Why Trust is Hard (in Reality)

If you hear another cliché like “There’s no team without trust”… and think, “Yeah, no sh*t, Einstein!” then you are not alone. Because you’ve probably heard hundreds of quotes and soundbites about trust – everyone from Lencioni and Sinek to Nadella and Buffett talks about how vital it is, and rightly so. It is good advice. But what does that practically mean in the real world? I mean, in the messy reality of people leadership – when teams are overwhelmed, stressed, stepping on each other’s toes, and not getting along. So let’s strip it back and get real.

🧠 LEARN something.

Over the last seven years, I’ve run hundreds of workshops to help new teams build trust, or existing teams re-build trust after change, restructure, or conflict. There’s one thing I’ve learned, which slogans and soundbites won’t tell you: trust is given; and giving trust is a deliberate act of vulnerability. In other words, you give trust knowing full well that you might get hurt. It’s a conscious decision we make to expose our ideas, reputation, and feelings – based on the belief that someone else will act in your best interest. Think of the old trust fall exercise: you close your eyes, lean back, and fall – hoping your teammate catches you. There’s no guarantee you won’t hit the floor. But you choose to give trust anyway.

Now that creates a challenge. Since trust requires vulnerability, it is inevitably very subjective and is always shaped by personal biases, fears, and past experiences. If that trust fall was off the edge of a building, I’m sure you would feel different about leaning back! Or if you’ve been dropped by teammates before in a trust fall, you’re going to hesitate. We see the same thing play out at work when people have been burned before or have worked in environments where the cost of being vulnerable was too high. In those cases, the tendency is not to give trust too easily.

Therefore, we need to change how we talk about and communicate trust. In the workshops I run, for example, I encourage teams to ditch the generic list of “trustworthy traits” and values list, and instead get real and specific, and have proactive conversations about what giving trust actually looks like for them, individually, in that moment. That’s all that matters in reality. Because the feeling of trust and vulnerability changes as relationships either grow or become strained. In other words, you have to keep that proactive conversation going. Trust isn’t a box you tick or a activity you do. It’s a conversation you have and the culture you create to enable those conversations.

🤔 REFLECT on an idea.

We sometimes wait for people to “earn” our trust. But in reality, especially during change or conflict, trust often has to be given first, before expecting a outcome or behaviour. That’s what makes this quote so relevant, because trust isn’t earned first – it’s often given first, despite the risk.

😊 SMILE a little.

If slogans and value posters actually built trust, we’d be in the poster printing business – not leadership and team development business! 🤣

✅ DO IT to get results.

Others can’t read your mind. But people do appreciate it when you clearly communicate what you need from them to help you give them your trust (and vice versa). So next time you’re trying to build trust with someone, skip the vague talk about what “trust looks like,” and instead get real and specific. Share: “What I need from you right now to help me build trust is…” It’s simple and way more effective than hoping for someone to read your mind.