Put The Us In Trust
As I continue my summer study of Ulysses S. Grant it has been interesting to compare the polarized political and social order of that time with today’s. We have had many periods of polarized social unrest. As I study Grant’s relationships, it becomes evident how important the “us” in trust is. This is the topic of Simple Truth #32: “There’s No Trust Without Us” in Simple Truths of Leadership: 52 Ways To Be A Servant Leader and Build Trust, Making Common Sense Common Practice, Ken Blanchard and Randy Conley. Conley pointed out that trust is a psychological and emotional construct between two people. Conley said, “There’s no trust without us – you and me, two people willing to take a risk and be vulnerable in front of each other with the expectation that the other won’t take advantage” (p. 87). Think about the greatest relationships you have; that comment by Conley pretty much sums up why those relationships are great.
“I don’t like that man. I must get to know him better.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
I love the above quote from Abraham Lincoln. We need to take the initiative to get to know others better and try to build relationships that enable putting the us in trust. Lincoln and Grant became great friends in the very short time they were able to be together. One thing my study has revealed is that the Lincoln/Grant friendship was built completely on trust. The two of them worked hard to nurture trust. Who do you need to work harder at nurturing trust with?
Just You Leadership
“No pretenses, no masks – just you.” ~ Randy Conley in Simple Truths of Leadership: 52 Ways To Be A Servant Leader and Build Trust, Making Common Sense Common Practice, Ken Blanchard and Randy Conley. This is the 31st week of the year and I am on Simple Truth #31: “People Admire Your Strengths, But They Respect Your Honesty Regarding Your Vulnerability.” When we allow ourselves to be seen as less than perfect, others get to really know us beyond title or position. When others see us modeling this, they are more inclined to do the same.
“I think when you’re vulnerable, people realize that you, too, are human. And, perhaps even more importantly, they love your ownership of your personal positive and negative characteristics.”
Colleen Barrett, President Emerita of Southwest Airlines
I was actually discussing this with a group of teachers last week. We were discussing how back in the day, teacher educators would tell you to never let the students know if you didn’t have/know the answer. I hope no one is still giving this terrible advice. From experience, let me assure you that showing some vulnerability with students is valuable. Some of the greatest labs we did in my agricultural science classes were ones that didn’t work. Student would say, “What happened?” I would then say, “I have no idea, but l’ll bet we can figure it out together.” We would proceed to “figuring it out” and a series of learning moments would follow. Let me tell you, Colleen Barrett, president emeritus of Southwest Airlines was right; the students loved that show of vulnerability and it made our relationship stronger. Vulnerability is very powerful when it is authentic. Are you willing to be “just you?”
Leaders Trust First
“In the workplace, it’s your job as a leader to extend trust to your people first. It’s not their job to have blind faith in you simply by virtue of your power or position of power” (p. 81). I loved this from Randy Conley in Simple Truth #30 “Someone Must Make The First Move To Extend Trust. Leaders Go First.” I’ve always said you can’t workshop or activity trust. Trust has to be earned in real time work. We must first give our trust to find out if someone is trustworthy.
I think of this being like the first time I gave my son the keys to one of our vehicles after he got his drivers license and saying have a good time and please be careful. I had to trust that he would take the examples and teachings of his mother and me and put it to use as a good driver and make good choices. By the way, he earned our trust and six years later still has it. But it started with us trusting him and giving him the keys, first. I’ve always liked how Stephen M.R. Covey put it, “The job of a leader is to go first, to extend trust first. Not a blind trust without expectations and accountability, but rather a “smart trust” with clear expectations and strong accountability built into the process. The best leaders always lead out with a decided propensity to trust, as opposed to a propensity not to trust.” How about you? Are you ready to go first?
What Is Your Leadership Point Of View?
How do you answer the question: what is your leadership point of view? Randy Conley told us in Simple Truth #29 “Self-Trust Is The First Secret To Success” we should clearly identify our leadership point of view. To do this we need to answer these questions:
- What motivates you as a leader?
