Trust is a critical part of any relationship. Knowing you can rely on a partner or teammate allows you to focus on your strengths and responsibilities without worrying that something important will fall through the cracks. In a workplace setting, that’s especially important. Breaches of trust will break a team faster than anything else. Trust is also key to a healthy relationship with the boss.
How well your manager trusts you will dictate the extent to which you are allow to act freely. I’ve heard it said that trust is like a rope tied to your waist. The more trustworthy you are, the more the person holding the other end of the rope will allow you to roam. As trust diminishes, the more likely they are to reel in the rope, restricting your movements. So trust can be equated to freedom – freedom to act independently.
Building trust, or rebuilding it, takes time. Our evaluation of someone’s trustworthiness is impacted by our past interactions with them. New employees, or those with little experience in a given area, may not feel they receive the amount of trust they are due. If trust has been eroded as a result of poor performance, miscommunication, or other letdowns, it will take a series of positive experiences over time to rebuild your credibility.
Building (or rebuilding) trust isn’t hard to do. Simply focus on those things that lead you to place your trust in others:
Think before you act. Prior to speaking or taking action, take time to think through the ramifications. You don’t have to identify every potential outcome, consider what is the most probable. How will people react? What are the ripple effects you are likely to set in motion? Thinking through the “natural” consequences before acting can help you identify negative blows to your credibility and adjust accordingly.
Be prepared. When you present a problem, provide a solution. When you make a claim, have evidence to support it. Speaking in generalities or “crying wolf” without back-up is a sure way to lose trust. Have answers to the questions you’re most likely to be asked as a result of your actions. This shows you are top of your game and builds trust.
Be on time. Rushing into a meeting late or barely beating the clock erodes trust. It demonstrates an inability to prioritize and a lack of respect for other people’s time. The same holds true for achieving deadlines. Show respect for the boss and the rest of the team by completing your work on time.
Under-promise & over-deliver. Most people have a hard time saying “No.” This leads them to overload their plate with a variety of projects. In an effort to get everything done, they multitask which means nothing gets done well, eroding credibility. Don’t make commitments lightly. Give yourself enough time to perform the job to the best of your ability, even if that means explaining why you can’t take on an additional responsibility. Most of us would do well to focus on fewer projects, while executing to a higher level.[Tweet “Most of us would do well to focus on fewer projects, while executing at a higher level.”]
Follow through. An easy way to build trust is to simply do what you said you would do. Every day, people promise to call and then don’t. They commit to taking specific actions, and forget. Those who actually follow through earn our respect and trust because they do what most people don’t.
Earning trust comes down to taking personal responsibility. It requires a level of accountability that most simply aren’t willing or able to exercise. The list of go-to employees is too short. Is your name on it?
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There’s no shortage of advice for managers out there. Scores of books have been written about managing employees, leading great service, and working with outside entities. It’s easy to find articles, videos, and even live training events focused on these topics. But when it comes to working with your boss, what’s called “managing up,” there’s little help to be found. A few are blessed with a relationship where communication flows freely and minds seem to be in sync. Most have to stumble their way through, approaching each interaction with a mixture of anticipation and dread.
Addressing conflict is one of the key responsibilities of a leader. It’s not a fun job; in fact it’s often quite messy. Nevertheless, it has to be done in order for a team or organization to operate effectively. Conflict rarely resolves itself. While things may eventually seem to smooth out on the surface, there are always scars. Poorly handled conflict results in missed growth opportunities, the loss of top performers, and an unstable environment for those left behind.
If there’s one aspect of the job that managers do their best to avoid, its conflict. Ideally, things would always run smoothly in the workplace. Each person would do their job, goals would be aligned, and differences would magically work themselves out. Unfortunately, that’s just not the case. In fact, one study found that the some managers spend up to a quarter of their time working to resolve conflict. That’s a lot of time devoted to an activity that’s simply not a lot of fun. Because conflict resolution is so mentally and emotionally draining, a lot of managers choose to ignore it. They simply look the other way.
On June 1, 1989, four men set sail from New Zealand aboard a trimaran called the Rose Noelle. They were headed for Tonga – a trip that should have taken them just a couple of weeks. But three days into their voyage, a rogue wave stuck the Rose Noelle, capsizing it and trapping the men inside the main hull. They had little food and a rapidly diminishing water supply. To stay dry, they were forced to share a space no larger than a full-sized bed. They’d managed to salvage the boat’s EPIRB locator beacon, but its batteries ran out on June 13th. The men were now on their own, adrift with nothing but their wits to help them survive. And survive they did – for 119 days.
According to a study released last summer, eight percent of patients treated in an emergency room wind up back in the ER within three days. Within 30 days of an ER visit, a full 20% of patients will have returned. To make matters worse, nearly 30% of those revisits resulted in the patient being admitted to the hospital. Their condition had gotten worse.
Whenever superheroes and supervillains clash, there will inevitably be a high degree of collateral damage. Vehicles, buildings, even entire cities are destroyed when good and evil collide. But after the battle is over, who picks up the pieces? Who cleans up the rubble, replaces lost inventory, and compensates the victims after the dust has settled?
Twelve seconds. That’s how long it took for Julia Gunthel to set a new world record. It happened in Cologne, Germany on November 23, 2007. In only twelve seconds, Gunthel popped three balloons with her back. While I have trouble bending forward to touch my toes, she can do it bending backward.
At some point in high school, I decided to learn how to juggle. I don’t recall the catalyst for this impulse, but I grabbed three tennis balls from the garage and a short how-to book from the library. I spent weeks practicing, standing over my bed so the errant balls wouldn’t fly all over the room. I started by tossing a single ball into the air over and over. I had to learn how to toss it to the same spot in the air (same height and distance from my body) consistently before adding in the second ball. I can still remember the rush I felt the first time I successfully completed a three ball cascade sequence.
It’s been widely shown that a strong correlation exists between employee engagement and performance. Engaged employees work harder, producing higher volume and better quality than their disengaged counterparts. Furthermore, organizations with high levels of employee engagement realize higher profitability (through increased revenue and decreased cost) as well as positive growth in both customer satisfaction and retention. Simply put, a motivated workforce is a significant competitive advantage.
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