Building Higher Trust 63 Trust Hallmarks

March 17, 2022

For several decades I have believed that organizations that show high trust hallmarks outperform weaker organizations by huge margins. 

While there are hundreds of examples of what high trust looks like, in this brief article I will share five things you will observe in an organization that specializes in high trust. 

What people say

One good barometer of trust is to monitor what people are saying to each other in normal conversation. If you just walk around your place of work for a couple of hours and listen to how people talk, you will get a quick view of the level of trust.

Mark an X on a card every time you hear a conversation about pursuing the goals or vision of the group. Mark an O on the card every time you hear a conversation that is basically badmouthing other individuals within the group.  If, at the end of your visit, you have more X’s than O’s, then you are likely witnessing a high trust group. If it is the other way around, then trust is low or totally missing.

How groups deal with challenges

All groups have challenges from time to time. Groups with low trust are stopped in their tracks, because the interpersonal problems make it very difficult to figure out what is wrong. They spend most of the time arguing about what the real problem is. Groups with high trust can resolve challenges quickly and easily because they communicate honestly.

High trust groups deal with the root cause of problems rather than analyzing symptoms. They also frequently come up with more creative solutions to problems, because they are not fearful and are free to explore out-of-the-box ideas.

The level of people development

In high trust environments, the leaders are vitally interested in developing all employees to be the best they can be. High investment of people is a hallmark of high trust groups.

In low trust organizations you can find leaders who are less interested in training people for a few different reasons:

1) They are so busy trying to survive that they have no time to devote to training,

2) They are afraid if people are well trained they might be overtaken, or

3) There is so much apathy that nobody really feels like development would be helpful.

Making ethical decisions

The study of ethics is very interesting because many leaders are convinced they are ethical, yet they find ways to shade things somehow when nobody is looking.  They rationalize that bad things should be OK “under these circumstances.”

We see this all the time in scandals that seem to come up like crocuses in the Spring. The important part of being ethical is not what you do when people will see it, but what you do when nobody would know if you were cheating. For example, if you are hiding some expenses to inflate earnings, it shows a corrupt leader.

Exposing hypocrisy

When leaders talk a good game but really do not act in ways that are consistent with the words, there is a falsehood that is obvious to everyone.

One current example that is evident in many companies is they state a value of trusting their employees when they are working remotely, but they use tracking software so they can identify the number of keystrokes made per hour.  

People notice the hypocrisy quickly, so the value becomes something we say but not something we back up with actions.  We look good on the outside but we are missing integrity underneath.

Conclusion

These are just five of the ways you can witness the hallmarks of trust in an organization. Stay alert and you can add dozens of additional items to my list.  Since high trust groups outperform low trust groups every time, make sure your group is operating on the high side always.

 

Bob Whipple, MBA, CPLP, is a consultant, trainer, speaker, and author in the areas of leadership and trust.  He is the author of: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals, Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind.  Bob has many years as a senior executive with a Fortune 500 Company and with non-profit organizations. 

 

 

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Building Higher Trust 62 Engagement and Empowerment

March 11, 2022

Engagement and empowerment are two words that we hear in organizations and OD circles. These words are often confused. I have heard the terms used interchangeably, which is a mistake.

The best way to demonstrate the difference between these words is to contrast two scenarios. I will focus on a specific job (customer service representative) for the description, but you can easily extrapolate the concepts to any job once the distinction is clear.

Engaged but not Empowered

Here the customer service person is fully on board with the goals of the organization. She knows her job and wants to help the customer. Unfortunately, the organization constrains her by numerous rules that tie her hands from fully providing great service.  For example, she may not be able to issue a refund until the customer returns the incorrect merchandise.  She may have to get “approval” from her supervisor to authorize a shipping waiver.

Empowered but not Engaged

In this case, the customer service rep has the power to do anything she thinks is useful, but this particular person does not follow the business goals. She really does not care if the organization does well; all she wants to do is make the customer feel great. In this case, she might overcompensate the customer to the detriment of the organization.

It is obvious that neither of these conditions is the best situation for the employee and the organization.  We need to have employees who are fully engaged in the business and fully empowered to accomplish their tasks. Consider this 2X2 matrix to take all possible combinations into consideration.

  Let us take a look at the impact of these two words on the viability of an organization.

