Book Recommendation - The Trust Factor: The Science of Creating High-Performance Companies

A book recommendation from Dan Beaulieu: 

The Trust Factor: The Science of Creating High-Performance Companies

By Paul J. Zak/ Director of the Center for Neuroeconomic Studies

Copyright 2017 Amacom

Price $24.00

Pages: 248 with Index

It’s all about trust

Yes, this is a book about trust and yes it does deal with what your associates, partners and customers feel about you and how you can make trust the most important element of your relationships with them.

Here’s the key: according to author and neuroscientist Paul j. Zak the way to make your employees more productive is to trust them. Is to allow them to use their own judgement in doing their jobs in fact for most people establishing true trust in them raises them to a new level. He goes on to say that trust is more effective than money when it comes to raising performance which is something I have always believed. There is an old saying that people die for a piece of cloth (read flag) rather than for money and that is the essence of what I believe Mr. Zak is talking about.

The thing about this book is that it talks about things we in management have always known but have not characterized. For example, as most sales managers know, motivating sales people is all about campaigns, setting high goals and rallying your sales team to make those numbers and achieve that goal. People want to know they are doing important work. We are no longer in a “leave your brains at the door and just do your job” environment, instead we encourage our people to think. We want their brains as well as their brawn no matter what their job is.

You’ll get a kick of how Mr. ZAK uses the acronym OCYTOCIN to describe the elements of building trust.

Ovation: which stands for appreciation

eXpectation: which stands for creating strong but achievable goals

Yield: which stands for letting your employees take control of their work

Transfer: which stands for letting the workers decided who they want to partner with

Openness: which stands for sharing everything in full transparency

Caring: which stands for honestly caring about your associates as you want them to care for each other

Invest: which stands for investing in employee’s careers

Natural: which stands for being honest with one another even when it means sharing vulnerability.

If you think about it, all of these elements should always have been the building blocks to successfully running any company or any organization. Our companies should all be built on trust as should all of our relationships. I thank Mr. Zak for bringing out in the open so clearly in his fine book.