Are You Trustworthy?
The 4 Qualities that Govern Trust
“To earn trust, money and power aren’t enough; you have to show some concern for others. You can’t buy trust in the supermarket." – Dalai Lama
Trust is a foundation for every relationship we have in life, and it acts as a glue in society. Trust holds people together to be able to live and work together and feel safe. While trust is the foundation of a secure and successful organization or community, a lack of trust is the foundation of fragmentation, conflict, and even war. This is why it is so important for leaders to be trustworthy for their organizations and communities to thrive and flourish.
What we are seeing today is an increasing lack of trust across the board. The public is losing trust in major corporations, the government, media, and often one another. Employees are struggling to trust the leaders in their organizations. PWC's 2016 Global CEO Survey revealed that 50% of CEOs worldwide consider lack of trust to be a major threat to their organizational growth.
The benefits of a trust-based culture are impressive and motivating for employers, employees, customers, and their communities. Paul J. Zak, a Harvard researcher, concluded that those working in high-trust cultures:
Experience 74% less stress
Have 106% more energy at work
Exhibit 50% higher productivity
Use 13% fewer sick days
Show 76% more engagement
Experience 29% more satisfaction with their lives
Enjoyed their jobs 60% more
Were 70% more aligned with their companies' purpose
Felt 66% closer to their colleagues
Had 11% more empathy for their workmates
Experienced 40% less burnout from their work
Earn an additional $6,450 a year, or 17% more than those working at low-trust organizations (Source)
Since trust is fundamental in both working and personal relationships, how can we measure it, build it, and repair it when it is threatened? People rarely give over their trust to corporations, they trust people. The character of an organization is only a reflection of the people leading it. Keeping this in mind, it is useful to view trust as a natural response to certain qualities in a person or the people leading an organization, and the absence of these qualities will diminish the level of trust.
We can think of trust as an equation that involves two parties: one who is trustworthy and one who is trusting. This forms trust on the part of both.
I believe we all have a clear natural sense of when trust is present. I have been a leader and I have followed leaders, and I am very clear on the experiences where trust was lacking. These relationships were difficult and felt as though they were on shaky ground. Either I felt unsafe and vulnerable in the dynamic or the other person felt that way. Being on either side of an equation requires all parties to seek trust in order to be productive and have a path forward.
One of the main pillars of my business is to help individuals take an inside-out journey to build more holistic lives which, in turn, will build more holistic organizations. Clearly an integral part of this journey would be to seek to be a trustworthy leader. A trustworthy leader will create trusting organizations, communities and cultures. So, trust begins with a trustworthy leader. We all can benefit from analyzing the qualities or principles for being trustworthy.
After researching many articles and studies about trust, I have found that there are four main buckets of “trustworthy” qualities. Some studies have these more broken up, but for the sake of being concise, I have combined sensible groupings. You can think of these as playing a part in an equation for trustworthiness.
COMPETENCY/CREDIBILITY (objective)
It is possible to take tests/assessments to measure mastery.
Competency has to do with the words you speak.
Tell the truth and admit what you DO and DON’T know.
3 things to show competency:
Do your homework
Be open, honest, transparent and accurate (no manipulation)
Ask smart questions
DEPENDABILITY/RELIABILITY (objective)
Show consistent actions.
Measurable behaviors - on time, adherence, etc.
Requires personal discipline .
Reliability has to do with actions you take.
3 things to show reliability:
Make small promises and keep them - always
Learn others’ language - familiarity
Be meticulous about your promises - watch out for under promising and certainly, over promising
VULNERABILITY/TRANSPARENCY/SINCERITY/AUTHENTICITY (subjective)
These are the strongest qualities in the equation.
Makes others feel safe - shows empathy and emotional intelligence - so they share openly with you.
Difficult to measure.
It’s personal - not private.
Requires courage and curiosity to be open to others.
3 things to show vulnerability/sincerity:
Get better at being vulnerable - admit fears and weaknesses
React to emotions and listen/ask
Get over your fears - learn to say “at the risk of…” and then state your fear
SELFLESSNESS/MOTIVATION (subjective)
High self-orientation lowers trustworthiness.
Awareness/care about others raises trustworthiness.
Either you are motivated by self or motivated by others.
A leader must be intentionally concerned about others.
Refers to your focus and motivation in your behaviors.
Everything I write about is meant to initiate a personal growth mentality, so the exercise here is to ask yourself ‘where do my strengths and weakness lie’? We all will get far more benefit from addressing our weaknesses over focusing on increasing our strengths. Trustworthiness requires consistency across all four buckets of qualities mentioned above. A trustworthy leader must work to be balanced, whole, complete and in-sync across all of these.
It is important to note that focusing on trustworthy qualities and addressing our weaknesses is an integral part of building trust in our organizations, communities and cultures, but we also must focus on the fact that people’s actions are simply manifestations of their core beliefs and values. Whatever is inside will come out. If a leader’s values don’t naturally push them to be trustworthy, it will be revealed in their actions.
In summation, we can analyze the sincerity of a trustworthy leader with four principles that govern trustworthy actions:
Human-Centeredness: A focus on the other for the other’s sake, not just as a means to one’s own ends.
Collaboration: A collaborative approach to relationships. A true collaborator has a natural inclination to work together, creating both joint goals and joint approaches to achieving those goals.
Long-term Relational Focus: A trustworthy leader looks at relationships from a long-term relational perspective, not a short-term transactional perspective. Nurturing relationships will ultimately lead to more transactions, but focusing on transactions will ruin relationships.
Transparency: Transparency strengthens relationships and builds an honest and authentic foundation. It increases credibility and lowers self-orientation through a leader's willingness to be open and vulnerable.
Ultimately, we must seek trust as a society, and it begins with good leaders who are trustworthy. It helps to be able to analyze leaders who are in place to understand where trust has broken down and hold them accountable for breaking the trust of those whom they lead. As individual leaders, we must be self-aware enough to seek growth in all areas and, especially, in our own trustworthiness. As more leaders work from the inside-out to be trustworthy, they will create more trust in their organizations. High trust environments are beneficial to individuals, communities, and the economy. It serves us all to seek to be personally trustworthy and to hold leaders accountable for building trust.