Engagement

In “Smart Trust,” Stephen M.R. Covey reported on some research showing that in the average company there are only two engaged employees for every one disengaged employee. In this case, much of the inherent power of the individuals is leaking out and not available to the organization.  Contrast that situation with world class organizations where there are nine engaged employees for every one disengaged employee. You can see the huge difference, and that difference goes quickly to the bottom line.

Having people engaged in the business means having them truly understand the vision for the organization and fully comprehend their role in making that happen. Beyond understanding, to be fully engaged, a worker needs to be fully committed to accomplishing her role, not just involved in the work. Someone once said that the difference between involvement and commitment is like the difference between eggs and bacon. In the case of the eggs, the chicken was involved; in the case of the bacon, the pig was committed!

Empowerment

Empowerment is more closely related to trust.  Employees bring their own internal level of empowerment and confidence in their abilities to do their jobs. Managers can increase empowerment through clear communication and a trust-building management style. Unfortunately, managers can decrease an employee’s empowerment and confidence level through negative communication or too many restrictions.

The extent to which people use their personal power for the benefit of the organization, and the level of freedom they have to do things right, will determine the level of empowerment experienced by the organization.  In OD circles, we use the term “maximum discretionary effort.”  The goal of empowerment activities is to solicit maximum discretionary effort from all people.  How can we accomplish that in the real world?

The secret sauce to create a culture of higher empowerment is trust.  As trust increases, people naturally feel more empowered because they can make decisions based on a firm understanding of the goals, but they can accomplish those goals in their own unique way.

In the environment of the past couple years, the ability to build and maintain trust is much more difficult. Many people are feeling frayed by the numerous pressures they face every day. It is more important that leaders show empathy and demonstrate they really care about their employees.  It is about how they do what they do and how they say what they say that matters in these times.

Conclusion

Try to avoid mixing the concepts of empowerment and engagement. They are two very different things, although they sound almost the same.  Seek to obtain both of them through the liberal application of trusting behaviors, and you will experience the best effort that people have to offer.

 

Bob Whipple, MBA, CPLP, is a consultant, trainer, speaker, and author in the areas of leadership and trust.  He is the author of: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals, Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind.  Bob has many years as a senior executive with a Fortune 500 Company and with non-profit organizations. 

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Building Higher Trust 61 Be Consistent

March 3, 2022

One critical skill for leaders to have in order to build trust is consistency. People need to see you operating from a set of principles that are 1) easy to understand, 2) easy to remember, and 3) easy to observe.

Earlier in this series, I wrote about the relationship of  Trust and Consistency. In this article, I will expand the topic to cover more information on how abiding by the values builds higher trust.

Relationship to Values

The best way to demonstrate consistency is to have a visible set of values that are easy for people to observe.  Values are a fundamental underpinning for any organization. Spend time with your team generating a set of 4-6 values that are easy for people to remember. Sometimes you can find an acronym that helps people remember the values.

For example, my personal values spell the word LIGHT. They are Loyalty, Integrity, Generosity, Honesty, and Trust. Because of the acronym, I can always remember my values.  Now comes the tricky part.

When Values Do You the Most Good

When following the values is easy, you just act them out in real time. It helps sometimes to verbalize why you are taking a specific action as a result of one of your values.  On the flip side, the values do you the most good when following them is challenging. If following the values would be expensive or time consuming, then to follow them would show constancy of purpose.  It also demonstrates to your people that you really do mean the values.

Example of Inconsistency

I was once in the lobby of a manufacturing plant and read a chart on the wall of the organization’s values.  The number one value was “People are our most important asset.” 

I thought to myself how impressive it is to value people over other assets.  However, as I interfaced with several managers, I noticed that they were planning to lay off about 20% of their workforce the following week.  It turned out there was a down cycle in volume, and they could save a lot of money by getting rid of people. This was proof positive that people were not their most important asset.

Unfortunately for them, the employees saw that their leaders said one thing but did something else.  It did not take long to figure out why morale in the plant was low and productivity was miserable. There was no trust.

Conclusion

When you take the time to establish values for an organization, you must always follow them. It is particularly important to follow the values when doing something else might be easier, more convenient, or more profitable. Values do you the most good when following them is difficult.

Bob Whipple is CEO of Leadergrow, Inc. an organization dedicated to growing leaders. Website www.leadergrow.com   BLOG www.thetrustambassador.com He is author of the following books: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals,  Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind

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Building Higher Trust 60 Practice Humility

February 25, 2022

The relationship between trust and humility is a strong one, even though we think of the two concepts as completely different things. In this brief article, I will describe some interesting ideas that demonstrate the synergy between these two ideas.

