Growing your Circle of Trust

Why is building trust so important? Why can’t we run an Objective-Key Result focused workplace?

Biological roots of trust

Fear is the deepest of all 5 primary emotions and the first one that gets wired into a human brain. As a primitive emotion, it is processed in the limbic system and is out of conscious control, unlike secondary emotions that are processed in the prefrontal cortex. Feelings are nothing but a feedback mechanism for the body-brain complex to such emotional responses.

Trust makes one feel comforted, protected and confident, all of which dispel fear. As it counters our deepest primary emotion, trust becomes the most primary of all positive feelings. It’s not a surprise then that the benchmark of 'feeling of trust' is what we feel in our subconscious or unconscious brain to our own mother.

What it means to team performance?

The north star for every leader is to deliver more than the sum of parts, getting the team synergies to deliver 2+2=5. Such teams need to have individuals who – (1) are uninhibited and contribute without fear of being judged and (2) reprioritize own agenda to the benefit of another. Needless to say, trust is the key aspect here.

As a leader (everyone is a leader), we should be obsessed with expanding our circle of trust. A good way to do this is to map people in lives in expanding concentric circles, basis our daily influence and interactions. Start with the innermost circle and expand outwards.

Here are a few simple behaviors you can practice every day to achieve this. You will eventually influence the behavior of your circle, slowly making it the prevalent culture.

Trust first to be trusted: This sounds basic, but on reflection we may realize that we don’t practice this very often. There are two barriers that comes in the way. First, is our cynical self and the second is our modern ‘transaction-oriented’ living.

Life experience teaches us to be cynical and the extent of cynicism varies from person to person. There are some, who claim cynicism as the ultimate defense mechanism, while many others who are naturally trusting. Irrespective of your predilection, it helps to be ‘consciously trusting’ (it becomes automatic with practice). If you meet someone new, look for reasons to trust – common interests, mutual friends, mannerisms or whatever favorable – and ‘be present’ and feel the trusting feeling within you.

Jim Collins talks about the concept of a ‘trust wager’. He asks, when you meet someone, would your first bid be a trust bid or a distrust bid? If it’s a trust bid, this wager will pay you in good stead. The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them first.

Practice Pro-Bono in your circle: Transaction oriented approach is the biggest enemy of building trust. There are many who live a life like two-sided accounting – with debits and credits, acting tit-for-tat. On the contrary, imagine if two people were to constantly contribute to the common pool, never taking out nor expecting any return. When both behave this way, the common pool becomes an ever growing asset. Both become richer, for they can draw from it when they badly need. This could be the smarter thing to do.

‘Pro bono’ is the antonym in Latin to ‘Quid-pro-quo’, but we rarely use it outside legal parlance. I believe it's time to make it part of our daily life. Start with a mental credit account and do stuff for people you want included in your circle, without expecting anything in return. Don’t be surprised when they reciprocate.

Be there, be a friend: We discussed earlier that ‘mom’ is your benchmark of trust. If we can’t be a mom to our circle, can't we try being a friend, a genuine one. It starts with ‘being there’. At our workplace, how well do we know the likes and dislikes, comforts and discomforts, strengths and weaknesses, anxieties and fears of people in our circle, especially of those in our innermost circle? Practice the ability of ‘sensing’ and stepping in when our circle-mate really needs us.

This may require making split-second decisions, overcoming inhibitions or resolving conflicts in our mind; and it's not easy. I’ve had a few experiences of losing trust, for not acting this way. In one case, when a teammate was uncomfortable with a topic of discussion, I was late to step in to rescue her from that spot.

It helps to be vulnerable and be your authentic self, especially with your inner most circle. The key question here is: when we move on, change teams or organizations, do we continue to nurture our earlier inner circles?

Give them voice, build a village: This is an awesome concept made popular by one of the most admired Corporate leaders, Kent Thiry. Kent as the CEO of DaVita achieved a near impossible task of turning around a sinking business, making it a global giant. Take out some time to learn about this awesome practice from Kent himself (see below link).

I can vouch that just this concept is powerful enough to build the deepest trusting, strongest team in any organization. It starts with the commitment of the leader to the welfare of the teammates – to help them succeed, to make their day at work worthwhile and enjoyable.

Try building your team with your own rituals and language and quirkiness and instill a deep sense of ‘One for All and All for One’.