Recently I co-delivered part of a leadership development programme to 140 delegates, and one of our richest conversations was about trust in leadership. Trust is hard to measure. It’s tricky to put on a dashboard, yet you can feel it within minutes of walking into a room.
Trust builds slowly, through three elements working together:
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Consistency: doing what you said you’d do and responding to similar situations in similar ways, so people know which version of you will turn up.
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Competence: being able to do your job, making clear decisions, delivering on promises and being honest about the limits of what you know.
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Care: listening, noticing when someone is not OK and checking in on them.
Trust needs all three.
In my experience, care is often misunderstood in values-led organisations. People choose this work because they care. It’s a strength, and like any strength it has a shadow: caring can show up as avoiding feedback or conversations that feel difficult.
Picture someone in your team whose work has been slipping for a few months. You know they have a lot going on outside work, looking after ageing relatives and young children. Raising it feels unkind, so you put the conversation off, hoping things will improve and you won’t need to have the conversation at all. Meanwhile that person misses the chance to put things right, and everyone else in the team notices. What gets ignored gets tolerated, and the team learns that this behaviour is acceptable here. The people picking up the slack draw their own conclusions about fairness, and trust starts to erode.
We tell ourselves the delay is kind. Often, though, the person it’s kindest to is the one who should be giving the feedback. Putting off the conversation spares us an awkward half hour, and we call that care. Caring for someone means being honest with them because you want them to succeed, and trusting them to handle what you have to say. In return, they can trust you to tell them the truth.
I’ve seen the same pattern in innovation work. Teams that get on well but lack candour keep weak projects going far too long, because nobody wants to be the one who says ‘I don’t think this is working.’
Building stronger trust in leadership
So what helps?
Raise things early, while they’re small and easier to talk about. Don’t kid yourself that the behaviour will change of its own accord. Be specific about what you’ve noticed and the impact it’s having, and kind in how you say it.
Lead by example. Ask your team for feedback on your own leadership, and thank them when it’s uncomfortable to hear. When honesty flows in both directions, difficult conversations start to feel like part of how you care for each other, and they become a normal part of working together.
Trust is built in small moments, and the conversation you’ve been putting off is one of them. Ask yourself: who are you caring for when you put off giving feedback?
I work one to one with senior leaders, helping them prepare for difficult conversations, make decisions in uncertain times and lead their teams through change. If that would help you right now, get in touch here.