The concept of humility revolves around the principle of self-worth.  The antithesis of humility is another word beginning with the letter “h.”  It is hubris. The Free Dictionary defines hubris as “An ancient Greek word meaning pride or arrogance, used particularly to mean the kind of excessive pride or conceit that often brings about someone’s downfall.”

Good to Great

In Good to Great, author Jim Collins wrote extensively about humility as one of the two universal characteristics of what he called “level five leaders.” The other characteristic is passion. Jim says that the concept of passion creates energy to get amazing things done and humility creates the ability to relate well to people and give them the credit. When you combine those two characteristics in one person, you create a highly effective leader and an atmosphere where trust grows spontaneously.

When people operate as level five leaders, they generate trust because they do not hog the credit for the good work that is driving performance.  They are not ego-centric. Collins uses the “window/mirror” analogy to explain the difference.

Window/Mirror Analogy

When things are going well in the organization, level five leaders look out the window and express gratitude for the many people who make it happen daily. When things are not going well, level five leaders see a mirror and recognize themselves as the problem. 

People who are not level five leaders do exactly the opposite. When things are going well, they see the mirror and are happy to take the credit. When things are going poorly, they see the window and look out at all the problem people in the organization that are goofing up.

By refusing to let an over-inflated ego take over in the good times, leaders cause satisfaction and empowerment in people. In that condition, trust will grow easily.

Collins wrote Good to Great over 20 years ago, and the world is a very different place now. Back then we had no idea the working environment would be radically different for more than 3 years in a row. However, the concept of the window/mirror analogy has stood the test of time and is still valid, even in a hybrid working world.

Why Many Leaders Operate by Command and Control

It is a shame that many people who become leaders did so by being managers first.  These managers often learn that to be efficient they need to use a “command and control” mentality.  When they move on to become leaders, they take that mindset with them.  The command and control philosophy of leading does not foster high trust because people resent all the bluster and lack of empathy.

How to Gain More Humility

If humility is one key that leads to higher trust, how can leaders increase their humility? I believe the best way to change such a basic characteristic is to get a mentor or coach who is a really humble person.

It takes time to wean out the thought processes that lead to excessive pride and ego. You have to reverse years of practice where the person is feeling dominant and smug. The only way to do it is to get a great role model and have that person coach you on what to do differently.

You also will need lots of encouragement when you start showing baby steps in the direction of a more humble existence. It may take years to reverse some of the old bad habits.

Conclusion

In these times of turmoil and difficult choices, the role of humility should not be a “nice-to-have” concept.  Having true empathy for what people are going through is a needed concept to help people survive and thrive as individuals and as teams.  Supporting each other is the best way to keep people engaged and empowered.

Bob Whipple is CEO of Leadergrow, Inc. an organization dedicated to growing leaders. Website www.leadergrow.com   BLOG www.thetrustambassador.com He is author of the following books: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals,  Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind

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Building Higher Trust 59 Be Ethical

February 18, 2022

There is a firm relationship between ethics and trust.  No doubt when you read the title of this article you thought, “That’s obvious.” The issue is actually more complex than meets the eye.

Of course, you should always be ethical. There is no dispute about that.  The issue becomes how do you go about determining what is ethical and what is not.

Background

I have taught ethics in three graduate schools, and I am the Chair of the Board of Directors of a not-for-profit organization called “Elevate Rochester” that gives out ethics awards to highly ethical organizations in our area. All my leadership work contains ethics because it impacts trust.  My professional life revolves around the topic of ethics.

Key Point

One thing I have learned is that ethical problems in the real world are sometimes not so easy to spot.  Sure, if you are embezzling money from an organization, it is not hard to figure out that you are operating unethically. Occasionally the unethical path is so obvious that you would be a fool to miss it, but that does not stop some people from doing unethical things.

The more common and insidious ethical dilemmas are not so easy to see. They often show up as two different paths that are considered by an organization. Each path has some advantages and some disadvantages associated with it. 

For example, suppose you discovered that there was a flaw in a product that you sold to a customer five years ago. The customer used the product every day and did not complain about it at all.  The customer was not aware of the flaw, but there was a very slim chance that the flaw could cause an electric shock sometime in the future. The question is whether you tell the customer about it or not.

