Trust

One of the topics that often comes up in coaching is trust. Which means that I have heard many people reflecting on it, and have, therefore, developed a few thoughts myself - and indeed read around a bit.

The first thing to say is that it is very easy to see this in a binary fashion: either I trust someone or I don't. But a few moments of reflection make it very clear that here, such a binary approach is unhelpful.  It is much more helpful to see it as a gradation: I may trust someone a little - what would it take to enable me to trust a little bit more?

The second is that there are different component parts of trust. Imagine you are going for heart surgery and have the choice of two surgeons. One is a known liar, cheat at games and generally untrustworthy kind of chap - but very skilled with the scalpel.  The other is a genuinely virtuous person, but with rather shaky hands. Which would you trust to operate on you?

So we need to start to unpack that word trust a bit, and consider (say) intentions, competence and communication. For me to trust someone to the highest level, I must be able to trust all three of those. And if I feel mistrustful of someone, it is helpful to identify which of these (or some other aspect) is causing me concern; and then at least I can recognise the aspects I do trust, which is a good foundation to build on.

And then, there's the need to look in the mirror: to what extent am I trustworthy?  Do I trust myself, for example? Stephen Covey writes about the importance of this in his famous Seven Habits. He talks of the Personal Integrity Account: the extent to which we believe ourself when we make commitments to ourself, and the importance of investing in that account.

If I do trust myself, it is worth recognising that others may not do so quite as readily.  There are good reasons for that. One is the realisation that we judge ourself and others in different ways. When I am considering my behaviour, what is most salient to me is my intentions.  I know my intentions are good, so that inclines me to take a positive view of myself (on a good day, at any rate...) However, others can't see my intentions, and I can't see theirs. So we deduce each others' intentions from behaviours and outcomes.

That is partly why transparency and openness are so foundational to trust: they enable others to get a better sense of our intentions - and may enable us to hear why others read us differently from our self-image. Daniel Coyle, in The Culture Code, suggests that the three essentials for leaders in developing trust in teams are building safety, sharing vulnerability, and establishing purpose.

We also need to distinguish trust from agreement.  Peter Block (as ever) is very helpful here, in The Empowered Manager; indeed, he suggests that we can create a four box grid, with trust (from low to high) on one axis, and agreement (from low to high) on another, and plot key relationships on it, so as to develop authentic strategies for addressing each of the possible combinations. 

And as Patrick Lencioni points out (in his Five Dysfunctions) trust is foundational for teams. A lack of trust leads to a fear of necessary conflict, which leads to low commitment, which leads to the avoidance of accountability, which leads to an inattention to results. So in his model, leaders in particular need to attend to this. They do this by modelling vulnerability, welcoming and managing the conflict of ideas, asking for commitment, holding people accountable and encouraging mutual accountability, and reviewing progress towards results with courage and honesty, with the team.

Vulnerability is, of course, risky. The root of the word is the Latin vulnus, a wound. So if we are trying to build trust where it has been damaged, we expose ourselves to being wounded. Why would we do that? On the positive side, because it demonstrates a willingness to trust the other not to abuse the vulnerability, which is in itself an investment in trust and an invitation to reciprocate. And on the negative side, because we all know what it is like when people lock into a highly defensive mode: progress becomes nearly impossible.  But it is a risk, so don't go too far too fast - not only is that risky for you, but it is scary for others, too!

And of course, that vulnerability is why it is so devastating when someone feels that trust has been betrayed: but perhaps that's a topic for a future post.

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With thanks to Ronda Dorsey for sharing this photo on Unsplash

Control and Trust

I have been thinking recently about control and trust. One of the organisations with which I work is keen to build more trust as part of its culture. That follows the retirement of a CEO who was very controlling.  He was highly competent, very knowledgeable, and normally had the good of the organisation at heart - but he ruled with a rod of iron, and that had some unfortunate side effects (as well as keeping things running very smoothly). One, it seems to me, is that many people were infantilised.  

Even senior people, with large personalities seem to struggle to take on responsibility. And managers throughout the organisation struggle to trust others (peers or subordinates) to do anything beyond the routine.  In a fast-changing industry, that is problematic.

Discussing this with some senior people, it became clear to me that part of the problem was a failure to distinguish between control and controls.

Jane in our GP14 on Ullswater

When I was challenging them to trust more, it kept coming back to a fear of losing control - and then disastrous things might happen. They accept that they need to be able to delegate more - and to trust more - but the c-word keeps coming up.

But if one thinks about controls, rather than control, things change. The analogy I like is sailing my dinghy on Ullswater. One of the joys of dinghy sailing is the immediacy and impact of feedback: get it wrong, and you are quickly in the water, wet, cold and spluttering.

If I am sailing with someone less skilled than I am (and that's a pretty low bar...) and want to be sure not to capsize, the easiest thing is to take control, and sail the boat myself.  But if I want to be free to do other things (take a few photos, perhaps), then I need to hand over control.  And to do that with confidence, I need to teach the other person how to use the controls. These are simple enough in a dinghy: the mainsheet, the tiller...  

James takes the controls...

But I think the analogy good for organisational life: if the right controls are in place, and the person to whom we are delegating understands both the requirements of the task, and the controls and their purpose, then we can afford to take the risk of trusting them with the tasks at hand.

So rather than focusing on control (which can really be a proxy for our own ego needs) it is more valuable to ensure that we really understand the necessary controls: and then we can hand over control - and free ourselves for more strategic leadership activities.