I’m still in shock. Recently I heard a keynote speaker tell their audience that they shouldn’t trust their employees or their clients. That one of the leadership lessons they had learned over the years is that people are not trustworthy.
WOW!
Think about the implications of that point of view for a moment. What do you think happens when the supposed “leader” makes the conscious decision to NOT trust the very people that they have decided to hire?
Ken Blanchard says in a trust-less environment employees “stay with the organization and do their jobs because they need a paycheck, but not much more. The [relationship] becomes purely transactional.”
In The Speed of Trust Stephen M.R. Covey says “in a high trust relationship, you can say the wrong thing, and people will still get your meaning. In a low trust relationship, you can be very measured, even precise, and they’ll still misinterpret you.”
John Mackey in the Huffington Post says that when there is a lack of trust “people don’t get ahead by being innovative, [they get ahead] by following the rules and playing it safe.”
When it comes to the trust issue, the leadership gurus all stand united. But are they wrong? Have they lived in their ivory towers so long that they are out of touch with what really happens in the workplace? That’s the impression the keynote speaker left with the audience.
So let’s look at trust from a real-world point of view. More than likely you’ve worked in a low-trust environment at some point in your career. So tell me your stories. In your experience how did you and your co-workers respond when you worked with a boss that didn’t trust you?
Submit your stories below, and let’s chat!
Tammy Rogers