One consideration is that the product guarantee was for one year.  This is five years down the line, and the customer has had no problem with the device yet. A recall would be very expensive, and it would impact the reputation of your company.

The leadership group is busy arguing among themselves which is the better path to take. They focus on the risks and rewards of each option and do not even recognize when they are dealing with an ethical problem.

Sometimes it is helpful to have a “devil’s advocate” on the team to challenge marginal decisions.

Situational Considerations

The decision process always involves the situation we are in at the moment as well as the future.  The argument might sound like this. “Ordinarily we show the sales by line of business because that is the convention, but since the lines of business have been scrambled by the reorganization, nobody will be able to figure out the reporting, so we should just show the sales as one large lump in this situation.” 

By making that decision, the leaders have neglected to mention the advantage of being able to hide poor performing units by showing only total sales.   They have crossed the ethical line without even being aware of it.

Crossing the Ethical Line

Most ethical situations are the result of prior decisions that are not unethical but are somewhat different from the normal pattern. Once we make an unconventional (but legal) decision, it is easier to do the same the next time and add a little more flavoring to the stew.  We end up walking off the ethical cliff by making very minor adjustments to what we already declared as legal in the past. 

The baby steps toward the edge of the cliff are so small that nobody notices them or challenges them until it is too late. A good example of this phenomenon was the fall of Enron in 2001. Through a series of moves, Enron fooled regulators with fake holdings and off-the-books accounting practices. When the truth became known, there was no way to save the company from bankruptcy.

The Antidote

There is an antidote for this creeping disease. It is trust.  If the leaders have built a culture of high trust that includes psychological safety, then people will know it is safe to say something when the leaders might contemplate doing something that leans toward unethical behavior. If you have 100 people working in the organization, then you have 100 voices that will challenge a decision that is off-color. You are protected by your own people.

Bob Whipple is CEO of Leadergrow, Inc. an organization dedicated to growing leaders. Website www.leadergrow.com   BLOG www.thetrustambassador.com He is author of the following books: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals,  Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind

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Building Higher Trust 58 Be Transparent

February 10, 2022

It is well known that transparency is a key issue in creating a culture of high trust. Many groups struggle with this concept because it is not always smart to be transparent. Sometimes it is even against the law. Creating an expectation or value that “we will always be transparent” is not possible.

This brief article looks at some of the issues around transparency and offers leaders some guidance on how to handle this enigma.

Lean in the Direction of Transparency

Many organizations have a misguided policy that sharing information with the workforce is to be avoided due to the dangers involved. Yes, there are situations where information cannot be shared, but the majority of times being open with employees will pay off. Let’s look at some specific examples of the conundrum and offer some guidelines.

When it is Illegal

If your organization is contemplating a merger or acquisition or some other action that will have a material impact on the valuation of the entity, it is illegal to disseminate that information until it is public knowledge.

You can go to jail for divulging information that is not ready for public consumption. If workers inquire about a rumor they heard that your firm merging with another one, you must reply, “We cannot comment on issues of this nature.”

An Impending Lay Off

Suppose you are considering a downsizing due to a low volume of work.  Workers would like to know as soon as possible in order to plan their lives. If the information is preliminary, you would do more damage than good by making the information available to everyone. 

However, once you have some concrete plans for the future, it is a good idea to share that information with those people who may be impacted, even if you have not selected who has to leave. Many organizations withhold this type of information because they are afraid of sabotage. I believe that is a mistake.

A Change in Wages or Benefits

It is better to announce these kinds of policy changes as early as possible. The reason is that the rumor mill will pick up on the potential changes, and you will have to deal with the imagined consequences of the change, even if they are worse than the actual impact.

A Change in Leadership

It is always better to announce a potential change in leadership as soon as it is known who is leaving and who the replacement will be.

The General Rule

A policy of openness is a better plan than a policy of withholding information. People are much better at coping with the negative impacts of a change than they are tolerant of being kept in the dark. Being more open leads to higher trust in leadership and that creates higher engagement and productivity.

Bob Whipple is CEO of Leadergrow, Inc. an organization dedicated to growing leaders. Website www.leadergrow.com   BLOG www.thetrustambassador.com He is author of the following books: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals,  Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind

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Building Higher Trust 57 Right Wrongs

February 4, 2022

In his timeless book The Speed of Trust, Stephen M.R. Covey describes 13 behaviors that can enhance trust. Behavior Number four is “Right Wrongs.”

