Trust Keeps Leaders off the Slippery Slope

August 29, 2010

Great leaders have the ability to build a culture of high trust. They consistently work to nurture an environment where people know it is safe to bring up difficult topics because they will be rewarded for doing so. This atmosphere is hard to find in most organizations, but where it does exist, the entity has numerous sustainable competitive advantages. Let’s examine ten of the more obvious ones:

1. Lower risk of ethical debacles – When people know they will be rewarded for speaking their truth, a remarkable thing occurs. They will tell you if an action is not the right thing to be doing. You may be saying “we would never be guilty of doing anything unethical.” Well, most likely you would be wrong. Reason: The number of potentially unethical activities that are on the margin are legion. Any leader will unintentionally step over the ethical line from time to time and not even realize he or she is doing it. That is how most ethical messes, like Enron, get started. At first, it might be just a cosmetic, and perfectly legal, change in reporting transactions to improve clarity. Then, if it is OK to do that today, tomorrow we can do a little more. The day after that someone else is involved, and we slowly but surely head in a direction where everyone would agree we are in an ethical quagmire. It may have started out innocently, but in the end it was clearly illegal. In a culture of high trust, all employees are the watchdogs who let leaders know if they are in danger of heading toward eventual problems, long before anything illegal or dumb has transpired. In high trust organizations, whistleblowers are a blessing rather than a problem.

2. Higher productivity – It is pretty simple, really; turned-on people produce more. Because there is less bickering and selfishness in high trust groups, people tend to pay attention to the true mission and goals. They motivate themselves to do excellent quality work rather than what we see in most organizations where management is constantly trying to figure out more attractive carrots to dangle before workers in a desperate, often pathetic, attempt to “motivate them.”

3. Lower costs – This occurs because people are engaged in the business rather than in outdoing each other. Stephen M.R. Covey, in his book The Speed of Trust, highlights that when trust is high costs go down because speed goes up. It is axiomatic. If something can be accomplished faster, it will take fewer resources of all kinds, so it will be provided at lower cost.

4. Less conflict – The most significant sources of conflict in any workplace are the little things that people do which annoy one another. One of my favorite behavioral rules for teams is “We will remember that we are all adults and try to act that way most of the time.” Low trust encourages people to squabble with each other, often acting like children. In high trust environments, there are still petty differences, but they are usually resolved by open dialog long before a public food fight begins.

5. Focus on the vision – Trust lets groups work side by side in harmony, free to focus on the critical vision rather than build fences of doubt or fear. When trust is low, people focus on the negative side of everything and spend much time trying to protect their parochial interests. Silo thinking is the result. Actually, this is a good test for the level of trust in an organization. Just keep track of the ratio of negative to positive statements you hear in an average day. If the ratio is over 50% negative ( for whatever reason) you can be sure the environment is one of low trust.

6. Trust is evident to customers – When people walk into a business where there is low trust, they get a creepy feeling almost instantly. Human beings are quick to pick up small clues in the body language or tone of voice of the people serving them. People instinctively seek to do more business with an outfit that has high trust.

7. Focus on development of people – High trust organizations spend more energy developing people because it breeds satisfaction and is just smart business. Learning organizations with great bench strength have lower turnover and more dedicated employees. Low trust groups are so consumed with stamping out problems of their own making there is little time or energy to put into developing people.

8. Improved communication – In employee satisfaction surveys, the issue of communication is habitually mentioned as the most significant problem. Reason: In low trust environments, communication is often viewed as manipulative. People sense a degree of spin or even lies, and the leaders lose credibility. There is communication in low trust groups, but most of it is from the “back channel” of rumors and gossip. In high trust groups, communication is credible and believable. The news may not always be good, but people respect their leaders for telling them the truth.

9. Better reinforcement – When leaders in high trust groups reinforce the workers, it feels good to them. Whatever form it takes, (verbal praise, special recognition awards, small bonuses, theater tickets, parties, etc.) people appreciate the sincere effort to recognize great performance. When trust is low, efforts to reinforce workers are often met with skepticism. Reason: People are used to being manipulated, so the reinforcement appears to be part of a ploy to squeeze the last drop of productivity out of an overworked group of people.

