Trust Me

As we are getting 2020 started, my leadership team and I have been talking a great deal about building our team culture and motivating our teams. A strong corporate/team culture can create a fun/safe/energizing work environment that you and your team want to be a part of. It makes getting out of bed early or staying a little late to finish a project not such a bad thing. Being able to motivate your team can help your team manage through the high volume and stressful times and help the larger organization reach those stretch revenue/service targets. I feel like the common thread through both the culture build and the team motivation discussions is trust. The team’s trust in you and your trust in the team. Trust in a leader/team relationship can be tough to earn and a challenge to maintain, but wanted to give some thoughts to help you when we are working with your teams-

Open Up- I know that there are times as a leader where you need show the team complete confidence when facing adversity and the team is looking to you to guide them through, kind of like the army general you see in the movies. I would argue that those situations are actually very few and far between. I have always found that open and honest interaction with the team goes a long way. We cannot be afraid to ask the question if we don’t know the answer. We cannot be afraid to seek additional input when we are unsure of our next step. We don’t want to display too much stress or anger; but it is important that we show we are human. Your teams knowing your strengths and our weaknesses shouldn’t be seen as a threat to your leadership. As leaders we cannot do all of this alone, we need our teams; so, we cannot be afraid to ask. This type of openness can really help in building that trust we desire      

Prove It- We can talk about trusting our teams all day, but we have to demonstrate that we do actually trust them. From a leader’s perspective, I feel like a great way to prove your trust is the delegation of key tasks to your team and not micromanaging them to complete it. I know that delegating tasks can sometimes be a stressful situation for leaders but delegating these tasks and providing the autonomy to the person(s) to get it done can be very beneficial on multiple fronts. It is a way to demonstrate your trust. It also allows you to set due dates and other parameters that will allow your associates to earn your trust by successfully meeting them 

Be Consistent- I found a quote that I think says it all. “Trust is a fragile thing. Easy to break, easy to lose and one of the hardest things to ever get back.” You have worked so hard to gain their trust, so don’t lose it in an instant. Back to my first bullet point, if you are open and honest with your team, then being yourself, all the time is being consistent and can help to maintain the trust with your team. You don’t have to be perfect, but you do have to be you!

As with most everything we talk about in these posts, there isn’t a blueprint to trust. We all have varied levels of trust from/of our teams, but we certainly could all find ways to improve.  Please consider ways to make trust a central part of your team dynamics. I don’t think you have to openly state “I trust you” (although we might not hurt) and I don’t think you need to ask “Do you trust me?”; but you should always be looking for ways to build those bridges between you and your team. Communication builds that bridge, but trust keeps in open. 

Onward and Upward