Covey comes at the topic from a point of view of you having made a mistake. To reduce the loss of trust, you must admit your mistake and then go beyond with some form of appropriate restitution. 

In this article, I will support Covey’s position and also extend the subject to a trickier area of setting things right when you were not involved in the wrong.

Admitting Mistakes

In an earlier article in this series, I wrote about the power of admitting mistakes.  In most cases, admitting a mistake and apologizing for it actually enhances trust. The reason is that you are not trying to duck the issue or blame it on someone else.

By taking personal responsibility for a mistake and then doing everything you can to atone for it, you are actually manufacturing trust.  There are some kinds of mistakes where admitting them is not likely to grow trust.

Two categories of mistakes where admitting them will usually not build higher trust are 1) Making the same mistake repeatedly, and 2) Making a stupid mistake that reveals you are sinister or basically clueless.

Covey stresses that you need to “do what you can to correct the mistake…and then a little more.” Here is a link to an interview I did with Stephen in 2020 that has an interesting perspective on how the level of trust pre-pandemic can impact how trust progresses during the pandemic and post-pandemic.

Other Wrongs

Going beyond correcting for your personal mistakes gets a little more challenging. Suppose you observe someone else doing something wrong to a third individual. Now you have a dilemma of whether or not to inject yourself to “right the wrong” when it is really not your business.

These cases come up from time to time in our lives, and it takes a good deal of judgment to identify a positive path forward that will demonstrate that you care in the right way.  In essence, you are trying to Right a Wrong the Right Way. 

In some cases, like safety issues, it is incumbent on you to let someone in authority know what happened. If you do not, there is a chance that the other person could be hurt or killed.

Other times, you might approach the person who made the blunder and suggest that he admit it to the person he wronged and apologize. Whether that is a good or bad way to handle the situation depends on your relationship with both people and the consequences of the wrong.

In extreme cases, you may be forced to reveal to the person who was wronged that something happened out of your control but that might impact the individual. Whether or not you reveal the perpetrator is a matter of judgment.

Conclusion

Righting a wrong that you did to someone else is normally an easy call, although it will be a delicate discussion.  Righting a wrong that someone else has caused calls for a lot of judgment and care.

Bob Whipple is CEO of Leadergrow, Inc. an organization dedicated to growing leaders. Website www.leadergrow.com   BLOG www.thetrustambassador.com He is author of the following books: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals,  Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind

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Building Higher Trust 56 Integrity

January 28, 2022

Trust and integrity are inextricably linked.  I believe before you can trust other people, you must trust yourself.  That means you must not be fighting with yourself in any way, which is a pretty tall order.

Integrity is about what you do or think when nobody else in the world would know. It is an interesting topic because it is very difficult to determine your own personal level of integrity.

We Tend to Rationalize

We all justify ourselves internally for most of the things we do. We have it figured out that to take a pencil home from work is no big deal because we frequently do work from home.

We drive 5 mph over the speed limit because not doing so would cause a traffic hazard while everyone else is going 10 mph over the limit.

We taste a grape at the grocery store as a way to influence our buying decision.

When we are short-changed, we complain, but when the error is in the other direction, we pocket the cash.

We may lie about our age. We probably sneak cookies. If you have never done any of these things, let me know, and I will nominate you for sainthood. If you think hard enough, I am sure you can identify something you did that was ill-advised.

Lame Excuse

There are some times in life when we do something known by us to be illegal, immoral, or dumb. We do these things because they are available to us and we explain the sin with a lame excuse like “nobody’s perfect.” 

I guess that is true that all people (except newborns) have done something of which to be ashamed. What’s is the big deal? Since we all sin, why not relax and enjoy the ride? That rationale is disastrous because it destroys integrity. 