10. More efficient problem solving – When trust is low, solving a problem is like wrestling an octopus. As you work on one part of the problem, another tentacle having to do with personal interaction starts winding around your neck. In high trust groups, solving problems is efficient because the only thing to resolve is the problem itself, not a myriad of other gremlins hiding under the surface.

These are just ten ways a high trust organization has a huge advantage over a group with low trust. There are probably dozens of other advantages one could name. The point is that if you are running or involved with an organization of low trust, you cannot possibly hope to compete long term. Seek to build trust and maintain it in every action every day. The payoff is huge.

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Keep Values Simple

August 15, 2010

Simple Values

Few people would doubt the impact of a good set of values for any organization. Values provide a bedrock of beliefs on which leaders build the culture for their group. The true power of values lies in having everyone in the organization not only understand them but live them every day. That is why I believe it is a mistake to make the values too complex.

Some leaders get enamored by the idea of values and create a set of complex rules that would take a rocket scientist to remember. It is not uncommon to have a list of 20-30 values published by a leader. This sounds like a good idea on the surface; after all, the more values we have the better, right? Not so fast! If the list is cumbersome and hard to remember, then people will have a difficult time remembering them, much less following them every day.

Coach Krzyzewski of the Duke Basketball Program modeled a kind of philosophy with values that helps illustrate the power of a short memorable list. He has used the analogy of the “fist” with each finger being one powerful value that is used to create passion and unity among his teams. The fingers represent 1) Communication, 2) Trust, 3) Collective Responsibility, 4) Care, and 5) Pride. By centering all activities in relation to a powerful fist, Coach K has nurtured a consistent champion level team that has won two National Championships.

Another coach who understood the benefits of a simple philosophy of values was Lou Holtz. He took over 6 collegiate football programs in his career. He never inherited a winning team, but never failed to take that team to a Bowl Game by his second season at the latest. His values were boiled down to only three concepts: 1) Do what’s right, 2) Do the best you can, and 3) Treat others like you would like to be treated. The incredible simplicity of this philosophy made it easy to translate the passion embodied in these values into the hearts of all players. The results speak for themselves.

Simple but great values are not just for sports teams. Any organization will benefit from a memorable set of foundational concepts. My home town of Rochester, NY is blessed to be the home of Wegmans, one of the most successful chains of grocery stores in the world and a frequent top placement in the 100 best places to work in America. The current CEO, Colleen Wegman, said of their values, “We’re committed to our Who We Are Values because they set a strong foundation for us as a company – a foundation of caring about people and each other.” The Wegmans values are very simple: 1) Caring, 2) Respect, 3) High Standards, 4) Making a Difference, and 5) Empowerment.

If you are a leader in an organization, challenge your senior team to come up with a handful of powerful words that describe the essence of your core values. Keep the list of values short so everyone will remember and live them daily.

Simple Values

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Leaders: Get Off Your Butts

August 8, 2010

The people in your organization who are the best teachers of leadership are not the development staff or the outside consultants. While there is a vital role for trainers and consultants, I believe it is the leaders themselves who are in the best position to train the next generation of leaders. Too often they sit in musty budget meetings or downsizing briefings all day and never get the chance to actually pick up a marker and share their passion for leadership with their employees. What a tragedy! I believe they are abdicating their responsibility, not only to their organization, but to the broader society as well.

There are many exceptions to this observation, and these leaders should be honored for their giving spirit and their foresight. They have understood the opportunity and gotten off their butt to get out and teach rather than just perform the leadership function all day, every day, as if playing a Whack-a-mole game. I will mention just three notable exceptions here for brevity, but there should be hundreds of thousands of exceptions like this, because the simple logic is so compelling.

Jack Welch got the idea a couple decades ago and built his Leadership University at Croton on Hudson. Jack was known to say that the times he felt best about his job were when he was actually in the classroom (called The Pit) teaching the next generation of GE executives how to lead. He devoted much time and energy to this effort, and it paid off huge rewards not only for the corporation but also for a whole generation of outstanding leaders who were fortunate enough to participate at GE.

