Building interpersonal and organizational trust

By Hubert Saint-Onge

Trust was a critical success factor in my most recent blogs on interdependence and collaboration. ?This article addresses what I felt was an essential missing piece on these two subjects. Some have called trust the “coin of the realm” because it opens up possibilities in teams and organizations that otherwise cannot be reached. Without trust, work in any organization becomes hard and unrewarding.

Trust can be generated or eroded through personal perceptions and behaviours. It is essential to know what it takes to signal authentic trustworthiness. ?Years of excellent research have focused on this topic, and many findings focus on earning and instilling trust. ?I aim to provide well-grounded, practical guidelines based on this research and years of practice. These guidelines are not just for your knowledge but for your active use. As a reader, you have a crucial role in improving your team's or organization's trust levels. Your commitment and actions are integral to the process, and with these?guidelines, you have the power to make a significant impact. ?

What is trust? ??

Trust is a judgment that you can confidently rely on an individual, a group, or an organization to have your best interest at heart. Although relatively amorphous, it can be readily felt, built, and repaired. Staying aware of our dealings with others is critical?to keeping tabs on how we come across and impact the?people around us.

?Trust is an actionable asset that we can enhance with the right approach. It works from the inside out: the principles we espouse will reflect the level of trust people around us will experience interacting with us. The trust experienced inside an organization significantly affects how its stakeholders, such as employees, customers, regulators, and investors, perceive its trustworthiness. An organization operating with low levels of trust will have less coherence and agility to face challenges. It takes more significant effort to mobilize people towards achieving goals. People hesitate to commit. Lacking confidence, they become more risk-averse and protective of themselves. This underscores the critical importance of trust in organizational effectiveness, which cannot be overstated in today's competitive and dynamic business environment.

Why is trust important to an organization or a team?

High trust levels lead to greater?self-responsibility, interpersonal connectedness, and, most importantly,?concerted collective action toward achieving common goals. Trustworthiness is not just a personal attribute but a collective one that can significantly influence the performance of an organization or team. As a leader or member of a team, your actions and behaviours play a crucial role in fostering a high-trust culture, which is essential to delivering high performance.

Trust is reciprocal: employees are more likely to trust their leaders when they feel they are trusted. Trustworthy leaders are rewarded by employees who stretch, push their limits, and volunteer to go above and beyond. When leaders create a high-trust environment that is consistent over time, collaboration increases, and organizations leap forward. Trust is a primary factor in how people work together, listen to one another, and build effective relationships.

Team members who trust their leaders strive to meet performance goals and communicate with transparency. This level of commitment inspires confidence and extends trust to others.

How do you earn trust as an individual?

People don’t become trustworthy by accident. They must learn the behaviours that build trust and practice them over time until they become habits. Here are the key behaviours researchers on trust have identified as?vital to instilling trust.

1.?Demonstrate competence and contribute to building the capability of others.

• People who are demonstrably competent and exercise good judgment will build trust if they openly share what they know and problem-solve with others. They can anticipate and respond quickly as issues arise. They can anticipate and react quickly to problems. They come up with sound ideas and demonstrate good judgment when making decisions. If their leadership leads to the right outcomes and lifts all boats, they will build a strong foundation of trust.
• People will develop confidence in you if you work with them and bring insights that help resolve complex challenges. Be generous in helping people overcome obstacles. Over time, your demonstrated competence will give them trust in your judgment. This is confirmed when they seek your views

2. Consult with others and show that you value their opinions.

• Someone seen as trustworthy will thoughtfully invite others to share their points of view, ideas, and expertise. Instead of imposing their ideas and taking umbrage at apparent differences of opinion, they compose with others by considering what others are saying and finding aspects of convergence from which they can build. They genuinely want the input of others and consider their feedback important.
• On the other hand, few things torpedo trust faster than a manager asking team members to share their opinions—only to ignore their advice and?do as previously intended without explaining the rationale.

3. Avoid coming across as self-serving.

• You care about others' needs and are committed to helping them improve. Influential leaders communicate in a way that leaves people’s dignity and self-esteem intact. Those who engender trust graciously and generously show a genuine interest in the well-being and success of others.
• Seeking others’ viewpoints is a hallmark of trusted leaders. Trust isn’t accrued by simply asking how they are as a formality. You show that you value your team members’ perspectives and desire them to share when you ask sincerely. Listening with empathy is the most underrated leadership skill. It means you check in on things that matter to your team members, not just what matters to you. People who are self-serving and manipulative will not be seen as trustworthy.

4.??Act with Integrity.

• Integrity is the foundation of trust. It means consistently telling the truth, admitting mistakes, and making ethical decisions. People who can’t trust your words find it hard to trust anything else about you.
• Trustworthy leaders share information openly and transparently. They keep their team members informed so they can make responsible decisions, as without information, people are shooting in the dark.
• Trustworthy leaders are humble. Humility doesn’t imply meekness; it expresses quiet strength. Leading with humility?means keeping your ego in check and considering the needs of your people more important than your own.
• Leadership is not for the faint of heart. Leaders must make tough decisions, often in ambiguous conditions with sparse information. Trustworthy leaders demonstrate worthwhile bravery by making decisions that align with their values and those of the organization. When they find counter-winds to their convictions, they don’t fold their tent at the first sign of unfounded resistance; they test these convictions by carrying out their due diligence. They proceed with resolution if the risks are worth taking. Integrity-driven convictions yield trust if the person is still open to considering other perspectives and counter-points

5.??Honour your commitments.

