“Trust is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It’s the foundational principle that holds all relationships.” —Stephen Covey
A team performs best when everyone is working together. And one of the key factors to seeing this happen is the presence of trust. Because it’s hard to work together well if you don’t trust each other.
This goes beyond being able to trust the leader, and flows in all directions. Does the leader trust those he’s leading? Do teammates trust their colleagues? Do subordinates trust those in authority? When trust disappears from one of more of these relationships, the performance of the team will eventually suffer.
If you don’t trust your teammates, you may be distracted from focusing on your task because you’re keeping an eye on everything they’re doing. Or you may not be able to get behind a decision if you don’t really trust the people who made it. Or you may not be able to be honest and forthright with your thoughts, because you don’t feel it’s safe to share. And when this happens to any member, the whole group is affected.
Ingredients of Trust
Often, when we hear the word “trust,” we think about the character of a person. Are they “trustworthy”? Do they care? Are they honest? Are they looking out for others, and not just themselves?
These kinds of characteristics are foundational, and if they’re missing, can lead to significant problems — both in the interpersonal communications of the group, as well as team morale.
But beyond someone’s character, competence is another key ingredient when thinking about trust. It may not be the first thing that comes to mind, but if a teammate or leader is a wonderful person, and has the best of intentions, but just doesn’t have the skills or competency to get the job done, there’s going to be a lack of trust at a certain level. And eventually, if there’s a lack of trust in the ability of others to perform, this will have its toll on the effectiveness of the larger group.
To the Mirror
It can be easy to look around and see individuals who are not trustworthy, either in character or competence (politics, for example, tends to have no shortage of examples). But the key question for each of us is, Am I trustworthy? Can others trust me?
Whether I’m leading or following or serving alongside, do I have both the character and competence others can put their trust in? Because the answer to this question affects not only me, but all the other relationships I find myself in.