Ed Betof has written a book titled “Leaders as Teachers,” in which he describes the journey to this model of excellence in the Becton Dickinson Company, a manufacturer of medical supplies and syringes. Ed was the CLO of BD working under the direction of CEO Ed Ludwig, who understood the value of having the top brass actually doing the instruction instead of relying exclusively on training professionals. For a great video describing their program you can navigate to http://www.corpu.com/leadersasteachers/

Probably the most famous and long term practitioner of the notion of having executives roll up their sleeves is Warren Bennis, who has been teaching leadership for over 60 years. As a leader himself for much of that span, Warren spent a good chunk of his time actually facilitating classes on leadership. He is currently still teaching and probably will until he drops. He noted: “The single most important thing I’ve done at USC over the past 15 years is to co-create and co-teach a course on leadership with Steve Sample (the current President of USC).”

So, if you are a highly paid executive working crazy hours doing the business of business, I humbly suggest you get off your butt and walk down the hall to where they are conducting the leadership classes for your upcoming generations of executives. Roll up your sleeves, and start sharing your philosophy of leadership. The first thing that will happen is that you will shock the suspenders off everyone in the room. Second, you will begin to realize this is a key part of your function as a leader. Third, you will come to really enjoy this activity as the high point in your day or week. You will see the immense benefits and willingly carve out time on your calendar in the future. Finally, after doing this for a while, not only will the profitability of your organization be substantially improved, but the morale of your executives will be greatly enhanced.

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Improve Your E-Mail Openings

August 1, 2010

Humans have the ability to synthesize data with incredible precision. In his book, Blink, Malcolm Gladwell describes how human beings can form accurate impressions of situations and people based on just a tiny amount of data. Gladwell calls this “thin slicing,” which is the ability to sort out germane factors from a large array of data with lightning speed. Let’s look at the first few words of some example e-mail notes and see how people are likely to react to them.

• “Hi Alan” This is a friendly and neutral salutation that puts the reader in a happy place. Why? You have used the most important word in your reader’s vocabulary. You used his name along with the happy word, “Hi.” After those two words, your reader is subconsciously saying to himself, “This is going to be a nice note.”

• “Alan” Here you use his favorite word again, but without the word “Hi” or “Greetings,” your note starts out on a sober, stern, or businesslike note. Your reader is wondering whether he is going to get chewed out or get a raise.

• “So Alan” This is an alarming opening to an e-mail. The reader will instinctively cringe before even reading the third word. This is going to be rough. Either Alan has previously written something to upset you, or you have a serious question about something he has done.

• No name or greeting. Here you have lost an excellent opportunity to start your note with a polite greeting. Alan will usually not miss it on a conscious level, but he will be wary about the contents of your note until he reads further. Without the name as a courteous salutation, the first couple words will set the tone for better or worse. If you start with “Once again…” you are signaling that Alan is in trouble unless he knows you are thrilled with his most recent performance. At worst this is a trust withdrawal, and at best you have missed the opportunity for a trust deposit.

• “You dummy” There is no mistaking the tone of this greeting. Alan is going to put on his flack jacket before reading this note.

• “Bless you, Alan” This is the kind of note Alan will print out and put on his wall or take home to show his wife.

The words used to begin a note are the first “thin slice” of the tone for the entire e-mail. Make sure you get started on the right track. There is momentum when reading notes. If the reader starts out in a good frame of mind, things go more smoothly. If the opening is abrupt, curt, or is a blatant trust withdrawal, it will take a lot of honey in the rest of the note to make up for it.

It is like the difference between a conventional photograph and a hologram. If you take a photograph and cut out just a tiny piece of it, you will have only the data represented by that piece. If you cut out a tiny piece of a hologram and hold that piece up to the light, you will be able to see the entire image, only with less resolution than the larger hologram. Humans work the same way. If you have an entire note, you can study it and reveal great detail, but people can sense the body language in just a few words. The first few words of an e-mail are especially important.

Let me share an extreme example for clarity.

It is the first day of an online class. None of the students know each other yet. Allison is responding to a question about whether leaders are made or born. Here is a short section of her note:

• Allison writes: “I really do not believe there is any such thing as a natural-born leader. I believe that leadership is an acquired skill and can be improved constantly. When I was seventeen, I was promoted to shift manager. I was not a good leader to say the least.”

Another student (Roger, who has not yet exchanged notes with Allison) replied to her note as follows:

• Roger writes: “Allison wake up!!! How many seventeen-year-old kids are asked to be a manager??”

