Doing More with Trust
Tom Carlson & Jack Ricchiuto

The corporate mandate to “do more with less” has become an unfortunately easy excuse to focus on the deficiencies of what we don’t have and can’t do.

“More with less” sounds good in theories from managers and consultants but doesn’t translate in practice. It is unrealistic to expect people to be energized by the challenge. People simply decide to give less of themselves.

Doing more requires having more, but more of what? Having more starts with engagement of people’s strengths and passions. The abundance perspective that inspires true engagement is a matter of perspective. Our most recent empirical research indicates that high engagement is rooted in shared values on a team.

Shared values provide a social contract among the staff at all levels of the organization. That contract allows staff members to form and hold reasonable and reliable expectations about how they will interact – treat each other and work together. People tend to be most engaged when they co-create those values. Shared values must be ‘lived’ each day. When values are shared, team trust is high.

Trust doesn’t occur by mandate or hope. Trust is built with hundreds, and thousands, of acts of trustworthiness. Capability, reliability, and selflessness are the essential characteristics of trustworthiness. Trustworthiness must be consistently demonstrated and earned by each member of the organization in order for generalized trust to exist and have meaning and power.

When clearly articulated shared values are ‘lived’ they establish reliable expectations for behavior and interaction, and team trust thrives.

Mutual trust significantly influences both engagement in performance and self-development. It answers the questions like:  ‘Can I count on my peers to deliver?”; “How free do I feel to offer what I can and ask for what I want?

An essential role of any leader is to establish and maintain a culture of shared beliefs and behavior.

Team trust is strengthened by trust in their leaders. Discrepancies between the attitudes and behaviors leaders espouse (‘the talk’) and those they ‘live’ and practice (‘the walk’) are magnified by their visibility and influence. Leaders must answer the unspoken questions; ‘Do they hear my concerns?’ ‘Do I have recourse if I disagree?’ “Am I able to voice disagreement?” ‘Am I included in decisions which affect me?’ ‘Trust in leaders and leadership has a significant influence.

The good news is that building team trust and trustworthiness is an intentional process that does not require altering the landscape of the team’s collective strengths and weaknesses. It does require the development of unprecedented agreements among team members that address issues of respect, regard, and civility. So-called “personality conflicts” are symptoms that emerge when these agreements have not yet been developed. When leaders make sure these agreements are created and sustained, the team’s capacity for high performance and agility improve many times over.