5 strategies to earn trust as a leader
Only 46% of employees have a great deal of trust in their employers. It’s a shocking statistic, particularly when you consider that employers typically believe that they are, by and large, trusted by their employees.
Why is this so significant? We know that employees who trust their employers are happier and more engaged at work. And happier, engaged employees turn out to be more productive and stay longer.
But with more employees working remotely or hybrid, there’s far less in-person contact between leaders and their employees which means that building and maintaining relationships, and the natural trust that comes from good relationships, is harder to achieve.
Trust cannot be mandated or expected. It must be earned. So, as a leader, how do you go about earning the trust of your employees?
In this blog, I’ll look at 5 key factors that will help you earn and maintain the trust of your employees.
Consistency
You need to be consistent with how you treat people. Be clear about your expectations, or the ‘rules’, and apply them consistently across all your team and across different situations. One rule for one person and another rule for the other will cause uncertainty and distrust.
You should also be consistent in your working practices. For example, if you plan to have a monthly review meeting with each team member, then it should be monthly and on the agreed date and time. If you regularly move the meeting, or worse, if you miss or cancel the meeting, your employee will assume that you don’t value the meetings.
Your employees want to know where they stand and that they can rely on you. Being consistent is the key to achieving that.
Be a role model
If there are behaviours or values you want to encourage in your team, those behaviours must start with you. People will take the lead from you. So whether it’s timekeeping or treating others with respect, it’s important that you model that behaviour and demonstrate the value. You can’t expect others to behave in a way that you are not prepared to yourself.
Also, don’t expect others to do tasks that you wouldn’t do yourself. No job should be ‘beneath’ you. That doesn’t mean that you should be doing the job of the salesperson, customer service rep or engineer for them – in fact, sometimes your employee may be more skilled in that area than you - but you should know what the person’s role involves and the challenges they face so that you can properly support them.
Direct feedback
Employees expect and value your feedback. They want to know how they’re doing: they appreciate your acknowledgement and praise when they are doing things well, but they also want to improve, so they equally value your feedback in how they can be better.
Clear, direct, timely and well-intentioned feedback is one of the most powerful tools at your disposal. Giving feedback little and often, is far more effective than saving up a long list of ‘performance issues’ to deliver at the 6 month or annual review meeting. If you don’t give feedback at the time, you’re missing an opportunity to help your employee continually improve. And from your employee’s perspective, it’s demoralising to be presented with a long list of issues at the same time, particularly when some may relate to incidents from several months ago.
Regular, clear and well-meaning feedback shows your employees you care about them and that you want to help them become better. This can only foster trust between you.
Being vulnerable
There was a time when many leaders believed, rightly or wrongly, that they had to appear to be a super-hero in the workplace. Show no weakness, make no mistakes, know all the answers, have a solution for everything. The problem with this is that people no longer value or trust super-heroes in the workplace. They want to work with other humans who are like them and that they can relate to. Connection is far important for employees than having leaders in ivory towers.
Show your employees that you’re a real person. Don’t be afraid to admit that you don’t know everything, be prepared to admit to your mistakes, demonstrate that you are willing to learn and become better. They will not think any less of you. But they will admire and respect you for it, they will feel a closer connection to you and they are more likely to admit their own weaknesses and seek help to become better themselves.
Trust your team
So far, we’ve concentrated on how you can earn the trust of your employees. But for trust to be strong and sustainable, it must be mutual. The more trusting you are of your employees, the more trust you will earn from them.
The reality is that most employers find this the most difficult step to achieve, despite their perceptions of the level of trust they display towards their employees. Studies show a large disparity between how trusting leaders think they are and how trusted employees actually feel. This gap, based on delusion, can un-do your efforts to earn trust and it can be dangerous.
Putting your full trust in your employees is a process that takes time, and it also represents a shift in mind-set. You have to accept that employees will make mistakes, you have to be prepared to give them timely and direct feedback and you have to be bold enough to let go at the appropriate times. There will be some pain, and a lot of learning along the way, but the rewards of being able to place your full trust in your team will easily outweigh the challenges of the process of getting there.
Employees who genuinely feel trusted are happier, more engaged and inspired. And of course, they are far more likely to place their full trust in you.
Trust is considered to be intangible and a trait that is both difficult to observe and to measure day-to-day. Therefore, it’s easy to mis-perceive the level of trust others have in us and to underestimate the importance of actively earning it. But a lack of trust will eventually become apparent in people’s behaviour. These five strategies are widely accepted as being effective in earning and maintaining trust. And mutual trust leads to happier, more engaged, inspired and loyal employees.
If you want to improve any of these elements within your team, you may benefit from some team coaching sessions. Click here to find out more about team coaching or contact me with any queries.