Do you have trust and confidence as a cornerstone of your culture?

Prior to a long awaited landmark decision in the High Court, we HR practitioners considered the concept of “trust and confidence” as a legal construct, not a culture construct.

In short, the implied term of “trust and confidence” was a contract law concept and we understood it to be a factor in consideration or performance of an employment contract.  After this High Court decision, it all got a bit murky (if you are interested in the decision, click here) – but that’s not the point of this article!

The point is, as a result of this industrial concept, we never really focussed on trust and confidence as a premise of culture, well at least I didn’t.  It wasn’t a foreign concept – phrases such as “he’s not trustworthy”, “she can’t be trusted”, “the managers don’t trust us” were not uncommon, but I’m not sure the HR community really thought about “trust” as a premise for building psychologically safe, diverse and inclusive teams in their people strategies.  We should have! We do now.

To some extent, we are now, thanks in part to lots of buzz around “psychological safety”.  This article is not about psychological safety per se, rather, the premise of “psychological safety” is a consequence of a trusting culture, and that is where to start.

In 2001, Jim Collins wrote a book called “Good to Great…why some companies make the leap and other’s don’t”.  The importance of building trust and respect was a major theme of his ideology.  He advanced the concept of “safe environments”, so the premise of “psychological safety” is far from new.  I read this book in 2001, yet I didn’t really take the baton and run, I was too busy focussing on hedgehogs and foxes (google it) or click here.

Not long after I realised fast what happens in an organisation where there is no trust and how damaging that can be.  I revisited Jim Collins’ book as a starting point for building trust principles into my people strategy and my leadership development training.

We say, ‘no trust, no chance’.

For completeness, let’s quickly define “psychological safety in the workplace”.  Broadly it is an environment in which people are comfortable expressing and being themselves, where inclusivity and diversity of thought (as well as a true expression of individuality or individual characteristics), is truly embraced.  Where you can speak your mind, speak up or out, and this will be considered a good thing in all circumstances, no matter how controversial.  Where judgement is not made, you are not labelled (“opinionated”, “high maintenance”, “vocal”) and there is no blame game. Where unconscious bias has been trained. So basically, an environment of trust and confidence.

This brings me to Hertzberg.  For years now, I have preached the principles of Herzberg’s two-factor hygiene-motivation theory.  I’ve even gone as far as to include the actual theoretical teachings in leadership programs for all levels (which I rarely do).  For those who want to review Herzberg’s theory, click here.  Simply put; until you get the environmental hygiene factors right it doesn’t matter what you do, it won’t work and it won’t stick. 

All of this means that without a base level of trust, where you trust your employees and they trust you, you can throw as much mud at the wall as you like but it won’t stick, you won’t drive change and your culture will be flawed.

Without trust and confidence as a cornerstone of your ‘hygiene factors’, you won’t achieve anything close to a culture that inspires all the good things where people grow and thrive. Or, as I also commonly say, you can’t build a house on shaky foundations.”

How do you do it?

This is to get you thinking…it’s a complex matter and a highly customised approach is necessary to get it right, but in short, trust and confidence should be thought of in 3 categories as depicted in this model:

In developing your strategy…

you need to ensure that initiatives are tailored at a company level, team level and individual level.  In an ideal situation, you would start at the top, influence the strategy and develop initiatives that are adopted from the top down.

However, in my experience sometimes the best place to start is in the middle, at a team level with department/line managers.  Given that department/line managers tend to have the most day to day interaction with the workforce, this can be the most effective.  This is also true if the senior leadership at the most senior levels of the organisation have issues with dysfunction or effectiveness. 

And in all circumstances for each category, there is accountability that is managed and measured!

The focus should be on the behaviour that builds trust which is best articulated in the list of questions to pose or workshop that we have developed over the years (and this can also form a checklist of sorts for you to develop a plan).  If you would like to receive our checklists, send us an email.

“Once you trust your workforce, they will trust you. Trust begets trust - simple but true”.

A feeling of being empowered and recognised and listened to, will breed trust and confidence and drive engagement and an overall sense of health and well-being.  This in turn will create a “psychologically safe” environment, improved productivity and retention.  Companies with real trust and confidence as a cultural premise, will be a destination of choice for the best talent.

We can help to tailor a specific strategy to build trust and confidence.  Click here to review our culture programs.