The note goes on, but for purposes of this illustration, these few words are all that is required. I believe Allison had Roger pegged after the first three words, and probably did not even read the rest of his note. If she did read it, she heavily discounted the information. To her credit, she did not take the bait and fire back a strong rebuttal. She just pretended the note never happened, which is a good strategy in a case like this.

Roger’s note was a blatant example of starting out in a way that completely alienates the other person. Usually the damage is more subtle, but the impact is similar. Here is another example of a note that begins poorly:

• “I really think you should be careful when you write, ‘people like you’ in a note. It tends to peg you as a bigot or someone who likes to put people in boxes.”

The first five words, “I really think you should,” give away the body language before the real content of the message is reached. After the opening phrase, the reader is prepared to get a lecture and reacts accordingly. Here is another version of the same message with a more constructive opening:

• “That was an insightful note. One possible upgrade is to avoid the phrase ‘people like you,’ because some people might find that offensive.”

The reader is more likely to absorb and heed the advice in the second note based on how it starts.

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Cosme was a Nocturnal Person

July 26, 2010

Central story – shared with my online Transformational Leadership Graduate Level Class at 3 am the morning after a program on “Telling Stories” by Kelly Swanson at the National Speakers Association Convention in Orlando Florida on July 17, 2010.

Cosme was a nocturnal person. Nobody ever saw him in the light of day. This little old wrinkle-faced man with only three teeth was always dressed the same. He wore white pants and sandals. He always had one of those large white Mexican hats and a Serape that looked like it had been through many long nights keeping him warm under the frigid Mexican Sky.

Cosme and my friend Bob Rule

Cosme was the “security guard” at our apartment complex in Guadalajara, when my bride and I were stationed there for Kodak in the late 70’s. The complex was always locked at night as a precaution, so we had to honk the car horn to get in after a night on the town. He sat in a lounge chair by the pool all night long waiting to hear a horn outside the gate. He would jump up and run to the gate to open it for apartment dwellers.

We always tipped Cosme two pesos when we drove in – a practice the hotel manager frowned on because he was thinking we were spoiling the man with such a huge tip. The manager wanted us to give only one peso – which at that time was the equivalent of a nickel. Any time, on any night, raining or not, you could see Cosme sitting out by the pool half hidden under his Serape to keep him warm. When we tipped him, Cosme always muttered some words we could not understand due to his bad teeth. It sounded like Hey mios do venata – muchas gracias. We finally figured out that he was saying “Que Dios lo bendiga – muchias gracias” which means, God Bless You – Thank You in Spanish.

Many times, a buddy from Kodak and I would be out with our wives and come home late at night. At the gate, we would tip Cosme as usual, and our wives would retire for the evening. We had a habit of getting a few beers and cigars and going out by the pool to keep Cosme company. He was always glad to have a beer and smoke and someone to “talk” to. It was very hard to understand the man, but perhaps through many nights and too many beers we finally found the ability to communicate with him. It turns out Cosme had an interesting life.

He had spent his entire life sleeping during the day and working outside for others all night as some kind of watchman. As a boy he would tend goats in the hills, and later he cleaned a fresh-air cafe after the bar closed for the night. Finally, he got the job at Suites Slila as a night watchman. When we were there he was in his 70’s and not in the best of health. But health is in the mind more than the body, and there was nothing wrong with Cosme’s mind.

He would go on for hours about UFOs which he had seen over the years. He firmly believed in these flying visions and knew they were real. Not many people on earth have spent so much time staring at the night sky, so we figured he knew more than us on the subject. He was simply delighted to tell us these stories because everyone else in his life all through the years had kind of looked past the man. Nobody paid any attention to him. He was there, working, but people left him alone unless they needed something.

Cosme was about as poor as you can imagine. I think he only had the clothes on his back and lived in a one room shack with a dirt floor the next block over. One day I saw him in front of his “house” in the morning sweeping the dirt before he retired for the day. He would eat scraps of food left by people from various restaurants and some other simple things he could get for free.