Crossing a Fine Line

The conundrum is where to draw a moral line in the sand.  Can we do something that is wrong and learn from that error so we do not repeat it in the future?  I think we can. I believe we have not only the ability but the mandate to continually upgrade our personal integrity. Here are seven ideas that can help the process:

  1. Reward yourself – When you are honest with yourself about something you did that was wrong, that is personal growth, and you should feel great about that.
  2. Intend to change – Once you have become conscious of how you rationalized yourself into doing something unethical, vow to change your behavior in that area and others.
  3. Reinforce others – Sometimes other people will let you know something you did, or are about to do, is not right. Thank these people sincerely, for they are giving you the potential for personal growth.
  4. Check In with yourself – Do a scan of your own behaviors and actions regularly to see how you are doing. Many people just go along day by day and do not take the time or effort to examine themselves.
  5. Recognize Rationalization – We all rationalize every day. By simply turning up the volume on your conscience, you can be more alert to the temptations before you. That thought pattern will allow more conscious choices in the future.
  6. Break habits – Many incorrect things come as a result of bad habits. Expose your own habits and ask if they are truly healthy for you.
  7. Help others – Without being sanctimonious, help other people see when they have an opportunity to grow in integrity. Do this without blame or condemnation; instead, do it with love and helpfulness.

Conclusion

We need to build our own internal trust so we can trust other people more. To do that, it is important to follow the seven ideas listed above. These ideas will allow you to move consciously in a direction of higher personal integrity.

Bob Whipple is CEO of Leadergrow, Inc. an organization dedicated to growing leaders. Website www.leadergrow.com   BLOG www.thetrustambassador.com He is author of the following books: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals,  Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind

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Building Higher Trust 55 Drive Out Fear

January 21, 2022

Several decades ago, the now-deceased quality guru, W. Edwards Deming came up with a list of 14 key points for leaders that would accomplish what he called “profound knowledge.”  Point number 8 on his list was “Drive out fear.” 

I believe this was one of the most powerful concepts on his famous list. The reason is that the absence of fear is a prerequisite for higher trust, and trust is the most important ingredient to higher organizational productivity. In this article, I will share seven tips to help drive out fear.

Fear is one of the most basic of human instincts. It is fear that allowed humanoids to survive during primitive times, and it is still the basis of survival today. Without fear, you would not be able to take proper precautions.

We must also understand that Deming wrote his famous 14 points in a very different environment from what we are experiencing currently. With the challenges of a worldwide pandemic, the omnipresence of fear is lurking in every home and organization every day.  Yet, my contention is that the best leaders are still trying to model the seven behaviors listed below, albeit suitably modified to fit current conditions.

Too much constraining fear in the organizational context can produce a gridlock of activities among the people that prevent the establishment of trust.  That can happen in the best of times or the worst of times. Let’s look at some tips that leaders can use to reduce the fear in the workplace, and thus help to increase trust.

Be more transparent

When leaders keep people in the dark about what things are happening that can affect them, it is only natural they will become afraid. When leaders contemplate draconian actions in sealed conference rooms, the word spreads.

Sometimes future actions must not be shared for legal reasons, but in many cases, leaders attempt to shelter people from possible actions because they do not want to cause panic. 

That attitude is false logic.  More panic ensues from speculation than would be present if leaders provided full disclosure.

Reinforce Candor

Praise rather than punish people for sharing their observations about inconsistencies. In most organizations, people do not believe it is safe to tell leaders the truth about their observations.  Their livelihood might be at stake.

When leaders invite open dialog on sensitive issues and reinforce people who verbalize their fears, it tends to extinguish the rumor mill and build a foundation of higher trust. Fear is lower in such an environment because people have psychological safety.

Be Kind

Treating people with dignity and respect is nothing more than following the Golden Rule.  If leaders consistently treated people the way they would like to be treated if the roles were reversed, there would be much less fear in the workplace. When people feel intimidated or bullied, they naturally cower in fear of what might happen to them.

Develop more Emotional Intelligence

Emotional Intelligence is your ability to understand emotions and your skill at being able to use that knowledge to manage yourself and your relationships with others. This skill allows leaders to act in ways that foster open dialog and lower fear.

A very good book to help people gain higher EQ is Emotional Intelligence 2.0 by Bradberry and Greaves. I use the book in all my leadership courses.

Level with people

Be honest with people and let them know of any improvement opportunities in a supportive way. When people know that you are sincerely trying to help them improve, they will be less fearful. 

Each person has some insecurity regardless of his or her history. Helping people grow is a great way to lower fear.

Care about others

Fear has a hard time growing in an environment where people truly care about each other. The expressions of empathy and sympathy when people are struggling mean they will feel supported in their darkest hours. They foster courage and faith that most problems are only temporary setbacks, and that life itself is an amazing journey.

Trust other people

When trust is present, fear has a hard time surviving. When leaders show that they have faith in the ability of people to do the right things, then they do not project a kind of “gotcha” environment that is evident in many organizations.  The result is that people are not on edge wondering when the next outburst will occur.

