The Thin Book of Trust

To work together successfully, people must trust each other.

Trust among colleagues fuels superior performance, and companies must take deliberate actions to cultivate it. Building trust is a competency – a way of behaving and speaking you can learn and teach by following specific strategies and using “the language of trust.”

Trust means exposing something you value to another person’s scrutiny and actions, so it calls for being vulnerable. You may value tangible assets, such as your income or job, or intangibles, like your reputation, your principles, or your well-being. You entrust other people with what you value because you believe you can achieve more working together than you could by acting alone. When you trust people, you share ideas and thoughts with them. You are confident they will not be careless with what you share or try to benefit themselves at your expense.

Members of a trusting team feel safe sharing their thinking. The team members may disagree about ideas or assessments, but they treat everyone’s contributions with respect. In a trusting environment, participants engage in vigorous debate on proposals, making a sincere, collegial effort to...