Once our belongings were packed and shipped off to Rochester for our long awaited return trip, we had little left to do at Suites Slila but hand in the keys at the Manager’s Office and put our travel bags in the Taxi for the airport. It was about 10 am, and people were going about their normal day. Just before stepping into the taxi I heard a familiar voice Un – momentito. It was Cosme shuffling up the path with a plastic bag in his hand. I hardly recognized him in the light of day. He shook my hand and looked deeply into my eyes: his had a tear. He said in broken, but understandable English, “Thank you my friend” and handed me the bag with a slight bow. In the bag were two bottles of Tequila, and it was a very good, expensive brand. That must have cost him over two month’s pay. I still have part of the second bottle left after 33 years, and of course I will never finish it because my memory of Cosme can never end.

The point is that we touch the lives of people every day, and we have little idea the impact we are having on people. Don’t look past the people who serve you – they are individuals with high value, and each one has a story to tell.

You cannot fully know the impact you will have on other people!

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Trust Insights

July 16, 2010

This BLOG entry is a little different from my usual pattern. I normally write an article about some topic that I am passionate about or interview someone else on his or her theories of leadership. This week I am letting someone interview me.

The following exchange was between a graduate student and myself in a class on Transformational Leadership. I thought her questions were excellent and wanted to provide my responses as a means to prime some further discussions in this forum. She wrote four questions about the nature of trust in organizations.

Student: Can the issue of trust be instinctive or factual or it is really a balance of both?

Trust Ambassador: I believe trust is a kind of reciprocal phenomenon. I trust you and you trust me to some degree. The level of trust in one direction is never exactly the same as in reverse, but everything that happens between the individuals causes either a deposit or withdrawal in the trust account (large or small depending on the situation). Trust never stands still – it is transactional in nature, and the transactions are going on thousands of times a day. Body language is a huge part of the equation that most people take for granted. Also, keep in mind that in online communication there is a kind of body language going on that most people are oblivious to. I find it fascinating. The most important information in an e-mail is actually between the lines.

Student: Does one bad apple really spoil the whole bunch?

Trust Ambassador: No, the bunch can work around a bad apple situation and coexist for a long time just fine. That said, a bad apple can be a kind of cancer that secretly undermines trust within a group, and it grows undetected for a long time before being discovered. I have a whole set of technology on how to deal with a bad apple. One caveat: If the bad apple is the leader, then you have a crisis. People cannot work around it effectively because the leader can muck up any attempt to build trust within the organization.

Student: Can we not cut out the bad part and salvage the rest?

Trust Ambassador: Yes – we can cut out and discard the cancer like a tumor. However, brilliant leadership actually converts some of the bad apples into the most vocal proponents of the forces for good in an organization. That is huge progress, and it is quite possible to accomplish.

Student: Can you trust in part and not whole and if so is that real trust?

Trust Ambassador: Yes! Trust is never absolute. There are qualifiers, and trust has numerous compartments that are working simultaneously. It is the sum total of all elements at a particular point in time that determines the balance in the trust account. It does not need to be the same in both directions. For example, I may trust you at 92% out of 100 at the moment, and you trust me only at 79%. Happens all the time.

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Leaders Create Meaning

July 11, 2010

Too many people go to work each day in a zombie-like state where they go through the motions all day and try to stay out of trouble with the boss. Work life is a meaningless array of busywork foisted upon them by the clueless morons who run the place. They hate the environment and intensely dislike their co-workers. Their suffering is tolerated only because there is no viable option for them to survive. What a pity that anyone would spend even a single day on this earth in such a hopeless atmosphere.

We can fault the individuals who allow themselves to be trapped in this way, but I believe the environment created by leaders has a great deal to do with this malaise. Reason: if you put these same individuals in an environment of trust and challenge, nearly all of them would quickly rise up to become happy and productive workers. It is essential that each individual in the workforce find real meaning in the work being done, and the responsibility is on leaders to make that happen.

Some good research into this conundrum was presented by Viktor Frankl a half century ago in his famous book, Man’s Search for Meaning. Frankl posits that it “is a peculiarity of man that he must have something significant yet to do in his life, for that is what gives meaning to life.” He discovered this universally human trait while surviving the most horrible of life conditions in the Auschwitz Concentration Camp. One cannot imagine a more oppressive environment, but believe it or not, many people at work feel like they are in a kind of concentration camp. The antidote is for leaders to create something significant yet to do.

