How Well Charged Is Your ‘Trust Battery’
At the core of good leadership is trust — trust which permeates all relationships: leaders, staff, customers, stakeholders…everyone.
Trust builds communities; lack of trust destroys them.
So, how do you build trust? It’s deceptively simple:
Do what you say you are going to do.
Be true to your word and to ‘the’ word (i.e. the organisation’s vision and values). Do the small things daily, and don’t shy away from, or put off, the big things. Run the hard miles with (and sometimes for) staff. When you fall short (and we all do), apologise and own it.
Inevitably, trust ebbs and flows with the daily beats, bumps, and successes of organisational life. Tobias Lütke, CEO at Shopify coined the term ‘trust battery’. Your trust battery is initially filled to 50 %. It’s then charged and discharged based on how you interact with people and on whether you deliver what you promise. It’s a useful way of thinking about how your actions (or inaction) affect trust.
Build trust. Do what you say you are going to do. Simple….but deceptively difficult.
Dr. Denry Machin is a consultant specialising in teacher training and organisational development. His latest book ‘International Schooling: The Teacher’s Guide’ can be accessed here.
