Alan writes – coming back to Stephen Covey’s book ‘The Speed of Trust: the One Thing That Changes Everything ' again; I was struck by the importance he placed on 13 behaviours.
His second wave of trust, (Relationship Trust) builds of the first wave (Self Trust - see my previous postings – here and here.). He argues that the thirteen behaviours determine the degree to which we trust someone. While the book has a chapter on each I have only listed them below with one or two explanatory comments.
1. Talk Straight – tell the truth and leave the right impression (it is often possible but unhelpful to tell the truth and yet leave the wrong impression).
2. Demonstrate Respect – simply how you treat people. “There are two critical dimensions to this behaviour – first, to behave in ways that show fundamental respect for people, and second, to behave in ways that demonstrate caring and concern (p145).”
3. Create Transparency – being open rather than secretive, transparent rather than hidden. “The opposite of Create transparency is to hide, cover, obscure, or make dark. It includes hoarding, withholding, having secrets, and failing to disclose. It includes hidden agendas, hidden meanings, and hidden objectives. The antonym for transparent is opaque – meaning something that is impervious to light and through which images cannot be seen (p154).”
4. Right Wrongs – is more than simply apologizing; it’s also making restitution. It’s making up and making whole.
5. Show Loyalty – give credit to others and acknowledge their part in any results. “Give credit to people for what they do, but also to acknowledge people for who they are (p167).” Speak about others as if they were there.
6. Deliver Results – look for people who are ‘short on talk and long on delivery’.
7. Get Better – Alvin Toffler said ‘the illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn.” “The opposite of Get Better is entropy, deterioration, resting on your laurels, or becoming irrelevant.
8. Confront Reality – is about taking the tough issues head on. It’s about sharing the bad news as well as the good, naming the ‘elephant in the room’, addressing the ‘sacred cows,’ and discussing the ‘undiscussables.’ “The opposite of confronting reality is to ignore it, to act as though it doesn’t exist. It’s burying your head in the sand, thinking that maybe it will go away or that it’s not really there after all. The counterfeit is to act as though you’re confronting reality when you’re actually evading it. It’s focusing on busywork while skirting the real issues (p187).”
9. Clarify Expectations – is to create shared vision and agreement about what is to be done up front. Covey says “I have learned to quantify everything: What result? By whom? By when? At what cost? How will we measure it? How will we know when we have accomplished it? And when and to whom is the accountability – both in terms of benchmarks and end results…. better to focus on results than activities (p197).”
10. Practice Accountability – accountability builds extraordinary trust when people know that everyone will be held to certain standards
11. Listen First – ‘I have found that the two best qualities a CEO can have are the ability to listen and to assume the best motives in others’ Jack M. Greenberg
12. Keep Commitments – ‘when you make a commitment, you build hope; when you keep it, you build trust’. Keeping commitments is the perfect balance of character and competence.
13. Extend Trust – treat people the way you want them to treat others. 97% of people can be trusted so make policies and practices based on the 97% rather than the 3% who can’t be trusted.
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