What happens when you realise your path is entrepreneurship rather than employment? Lindsay takes up the challenge and shares an account of her journey as it unfolds…

Business has stalled for a month.  It’s mid-summer and there’s no activity.  My pipeline , everything is frozen in time while outside it’s a heatwave.

We went on a European road trip for 3 weeks covering 10 countries – it was amazing, hectic and hard work.  Sounds like business!

While I was away, I read Stephen MR Covey’s book, The Speed of Trust.  It inspired me to share. A summary of what he says is this…

There are 4 core aspects of trust that build credibility: Integrity and Intent (character), Capability and Results (competence).   All of these are needed to establish trust. For example, you can trust your friend but wouldn’t to go to them to get your teeth fixed unless they were a qualified dentist.

Building trust starts with inspiring trust in self through behaviours, such as: talk straight, demonstrate respect, clarify expectations, show loyalty, and confront reality.  Through reciprocation of these behaviours, trust can be created between people.

Organizations need another dimension to build trust, which centres around the ‘principle of alignment’ at the design level: “Just as the tax created by low trust is real, measurable, and extremely high, so the dividends of high trust are also real, quantifiable, and incredibly high.”

The stories that Covey tells about how these behaviours work in practice orientate around congruent communications and systems that lead to rich, expedient, productive actions.

These tables say it all…

What does it look like in an organization when there is no trust?

Organization level	Interpersonal level
Micromanagement	Hostile behaviours and confrontations
Sabotage, grievances, lawsuits	Labelling of others as enemies or allies
Punishing systems and hierarchy	Communications coloured by fear, uncertainty, doubt and worry
Unhappy employees and stakeholders	Real issues not surfaced or dealt with effectively
Time wasted defending positions and decisions	Energy draining, joyless interactions
Bureaucracy, redundancy and misalignment in systems and structures	Evidence-gathering of other party’s weaknesses and mistakes
Hidden agendas	Guarded / grudging dispensing of information
Slow approvals / lack of overall agility	Regular misunderstandings

 

What does it look like in an organization when there is trust?

Organization level	Interpersonal level
Aligned systems and structures	Positive energy
Good communication	Inspiring work characterised by purpose, creativity and excitement
A focus on work and results	Open, transparent relationships
Positive partnership relationships	Cooperative, close, vibrant relationships
Helpful systems and structures	Cordial, healthy communications
Strong creativity and innovation	Focus on smooth and efficient collaboration
Engagement, confidence, loyalty	Mutual tolerance and acceptance
Healthy workplace	Mistakes seen as learning opportunities

Mirror Mirror– We identify and close alignment gaps between people in organizations to improve engagement and performance.

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