trust – Leading Differently

A Few Words About Trust

“Trust brings a higher level of communication and a higher level of commitment and accountability.”
Bruce Arians

You cannot advance change without understanding the importance of trust. Every positive change that has ever occurred in human history has happened because of the development of personal relationships built on trust. Trust is a necessary component in turning shared values into shared action.

Trust doesn’t happen overnight. It develops over time. If we trust each other, it doesn’t simply mean that I believe what you say. When you consistently do what you say you are going to do, it builds trust. When you demonstrate honesty, kindness, transparency and humility, it builds trust. Trust is created by actions, not by saying, “trust me.”

Because it is intensely personal, trust can be complex. It can be influenced as much by intuition, and gut feeling, as it is on logic and evidence. Trust is not necessarily an either/or proposition. It can exist on a continuum. You can share values and goals with someone, but disagree with the means by which they want to achieve those goals. Your level of trust informs your tolerance for risk, or your willingness to invest time and energy.

Trust is not transferable. Just because A trusts B, and B trusts C, it doesn’t mean that C will automatically trust A. The trust between B and C can, however, serve to open a door to a trusted relationship between A and C. Trust can also fade without regular, reliable, trustworthy acts,

Misinformation erodes trust. Example: Outlandish, unsubstantiated medical, or scientific claims on social media serve to erode public trust in science. There isn’t a tremendous return on investment trying to combat the rantings of the misinformation echo chamber. When it seems difficult to tune out those rants, just ignore them, and remember that change happens at the center.

Finally, remember that trust is not about marketing, or propaganda. It is about developing authentic human relationships and having each other’s backs. In the words of psychotherapist and author Thomas Moore: “We need people in our lives with whom we can be as open as possible. To have real conversations with people may seem like such a simple, obvious suggestion, but it involves courage and risk.”

Strangers in Support of Thriving Communities

“I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.”
Blanche DuBois, A Streetcar Named Desire, by Tennessee Williams

I have frequently written about the importance, and primacy of personal relationships when it comes to working for change. I continue to believe that most things that ultimately succeed in this world do so because of personal relationships. There are, however, complementary endeavors that lead to success, and the relationship that makes those work is not interpersonal, but rather it reflects a person’s relationship with their community as a whole.

A number of years ago I was in a work meeting that was winding down, when the subject of LinkedIn came up. For those of you not familiar with LinkedIn, it was created to serve as a “professional” social network. It is not the kind of social site that many people who belong think about, much less check on a regular basis. People you’ve met through work make requests to become part of your list of “connections.” The site identifies varying degrees of connectedness among your connections. Its algorithms also predict that you know lots of people you’ve never heard of.

Anyway, back to the story. Most of the people in the meeting were saying that even though they were not active very on the site, accepting someone’s request to be a connection was a painless way to have a potential bridge to someone who might be a professional contact in the future. Plus, it provided them a tiny bit of validation when someone thought they were important enough to be networked with. Almost everyone agreed, however, that they did in fact have numerous people among their connections who they couldn’t remember, or had any idea how they were currently connected to their work.

Then a woman shared that she had set about the task of weeding out her list of connections on the site. She said that she used one simple question as a determining factor. The question was: If this person asked me to do them a favor, would I do it? If the answer was yes, they stayed on the list. It was her way of turning a confusing, infrequently used, personal network, into more of a trusted personal network.

Our non-professional, offline lives operate a little differently than social media sites. Our community may include relatives, friends, acquaintances, people we know of only by reputation, and strangers (there are probably many more categories, but you get the idea). There are varying levels of connection, and trust exist across and within these categories, but all can, and do bring value to the quality of life in the community.

Community-building, and community development obviously benefit from trusted relationships that result in constructive community engagement. Community engagement and connection, however, also occurs outside of trusted personal relationships. It happens because individuals with few individual connections place their trust in the idea of community itself.

Community engagement can be thought of as people doing a personal favor for the community. You can be a loner, or a hermit, and still value the quality of life created by community. A strong commitment to a place might simply come from the comfort of the familiar, or the lure of some natural feature, or maybe you just want the community to thrive for convenience of not having to go out of town to shop, or get a haircut.

I don’t think one can underestimate the power that an individual’s sense of place holds. As philosopher Patricia Churchland wrote, “Being engaged in some way for the good of the community, whatever that community, is a factor in a meaningful life. We long to belong, and belonging and caring anchors our sense of place in the universe.”

The efforts of strangers can complement, or build upon the work of organized allies. Just because people are not acting as part of your group’s plan, does not devalue their contributions. Maybe they eventually get to know you, maybe not. It doesn’t matter, because you always have a common friend – the community.

The Unexpected Benefits of ABCD

NOTE: This post is a companion piece to the post, “Asset Focused Leadership,” which provides an overview of ABCD fundamentals.

“Happy accidents are real gifts, and they can open the door to a future that didn’t even exist. It’s kind of nice sometimes to set up something to encourage or allow happy accidents to happen.” — David Lynch

An asset-based community development (ABCD) approach to creating change requires a recognition of the fundamental humanity of every member of the community, and allows each person’s gifts, skills, and talents to be shared and celebrated. It should not be surprising that these basic tenets often result in unexpected discoveries of human ingenuity and accomplishment.

Communities use ABCD to uncover, and creatively implement ways to address local issues. Along the way, however, small groups of collaborators, many of whom have only recently met, begin to see their community through a different lens. As people work together to create positive change in their community, social capital, and trusted personal relationships are created.

That trust can be a key to a sense of belonging for people who formerly found themselves on the margins. Being surrounded by gifted, caring people does more than instill confidence that committed people can get things done. It often uncovers a generosity of spirit, and a level of compassion that the community had not previously seen.

The unexpected benefits of taking the time to ask people what they care deeply about, and what their talents are, consistently changes the conversation. People are forced to rethink notions about where wisdom and expertise reside. That gives them confidence to believe that they don’t have to wait around for someone else do something about improving the things that they are passionate about.