Dave and Wendy Ulrich, co-authors of The Why of Work put it this way. “In organizations, meaning and abundance are more about what we do with what we have than about what we have to begin with.” They point out that workers are in some ways like volunteers who can choose where they allocate their time and energy. For their own peace and health, it is imperative that workers feel connected to the meaning of their work.

What can leaders do to ensure the maximum number of people have a sense of purpose and meaning in their work? Here are a dozen ideas that can help.

1. Create a positive vision of the future. Vision is critical because without it people see no sense of direction for their work. If we have a common goal, then it is possible to actually get excited about the future.

2. Generate trust. Trust is the glue that holds people together in a framework of positive purpose. Without trust, we are just playing games with each other hoping to get through the day unscathed. The most significant way leaders help create trust is by rewarding candor, which is accomplished by not punishing people for speaking their truth.

3. Build morale the right way. This means not trying to motivate people by adding hygiene factors like picnics, bonuses, or hat days. Motivate people by treating them with respect and giving them autonomy. Leaders do not motivate people, rather they create the environment where people decide whether to become motivated. This sounds like doubletalk, but it is a powerful message most leaders do not understand.

4. Recognize and celebrate excellence. Reinforcement is the most powerful tool leaders have for changing behavior. Leaders need to learn how to reinforce well and avoid the mine-field of reinforcement mistakes that are easy to make.

5. Treat people right. In most cases focusing on the Golden Rule works well. In some extreme cases the Golden Rule will not be wise because not all individuals want to be treated the same way. Use of the Platinum Rule (Treat others the way they would like to be treated) is helpful as long as it is not taken to a literal extreme.

6. Communicate more and better. People have an unquenchable thirst for information. Lack of communication is the most often mentioned grievance in any organization. Get some good training on how to communicate in all modes and practice all the time.

7. Unleash maximum discretionary effort in people. People give effort to the organization out of choice, not out of duty. Understand what drives individuals to make a contribution and be sure to provide that element daily. Do not try to apply the same techniques to all individuals or all situations.

8. Have high ethical and moral standards. Operate from a set of values and make sure people know why those values are important. Leaders need to always live their values.

9. Lead change well. Change processes are in play in every organization daily, yet most leaders are poor at managing change. Study the techniques of successful change so people do not become confused and disoriented.

10. Challenge people and set high expectations. People will rise to a challenge if it is properly presented and managed. Challenged individuals are people who have found meaning in their work.

11. Operate with high Emotional Intelligence. The ability to work well with people, upward, sideways, and downward allows things to work smoothly. Without Emotional Intelligence, leaders do not have the ability to transform intentions into meaning within people.

12. Build High Performing Teams. A sense of purpose is enhanced if there is a kind of peer pressure brought on by good teamwork. Foster great togetherness of teams so people will relate to their tasks instinctively.

This is a substantial list of items, but most of them are common sense. Unfortunately they are not common practice in most organizations. If you want to have people rise to their level of potential, they must all have a sense of meaning. To accomplish that, focus on the above items, and see a remarkable transformation in your organization.

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Interview with Barbara Kimmel

July 8, 2010

This week I interviewed Barbara Kimmel from the “Trust Across America” Organization. I have been impressed with this group as a real force for helping build a higher level of understanding about trust in organizations throughout our country. We need more people like Barbara and her husband Jordan, who runs a weekly radio broadcast on the Voice America Variety Channel specifically devoted to issues of trust. Here is my interview with Barbara Kimmel with some additional comments:

Trust Ambassador: Why did you start “Trust Across America”?

Kimmel: We started Trust Across America to collaboratively find solutions to America’s trust crisis. The time has come to wrap our arms around the word “trust” and to highlight companies and thought leaders that aren’t just doing things right, but are “doing the right thing”. We will provide collaborative forums, media, and other opportunities for consultants, academics and companies to share their best practices.

Trust Ambassador: What interesting or unusual things have happened with this experience?

Kimmel: Many individuals and organizations are reluctant to use the word “trust” or “trustworthy”. It’s very risky. The word just seems too big, burdensome, and even scary for some.

Trust Ambassador: Perhaps part of the issue is that to fully trust, one must be vulnerable. That may be uncomfortable for some people, especially for some leaders.

Trust Ambassador: How fast is the organization growing?

Kimmel: Fast. Right now our focus is on building a core trust ecosystem… professionals who want to roll up their sleeves and find actionable solutions to the trust crisis.