• People trust you when you follow through on your commitments and deliver results.
• The failure to meet commitments erodes the trust of those who count on you to come through. Avoid shifting the blame when it happens: acknowledge and own the outcome without delay. ?Share what you have learned and commit to correcting the situation. ?Explain why things went off course without sounding defensive?and admit where you went wrong. Mention what you learned from the experience and describe what you will do to avoid this situation in the future.

6.??Help people be successful.

• If you are exercising any form of leadership, formal or informal, your primary focus must be helping people succeed. You open thoughtful dialogues with others. For instance, you give honest, helpful feedback. You coach them with thoughtful questions that help make them more aware of how they come across. You balance results with concern for others.
• Everyone wants to do well, but somehow, along the way, many of us have acquired counterproductive mindsets. I remember vividly coaching someone at the top of his field but who alienated everyone who approached him for advice. ?Although well-intended, he became known as a curmudgeon. I started to coach him by asking questions to understand what was underlying this behaviour. It turned out he was experiencing an unrecognized fear that if he helped other people, he could lose his expert status and possibly his position. He opened up to coaching others and turned things around when he realized that this fear-based mindset was limiting both the impact he wanted to have and the value he could create in the organization. ??????

7.????Be consistent and clear.

• Consistency is the extent to which leaders walk their talk and do as they commit to conduct themselves. Say-do gaps erode trust. Leaders who align their behaviours to their values and the organization's values further enhance the consistency of their leadership practice. They articulate their leadership principles, bring them forward when relevant and live by them. There is no surprise: their reactions are entirely predictable. ???
• People who are trusted communicate without ambiguity. While leaving people guessing what someone said may appear to some as a clever way to obfuscate, it diminishes the person’s credibility.
• Predictable and consistent behaviours are essential to being a trustworthy leader. People who work with you can then rely on you to act and react consistently. Wild swings of behaviours or moods put people on edge?and?cause people working with you to hesitate to take the initiative and hold back on giving you their all because they aren’t sure how you’ll react when they encounter difficulties.

How do you repair trust when it has been eroded?

• Our capacity for trust depends on how much we trust ourselves and?others. A trustworthy person will resolve to rebuild a trusting relationship that has been affected for one reason or another. ?The reality is that everyone will misstep at one point or another in the intensity of the work environment. It is not whether it will happen but more a matter of what you will do about it.
• You have to stay attuned to people around you. Ask them for feedback when you sense that a relationship has been affected. ?When a conflict arises with people, don’t ignore the situation out of a sense of anger or betrayal. Seek them out and engage in a dialogue where you readily acknowledge where you went wrong. ?Showing vulnerability and admitting where you may have gone wrong in hindsight is essential. Share how you would handle things differently in the future. Affirm your commitment to a strong relationship and ask for a commitment to work things out should another misunderstanding come up. ?In other words, own your faults and be responsive to others' feedback.
• To carry out this conversation effectively, you first must forgive the person with whom you have had a misunderstanding that eroded the level of trust with you. ?This process is demanding but highly rewarding when the?trust that has been lost is restored. This is the mark of a true leader. The liability for failing to repair trust: you will leave ‘broken pots’ that keep cropping up and weaken the integrity of your leadership.
• Maintaining trust is hard work that requires tenacity and courage but is worthwhile. Distrust is contagious?and quickly becomes a slippery slope. When team members experience a low-trust environment, they often become too?demoralized to commit to their jobs fully. ?If you sense that you are sliding into a trust deficit, it is essential to address the situation to ensure continued success.??

Building trust at the organizational level

Many trust principles at the interpersonal level apply to the organizational level but manifest themselves slightly differently. How well these principles are lived through the organization will determine whether it has a high-trust culture. ?

• Speedy resolutions —There is no bin of unresolved issues hovering over the whole organization because they are resolved as quickly as they emerge. Sticky problems that fail to be addressed create muck that clutters the work. Over time, unresolved issues become undiscussable, and everyone walks around them, pretending they don’t exist. ?The inability to wrestle them to a?resolution muddles the openness of the discussions required to overcome obstacles and challenges.
• Working through to agreement – Disagreements between well-meaning individuals often stem from looking at things differently. The key is to understand the different positions, compose with others in a constructive way to gradually find common ground and keep filling the gaps until mutually acceptable solutions appear. It requires a commitment to listening to one another to identify and broaden the narrow space that will allow this solution to be adopted with full support. It is then just a matter of agreeing on what needs to be done by whom. All issues not resolved in a quarter should be subject to this process in the next quarter. This must be a highly participative exercise that does not allow finger-pointing and defensiveness.
• Commitment—People do not hesitate to commit. False commitments taken lightly are not tolerated. Instilling mutual accountability reinforces these commitments.? The disciplined exercise of mutual accountability is a fundamental condition of a high-trust work environment
• Respect—People communicate in a straightforward but constructive manner. They are treated with dignity, no matter what. It is vital not to speak negatively about others behind their backs because it is the most damaging source of distrust across teams. Left unaddressed, this propensity becomes?a systemic way to sow discord, creating a “US versus THEM” environment that impedes the need to connect and collaborate. Trust builds the bridges required for collaboration. When disrespect is tolerated, everyone protects their respective territory, collaboration becomes an unreachable ideal, and systemic issues are impossible to resolve.

Conclusion

A culture where these interpersonal and organizational principles are fully adopted ensures strong and pervasive connections and promotes collaboration across teams and functions. Collaboration allows them to find ways to overcome organizational challenges, learn together, and develop greater organizational agility. As trust works from the inside out, customers and other stakeholders experience the organization's coherence and collaborative nature and build confidence that this is a partner?they can readily benefit from?working with.???