You are the Trust issue

Trust works both ways... it needs someone to prove they are trustworthy and another to be open enough to take the step to trust them.

As an individual you may think you are trustworthy, you may be saying all the right things and taking all the right actions to prove you are trustworthy. But... if someone is unwilling to trust you (or you are unwilling to trust others), the trust relationship may never come.

This is because being able to trust someone is hard. As human beings we are inherently wary of others and always on the look out for others doing wrong by us. And through our lives we've been let down by people, as is human nature, so we become skeptical and not always able to fully let our guard down.

This makes being a human leader tricky, as you have to trust people in order to do your job. I am accountable and responsible for a number of things and work collaboratively with others both internally and externally so it's really hard to let go, to stop directing, telling, organising and leading in every area I can. This would ordinarily make going on my 2 week summer holiday a stressful experience, which kind of ruins the point of taking a holiday. But it wasn't stressful this year, I was able to relax from day one and enjoy my break from work. I didn't check my work emails once, or even care/worry as to what was going on in the office without my being there. And I put it all down to trust.

Being able to trust people is not easy

Whenever I see articles about 'trust in teams' the focus is on leading by example and building trust in a team, banging on about the importance of trust etc. which we all know already. This is great, and semi useful, but the articles seem to just assume that the managers/leaders will be capable of trust, brushing over it with one sentence like 'show your people that you trust them' and making out it is as simple as that.

If you follow the tips in the articles to show trust, but you are secretly checking up on them, keeping an eye on their stats, asking colleagues how they are getting along... you are not really trusting them. Yes you may be making them feel trusted through a 'painting by numbers' style of management, but you need to actually trust them... in your head.

In order to become a strong leader you have to trust people

If you don't trust your team, YOU are the one in the wrong. There are only so many times you can say to yourself 'they have to earn my trust and respect', before you need to look inwards to what you can do differently. Of course I'm not saying you have to trust everyone all of the time as you have to build and grow relationships, but YOU have to take responsibility for trusting people, not waiting for them to jump through whatever mental hoops you've created before they can 'earn' your trust.

As a leader you must learn to let go

It's so hard to hand your baby (your team/department/project/business) over to someone else and leave them to it, but you have to do it sometimes for your own sanity. You have to take the action to let go of things, to leave a project/department/process for one of your team to manage, without you having any real input. This is easy to do as an action (as it's fairly simple on paper) but in reality it's really hard as a mental exercise, especially as you're probably the person ultimately accountable for the team and all work/targets/projects carried out.

You need to let them shine (or fail)

So there's a risk with letting go and trusting other to do things... they may let you down, they may not do it as good as you would, make mistakes, miss targets... they may fail. But failure is OK. In fact as I've said before, it's a good thing and should be embraced. People will fail more times than they succeed, so don't be scared of it, learn to love it, learn from it and get more awesome.

Ignore the risk... let's assume they will shine! How good will that feel? For them and you. They will have achieved something, which whether big or small was done with a huge level of trust and will give them the belief and ability to go on and achieve more. You get a motivated team, building on their capability and experience. As well as that warm fuzzy feeling inside for having done something good for someone. :)

Note - don't really ignore the risk. Manage it to a point you are comfortable with.

You need to get them there

The team aren't automatically going to be capable and ready to take on new responsibilities, so don't set them up for failure. You have to get them in a position to win. Give them all of the support, training, tools and time you can, so when you do give them the chance to shine they are ready and grab onto the opportunity and run with it. The cheesy but obvious point to make here is that they have to trust in themselves to be able to do it; as a leader you play a big part in building that belief within them.

So go and read up on '10 ways to build trust in teams', or whatever else comes up in your generic search engine, and learn the tips and tricks to lead by example, but don't forget you have to trust others (not just say you do).

Get your head in a place that is ready for failure. Get ready to stop stressing about all of the small things. Get your team ready for success. Then take a step back and trust in others.

People are wonderful and will surprise you

Incidentally, my team did me proud! I returned after 2 weeks off to find the team had managed through various challenges and came out of it stronger. I just had the usual several hundred emails in my inbox to read through (delete).