Trust Ambassador: What are your long term objectives or goals?

Kimmel: We want to reverse the trend in the breakdown of trust in corporate America by first developing a workable definition of trustworthy behavior and then identifying and highlighting those companies who are industry leaders, so that they can become role models. Essentially, we want to lead a “Trust Revolution” in corporate America.

Trust Ambassador: Has there been any down side to this effort?

Kimmel: Other than not enough hours in the day, no. People like yourself have been very generous with their time, and supportive of our efforts.

Trust Ambassador: How can people get involved?

Kimmel: Read our monthly newsletter at http://www.trustacrossamerica.org/documents/newsletters/newsletter.pdf. It outlines many ways for people to get involved. Email me at barbara@trustacrossamerica.com with comments/suggestions.

Trust Ambassador: I want to thank Barbara for this information and for the great work she is doing with Trust Across America. I also urge you to join Jordan Kimmel for his weekly broadcast on the Voice America Variety Channel on Wednesdays at noon EDT. http://www.voiceamerica.com/voiceamerica/vshow.aspx?sid=1713

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Favoritism is a Huge Problem

July 5, 2010

Playing favorites is one of the most damaging problems in any group of people. Leaders who practice favoritism in the workplace have no chance to build a culture of trust. In business schools, they teach that the antidote for playing favorites is to treat everyone the same way. But this is a trap that can cause problems because it ignores the simple fact that all people are different.

On the occasion of the death of John Wooden, the great basketball coach from UCLA, Tony Robbins re-released an interview he did with John a few years before his death. In the interview, Tony was asking how John dealt with the issue of treating some players differently from the others. John made the following remarkable statement, “treating everyone the same is the surest way to show favoritism.”

The statement caught me off guard because I was always taught that we must treat everyone the same way to avoid the problem of being biased toward one person over another. John was suggesting that exactly the opposite phenomenon was happening. How could this be? To answer this question, we need to consider the nature of favoritism and its implications.

First, it is important to recognize we all have favorite people in our lives. You cannot have exactly the same feelings about different individuals. On some level, you are going to like being with or working with one person more than another. To deny any favoritism within you for other people is to deny your humanity.

So, I have favorites, but does this mean that I play favorites? I think so because I will instinctively want to slant my world conditions to be allowed to spend more time with people I like and less time with people I do not like. Then I will begin to worry that I am not treating people equally and perhaps over compensate to give preference for people I do not like as much in order to not appear biased. After a while it becomes impossible to tell if I am being fair or hopelessly partial.

Getting back to Wooden’s quote, if I treat everyone the same way, I am for sure being biased because each individual is unique. The needs of different people require me to treat them differently. In order to not show blatant favoritism, I must take into consideration individual needs and do my best to treat everyone the right way. This means NOT treating everyone the same way. But then, won’t I appear to be playing favorites to some outside observers. This conundrum can drive you slowly insane.

I believe there are some effective antidotes to this dilemma? Here are some simple ideas that can help:

1. Be aware of the issue of favoritism and use the word when a decision might be perceived as practicing it. Say, “I am asking George to do this budget revision again. Since I have done this in the past, I do not want to be perceived as playing favorites. George has the accounting background to do this work. If others of you would like to work with the budget, let me know and I will help you get some training so you can do it in the future.”

2. Operate outside your normal pattern for some percentage of the time. This allows you the opportunity to show you are not always picking a certain person for assignments. There may be some small risk in doing this, but you can mitigate it by selecting the application to change assignments.

3. Create a culture where cross training of people is routine. In doing so, you develop bench strength, and you can demonstrate less tendencies toward favoritism.

4. Be inclusive rather than exclusive with your language when you address groups. Your choice of words will give away your feelings toward others, so always seek to use language that reflects a broad rather than narrow range of people.

5. Be alert to your own body language. We communicate more through body language than words. It is important to be cognizant of your facial expressions and posture when interfacing with all people to not project a strong bias. If you are the kind of manager who pats people on the back, make sure you do that for everyone when it is deserved.

6. Test for your own biases. Most managers are not even aware of their tendency to play favorites, so it is difficult to see the damage to trust when it is happening. Seek out a trusted individual who will tell you if your actions are being perceived as slanted toward one or more individuals. Caution: do not select one of your favorite people to solicit this information or you will obviously defeat the purpose.