- What are your values?
- What are your beliefs about leading others?
Randy said, “If you don’t know the answers to these questions, your leadership could be drawn off course” (p. 79). Randy also asked us to contemplate what leadership legacy we want to leave. I learned from my friend and mentor, Dr. Joseph Michelli, CEO of The Michelli Experience, how important is was have a Legacy Statement. Here is mine: “Hopefully I’ll be remembered as a thoughtful leader who showed love for those I served by providing growth and development.” It is amazing how often I go to this to make sure I am serving people in a way that will carry out my legacy. Along with my core values, this serves as a compass to keep me pointed true north. Finally, as Randy reminded us, make sure and share all this with those you serve.
It’s As Easy As ABCD
As I dive into the second half of Simple Truths of Leadership: 52 Ways To Be A Servant Leader and Build Trust, Making Common Sense Common Practice, Ken Blanchard and Randy Conley, I’m thinking about how trust is a word we use a lot without always thinking about how trust works and why it’s so important in our lives. It really is a bridge or social glue that allows us to be vulnerable and become comfortable with doing something differently, trying something new, or dealing with uncertainty. In Simple Truth #28, “Building Trust Is A Skill That Can Be Learned And Developed,”Randy told us that trust is about learning and using the right behaviors, and then becoming better at building trust with practice.
I’ve heard Brené Brown say that trust isn’t built in grand gestures, but in the small moments that people treat what is important to you with care. This goes right along with the ABCD Model introduced in Simple Truths of Leadership to foster and grow relationships and communities built on trust. Here is the model (p. 77):
- Able: demonstrate competence
- Believable: act with integrity
- Connected: show care and concern for others
- Dependable: honor commitments
All these skills/qualities contribute to the degree of trust people have for each other. All can be developed and honed. Trust is an ongoing and symbiotic relationship. We need to keep working to get better at our close bonds of trust.
Trust Is An Outcome
As a person who is driven by outcomes, I loved this statement: “Trust is an outcome, a result of the behaviors we use in our interactions with others” (Randy Conley, p. 72). I started the second half of the great book Simple Truths of Leadership: 52 Ways To Be A Servant Leader and Build Trust, Making Common Sense Common Practice, Ken Blanchard and Randy Conley. In this half, Randy takes the lead discussing trust in leadership. In Simple Truth #27 entitled “Leadership Begins With Trust” Randy told us that when trust is established, “Creativity, innovation, productivity, efficiency, and morale flourish” (p. 75). That’s why I love that Randy calls trust an outcome, because it is so tangible. When trust is there we feel it and when it is not we really feel it.
While some organizations and leaders still use the so called, golden handcuff (showing up with cupcakes, pizza in the break room, or the kitschy trinkets) approach for attempting to get employee satisfaction and engagement, I believe that building a culture of trust is what makes a meaningful difference. It is an outcome. One of the challenges with the random perks approach is that these perks are being given by someone who is not taking the time to build relationships and trust. It comes down to walking our talk, keeping our promises and aligning our values with our behaviors. If we do this we should be constantly growing the trust of others. The old adage “actions speak louder than words” applies here.
Love In Action
Today officially marks the start of the 26th week of the year. We are at the halfway point. It also means I am halfway through the great book Simple Truths of Leadership: 52 Ways To Be A Servant Leader and Build Trust, Making Common Sense Common Practice, Ken Blanchard and Randy Conley. I am reading the book one simple truth at a time and writing a reflective post each week. This week’s post reflects on Simple Truth #26: “Great Leaders SERVE.” In this simple truth the elements of the SERVE model from The Secret: What Great Leaders Know and Do, by Ken Blanchard and Mark Miller were introduced. Two things jumped out at me. First, the idea of “reinventing continuously,” and second, the statement at the end of the simple truth: “…servant leadership is love in action” (p. 69). Let’s look at reinventing continuously.
