBS BY BLINDLY FOLLOWING ORDERSTHIS “GOOD” OR POSTIVE CONFLICT WILL CREATE GREATER CLARITY, AND COMMITMENT, OF WHO IS DOING WHAT AND WHYWHICH WILL ENSURE THAT MEMBERS OF YOUR TEAM WILL HOLD THEMSELVES ACCOUTABLE FORBETTER RESULTS
Lencioni suggest that by having a higher level of trust in an organization:1. Conflict will be created: GOOD CONFLICT -=- the kind that leads to better decisions because by having trust present people will feel empowered to PUSH BACK, CHALLENGE EACH OTHER AND NOT JUST DO THEIR YOBS BY BLINDLY FOLLOWING ORDERSTHIS “GOOD” OR POSTIVE CONFLICT WILL CREATE GREATER CLARITY, AND COMMITMENT, OF WHO IS DOING WHAT AND WHYWHICH WILL ENSURE THAT MEMBERS OF YOUR TEAM WILL HOLD THEMSELVES ACCOUTABLE FORBETTER RESULTS
Lencioni suggest that by having a higher level of trust in an organization:1. Conflict will be created: GOOD CONFLICT -=- the kind that leads to better decisions because by having trust present people will feel empowered to PUSH BACK, CHALLENGE EACH OTHER AND NOT JUST DO THEIR YOBS BY BLINDLY FOLLOWING ORDERSTHIS “GOOD” OR POSTIVE CONFLICT WILL CREATE GREATER CLARITY, AND COMMITMENT, OF WHO IS DOING WHAT AND WHYWHICH WILL ENSURE THAT MEMBERS OF YOUR TEAM WILL HOLD THEMSELVES ACCOUTABLE FORBETTER RESULTS