7. Build Trust – with high trust, people understand the intent of actions better and can interpret complex interpersonal issues between people.  If trust is low, people instinctively assume the worst intent rather than the best intent. 

These actions, along with a general awareness, can mitigate the problem of appearing to play favorites. Even though as a human being you do have favorite people, you can operate with fairness and integrity if you do not try to treat all individuals the same way in every instance.

3 Comments | Candor creates trust, Communications, leadership, Trust, Trust and breach of trust, Trust and fear | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by trustambassador

When Trust is Lost

June 27, 2010

There is a whole sector of the trust technology that deals with betrayal of trust. The bottom line is that hard-earned trust is easy to lose and very hard to rebuild when the basis for it has been destroyed. If you would like to read a good book on the technology, you can read Trust and Betrayal by Dennis and Michelle Reina.

In my work, I use the concept of a trust withdrawal as a trigger point for building trust to a higher level. It takes a lot of work, but it is critical to do because trusting relationships are what drive good performance on every level. Great leaders use withdrawals in the trust account to redefine the relationship quickly if possible. Rather like a marriage, if a leader can take the right steps after an inevitable withdrawal, the relationship can emerge stronger rather than wrecked. Sometimes the stakes are too high and the personal interface time does not allow a rebuilding process to happen.

We were reminded of the conundrum when President Obama accepted the resignation of General Stanley McCrystal as the top commander in Afghanistan. I am not going into the politics of the situation and whether Obama was right or wrong to take the action. Any strong action by a president is going to draw a firestorm of rhetoric from supporters and detractors. The fundamental reason why McCrystal was asked to step down had to do more with trust than talent, capability, or even circumstances. Obama said that he had great admiration for the work of McCrystal over the years and the personal relationship they had, but the actions in giving that interview to Rolling Stone “eroded the trust that is necessary for our team to work together…” In a time when actions every hour of every day hold the fate of American lives and interests, there was just no room for anything less than a trusting relationship among the top leaders. That is why Obama instinctively went to General David Petraeus to fill the void. Trust with McCrystal will need to be rebuilt over time offline and will probably never be whole again.

Every day there are countless decisions made in corporations and families around the world where trust becomes the defining characteristic. It actually seals the fate of organizations and relationships every day. The majority of promotions and marriages are based on trust, while the majority of dismissals and divorces are rooted in lack of trust. In my three books on trust, I outline numerous aspects of trust and how to rebuild damaged relationships. Here are a few ideas that apply to your world and might have led to a different outcome in national drama we witnessed.

If a leader can extend trust when it seems irrational to do so, it is often a huge and lasting deposit in the trust account. The ability to forgive an errant subordinate who was clearly off base can strengthen rather than sever the relationship. The nature of trust is reciprocal. When we are extended trust, even if we do not at the moment deserve it, a chain reaction goes on within us to live up to that commitment far into the future.

The ability to forgive someone who has wronged you, especially in a very public and impactful way, flies in the face of conventional wisdom in most organizations. An egregious sin needs to be punished in proportion in order to maintain discipline and respect. An ancient Jew from Nazareth taught the world that forgiveness often leads to higher respect in the long run. Ultimately, greater power is derived from humility, empathy, and love than from command, discipline, and control.

The ability to reinforce candor is another significant way to build trusting relationships. When someone points to something about a situation that is happening that does not seem logical, it is easy for a leader to become defensive and clobber the messenger. Leaders who have a high batting average at reinforcing rather than punishing people who express their concerns take the higher road to building trusting relationships.

Please do not misread me here. I do not want to get into a political debate; I would lose in a heartbeat as I am not a political animal. My objective is to use the McCrystal case as illustrative of lesser decisions we all are called on to make on a daily basis. I do believe Obama made a very difficult call with consideration, maturity, and conviction. It was a defining moment in his presidency, and he passed the test of strength and courage. He also ended a long standing career of excellence and lost a friend, probably for life. History, not I, will determine the wisdom of his decision.

1 Comment | Candor creates trust, Communications, Enabling Actions, leadership, Teamwork, Trust, Trust and motivation, Trust and respect | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by trustambassador

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