Trust is a Two-Way Street
Theme: Trust
Introduction
Trust is a funny thing. It can be so hard to gain, but so easy to lose. And once you lose it, there’s a chance you may never get it back. And no chance that you will if you don’t work really hard at it.
Trust, in the workplace, is when you can place your confidence in your team and your leadership. You can expect actions and reactions to be within certain limits, and that your team and leadership will have your back when needed.
Old school thought seems to have been that you wanted to make your team fear you in order to get anything done. In my experience, you get better results with trust.
As a leader, you not only have to be concerned with making sure your team trusts you, but you have to initiate that, by trusting them, first.
Having the trust of your team makes the work easier. They’re not second guessing you or themselves. The lack of worry that comes with a team that trusts their leadership frees them up to be more creative and to do their best work! It will also be a lot harder for them to make the choice to leave a position where they know they trust the leadership, vs. a new position with a new leader and a new team (at a new organization?) which are all mysteries regarding the level of trust.
In this post, I will share concrete ways to establish and maintain trust with your team, examples as to what it can look like when trust is involved in a working relationship vs when it’s not, what trust means for neurodivergent leaders, and some concrete tips on how to go about holding a team together with trust. Stick around to the end for a surprise!
Key Insights
Ways to establish trust:
Preparation: Prepare what information they need to know to do their job ahead of time. One way to accomplish this is with SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures).
Clarity: Not only do you need to provide the information needed to accomplish their projects, but you also need to give clear instructions on what is expected of them. This is another thing that SOPs can help with. But it’s also important to:
Agree on a deadline
Assign a point person (someone who is responsible for making sure the work is getting done)
Trust first: Do the above and then back off. Let them do their work. Trust that they can do the work that they were hired for.
If an issue arises, start by assuming a misunderstanding before moving forward with consequences.
Consistency: Become someone who they can rely on knowing that you will make decisions a certain way (Focus on the Mission), you will be certain places at certain days/times, and you will protect them when needed.
Respect: Show your team the respect you want from them, and the respect you want them to show those you serve. They will not trust you if you do not respect each other.
Ways to maintain trust:
Honesty: If your team sees that you lie or “stretch the truth” with anyone, they will assume you will do it with them, too.
Be Ethical: have moral standards/standards of conduct that you adhere to (like, the other aspects of honesty).
Team Building: have non-work related activities that everyone is welcome (but not required) to participate in, that help the team get to know each other better. I like board games. You’ll get more participation when it’s during work hours and prizes are involved. See: Brooklyn Nine-Nine for ideas. ;-)
Sportsmanship: Whether you win or lose an argument, do so gratefully and respectfully.
Maintain Confidentiality: When someone shares sensitive or personal information with you, as long as it does not affect the rest of the organization, do not share it with anyone else without the permission of that person.
Examples
Story about a boss I trusted
Long ago, I had a boss who was the first one to work every morning and the last one to leave every night (he claimed it was to avoid traffic, which was very believable). While I was concerned, even back then, about his work-life balance, I could rely on the fact that he would be there. He had an incredible work ethic, and appreciated that I did as well. MY ADHD hyper focus really helped me out, because I would crank through the work they gave me way faster than anyone expected.
This was an internship, where I was trying to get my foot in the door of that industry. When they ran out of internship level work for me, they gave me work that full-time employees would do, to keep me busy.
*Side Note: I would not recommend working like this. I advocate for people to be paid for the work they are doing. This was a totally different time, we were still reeling from the economy crashing and it took months of applying to land this job, so I wanted to do well, and I needed to have more work to do because I was paid by the hour and wanted to stay longer.
In that job, I did the work well, but I made a few “political” mistakes, as young people do, which almost got me fired (I now recognize that my neurodivergence played into these difficulties). But my boss stood up for me and saved my job. Looking back, I recognize that many people from the other departments didn’t like me or thought I was weird because of my undiagnosed ND status. But he recognized the value I brought to the organization.
As long as I worked there, I knew that he appreciated my contribution and would go to bat for me.
((Honestly, this is kind of a lame example, but it’s the best one I can think of. Ultimately, I’ve had a lack of trust in some level of leadership, due to their actions, at some point in every position I’ve held. I texted a friend to say I was struggling with this part of the post and she responded, “That tells me a lot about why your work is so important.”))
Story about a lack of trust in leadership
I once (briefly) worked for a boss who trusted her team so little that she had cameras installed throughout the already open room. I guess that way, she could spy on us without having to get up and walk around. She also lied to us, fabricating complaints that never happened, to scare us into working harder. For me, it had the opposite effect. It just made me worried about what I had done wrong and I second guessed every move I made.
That was the first job where I would go out to my car on my breaks to cry, because I had no trust in the boss. Her dishonesty, manipulation, lack of respect, lack of confidentiality (if what she did say to me was true), lack of ethics, lack of clarity in what she wanted, and several other issues all made me not trust her, or that my job was secure. It really didn’t make me want to stay. I think I stayed in that job for 2 months (my shortest stint at any workplace), and after I left, the other employees reached out to ask me for a letter about why I left in their attempt to report her to Corporate for her poor behavior.
What This Means for Neurodivergent Leaders
Depending on our neurotype, and whatever other experiences/traumas we have, we can have a tendency to trust too easily, sometimes people we should not. And if we’ve had that happen too many times, we often seek patterns and apply that to anyone who fits that pattern, struggling to trust them, whether they’ve earned that hesitancy or not.
With that in mind, we have to be sure to remind ourselves that people are different, and can be messy. Even those who have let you down could possibly change with enough accountability and self-reflection on their part.
We can be messy, too. We are more prone to overwhelm, which can make all the necessary communication harder. We have to be able to own up to our mistakes, make apologies when needed, and forgive quickly, in the hopes of getting everything back to a place where we can move forward and get back to the mission.
Tips & Action Steps
Here’s a few digital products I’ve created for specific productivity activities, which also have the beneficial side effect of building trust with your team:
SOPs: I’ve said this a few times, but having clear instructions written out on how to do as many tasks as possible is so helpful in onboarding new people and covering people who are unavailable.
Regular Check-ins: My freebie explains this more, but just showing up to quickly check-in with each team member every week or so makes you come across as more approachable, so they can begin to trust that you will be there 1-on-1 for them to ask questions of without accidentally interrupting something important, and eventually they will trust that you will help them when needed for any work-related issue.
Office Emergency Preparedness Checklist: Being prepared for the worst, especially when it’s something outside of regular work parameters but could affect them at work, is a wonderful way to build trust with your team. When they know that you are concerned about their health and their lives, for more than just what you can get out of them for the organization, they will trust you more.
Building Trust Worksheet: If you struggle with trusting people because of past experiences, I’ve just created a NEW worksheet to help you reflect on why you’re having difficulty and working through it.
Basically, the most important thing in trust building is remembering that your team is made up of people. Individuals who choose to be a part of the team for as long as they feel like the work they are doing (and whatever compensation is included) is more important and valuable than whatever discomfort they feel when they do the work.
Treat your people well.
Do your best to set them up for success.
Trust them first.
Be consistent, ethical, and honest.
And focus on the Mission and be kind.