As a person who loves learning and experiencing new things, I believe In the idea that what we know today will probably not make us successful even in the near future. We must be constantly reinventing ourselves. This does not mean we are giving up or changing core values, but means we are iterating. In fact, iteration, might be a better way to look at this than reinventing. By its very nature iteration is about learning and progressing to the next level – what great leaders do. For every new iteration, feedback must occur so that the next iteration is better and moving in the right direction.
Besides the personal reinvention there are two other parts to the Blanchard and Miller model of reinventing continuously: reinventing systems and processes and structural reinvention. Now more than ever, there is rapid and continual change all around us. Just think of the supply-chain for one. There is a great need to develop an iterative mentality and create a culture of learning. Therefore, if we want to practice “love in action,” we must not wait or hope that those we serve will somehow learn all of the needed skills that make them great. We must deliberately lead and model the reinvention/iteration process for all.
Your Unique Reason
I believe each and every one of us has a purpose. We each have a unique reason for being here on planet Earth. We are not here to only stroke our own egos and be interested in our superficial selves and obsess over what we want, what we have and what other people think of us. I learned a long time ago that others don’t think of us as often as we sometimes think they do and are usually so self-consumed with themselves that most of their time is spent thinking about themselves instead of us. This was the subject of Simple Truth #25, “It’s Not About You” of Simple Truths of Leadership: 52 Ways To Be A Servant Leader and Build Trust, Making Common Sense Common Practice, Ken Blanchardand Randy Conley. In today’s world, it’s easy to get off track or focus on the wrong things, leading to dissatisfaction and not taking good care of those we serve.
Great leaders bring out the best in others. Those we serve need to hear that we believe in them. Once those we serve recognize that we genuinely want to see them do well and are committed to helping them, they will begin to believe they can accomplish their purpose in the organization. By realizing it is not about us, we can bring out the best in others.
Getting A Helper’s High
“People who feel good about the work they do are always looking for ways to contribute to the success of your organization.” When I read this tonight in Simple Truth #24, “People Who Produce Good Results Feel Good About Themselves” of Simple Truths of Leadership: 52 Ways To Be A Servant Leader and Build Trust, Making Common Sense Common Practice, Ken Blanchardand Randy Conley I thought to myself, “Drop the mic!” Then at about that same moment I got this text from a client I had just facilitated an important event for tonight: “That was really neat and very special tonight. Thanks for all of your intentional work and planning to make such an awesome event!” That really made me feel good. I had produced the results they wanted.
I think they call this a “helper’s high.” As a person who considers himself a helper this is awesome. The brain released those feel-good chemicals called endorphins. I also felt gratitude which makes me want to do even better work for the organization, proving Blanchard’s and Conley’s points. We human beings have a basic need to know that we contribute, create value and can make a difference and effect change in our environment.
The Gift Of Feedback
You all know how the children’s fairytale The Emperor’s New Clothes ends…the emperor goes out with his new clothes which were allegedly invisible, and, of course, is naked. No one has the courage to tell the emperor he is naked until he comes to a little boy who says, “But he doesn’t have anything on!” It took the innocence of a child to make the emperor realize he had no clothes. In Simple Truth #23, “Servant Leaders Love Feedback” of Simple Truths of Leadership: 52 Ways To Be A Servant Leader and Build Trust, Making Common Sense Common Practice, Ken Blanchard and Randy Conley told us the feedback is a gift and that servant leaders love feedback.
“Feedback is the breakfast of champions.”
~ Rick Tate
It’s curious to me that a lot of development and coaching centers around getting better at giving feedback to others, but we rarely focus on how to attract, receive, and use actionable feedback about ourselves; even though it’s in our own best interest to do so. The top performing people I know always ask for feedback. Getting actionable feedback is a skill, and the top performers excel because they are continually honing that skill. Feedback is data and when we have more data, we’re better positioned to respond to the world around us. In a culture where leaders ask for feedback there are broad practical and interpersonal benefits, including relationship building and employee engagement.
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