The absence of unnecessary fear is a huge benefit for any organization. Some fear is good for the self-preservation of individuals and organizations, but keeping it at the lowest possible level is liberating and will bring out the best in people.

Bob Whipple is CEO of Leadergrow, Inc. an organization dedicated to growing leaders. Website www.leadergrow.com   BLOG www.thetrustambassador.com He is author of the following books: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals,  Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind

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Building Higher Trust 54 Trust Versus CYA

January 14, 2022

We are all familiar with the phenomenon of playing CYA at work. There is the potential for something negative happening in the future and we take care to document the problem and give our recommended solution to it. 

We put the information in an email that we send out to a manager involved in making decisions.  The idea is that if the dreaded situation comes up at a later date, we can produce the email and say, “I told them that this would happen and even suggested the fix, but nobody listened to me.”

CYA Lowers Trust

This is just one form of CYA activity, and I offer it as an example to illustrate why this form of one-upmanship hurts an organization because it lowers trust.  It is one thing to say what “they should do” about a potential problem.

Words are cheap, and one can speculate that we should spend $100K to provide additional reinforcement to the foundation of our building in case of a future earthquake. Putting that information in a note to the manager puts her in a difficult spot.

Clearly, we do not have $100K lying around with no purpose so we can just shell out the cash.  The risk of an earthquake may be pretty low, but it can always happen.

The reason the CYA note lowers trust is because the manager realizes if she does not take the suggested action and there is an earthquake that results in several workers being killed, then she is going to be blamed, but if she does reinforce the walls and there is no earthquake, the money will be spent only for insurance. 

The manager is in a no-win situation, and that lowers trust in both directions. The manager has less trust in the worker because he is trying to entrap or usurp the leader’s judgment.  The worker has lower trust in the manager because there is a perceived need to document the suggested remedy for future reference.

Real-Life Example

I have been in a situation where workers wanted me to purchase an entire new facility for close to $1Million because they believed the current one might someday fail.  My response was to have the facility thoroughly inspected to determine if there was a real risk and how high that might be. 

The engineers came back that the risk was real, but I could test for the robustness of the facility each year, and that would detect if things were deteriorating beyond a safe level.

Having that inspection was better than nothing, but it was not totally foolproof, so the workers wanted to just scrap the old facility and purchase a new one. That expense was difficult to justify because the product made there was near the end of its life, so a new facility would never pay off.

Caught between a rock and hard place, I asked the workers to understand that the minute risk was manageable with the yearly inspection and they need not worry. If anything ever happened in that facility, I knew I would be held accountable, so I tried to find another way to reduce the risk.

The engineers said that if we slowed down the equipment it would probably never fail or if it did, the failure would be detectable so nobody would suffer. I decided to run the operation at a reduced speed as a compromise position, but the workers were not happy with it.

The series of discussions, notes, and meetings did serve to lower the trust that the workers had in me. Their point was that if I truly cared for them as people, I would spend the $950K to upgrade the facility even though there was no economic payback for it. 

It turned out that we shut down the complex less than a year later because the volume of demand for the product decreased, but the reduction in trust was something I had to endure.

The antidote for this phenomenon is to listen to the whistleblower and not ignore the request. That was my approach in this case, but it was not an easy pathway to a decision.

Trying to figure out what to do in a marginal case like this is what keeps managers up all night. Finding the right balance between trust in the system and protection from all forms of potential problems can be a very tricky area for managers.

Spending money to prevent any potential for disaster is a never-ending proposition. It is like buying insurance policies.  You are never fully protected from all hazards, but you can go broke trying.

Best Approach

The best approach is to involve the impacted people in all aspects of the business, including protection from possible but highly unlikely scenarios.  If the workers realize that any tradeoffs made in the operation have a direct impact on them as well as the business, they can become part of the process to make decisions.  This usually increases the level of trust for two reasons: 1) it improves transparency, and 2) it lets people be part of the process so they are aware their managers care about them.

Bob Whipple is CEO of Leadergrow, Inc. an organization dedicated to growing leaders. Website www.leadergrow.com   BLOG www.thetrustambassador.com He is author of the following books: The Trust Factor: Advanced Leadership for Professionals,  Understanding E-Body Language: Building Trust Online, and Leading with Trust is Like Sailing Downwind

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