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MESSAGE FROM THE AUTHORS
Every day, newspaper headlines have breaking news about leaders who have breached our trust. We are shocked at the damage that has been done to various stakeholders in their organizations, communities and world--not to mention their personal lives and families.
We wonder if we should pull our money out of the market, worrying about who will be next.
Corporate leaders who should know better are tragically revealed as having put their own interests ahead of their responsibilities to those who had believed in them. But it isn’t only news making leaders at the peak of the hierarchy who make the unfortunate choice to breach rather than build trust.
Typical of the co-authors’ experiences is this recent exchange with the training manager of a global company with over 100 offices and thousands of employees around the globe. We were suggesting that they do a training based on the material covered in Trust, Inc.
“We don’t offer ethics training because we can’t afford to take the time away from billable hours,” he explained.
“No ethics training is offered whatsoever?”
Patiently, we explained to him that we thought of calling him because in a similarly sized and styled firm in the very same industry, a client had recently threatened a lawsuit because of a wide range of ethical breaches by several senior executives, everything from over billing to unrevealed conflicts of interest.
Now we were being rushed in to do ethics consulting on the backend, at our higher crisis rates. This expenditure was but a drop in the bucket compared to the cost of legal counsel, lost business and employee turnover related to the case.
“If we were in crisis,” he replied, “we would be hiring your services, too.”
“Why not do the training in advance, setting the standards, dealing with the issues, before they comprise a crisis?”
“Truthfully,” he replied. “I couldn’t agree with you more. I know there are issues here. But it would be a risk to even propose ethics training to our CEO. He has made it clear that everything we do here is about pushing every possible dollar through the door. I couldn’t justify this to him and I don’t want to put my own job at risk.”
This, we then understood, was an organization already in breach of trust. Driven by fear, the greater good of the company—let alone of the larger community of stakeholders who have placed their trust in this company—has already been undermined.
While the director of training bears responsibility for his unwillingness to buck the system to take the risk of doing the right thing, the ethical flaws in this company had begun at the very top.
Unless someone in the organization found the courage to speak up, it would only be a matter of time before we got the call asking for crisis counseling, reading about them in the business section of the daily paper.
As the co-authors of Trust, Inc. we have taken up the gauntlet of teaching organizational leaders committed to both values and results the importance of building rather than breaching trust with stakeholders while going about the day-to-day business of leading their divisions and companies.
Trust, Inc. argues that leaders who place a high value on operationalizing trust even in the face of adversity can count on players who are on the same page, who have the clarity and courage to address the real root problems and the confidence to dutifully carry through on plans and to seek opportunities to innovate.
The pay-off is increased productivity and an enhanced bottom line, as the organization learns to speak and act in alignment.
Every day, we are asked the question: Is it possible to be a values-driven leader and still succeed in the pressured environment of the contemporary workplace? Not only is it possible, but it has become increasingly obvious that today’s companies will achieve their greatest success not despite their leaders’ most deeply held values—but because of them.
This is the essence of Trust, Inc.: the power of a management structure that adopts the practice of the alignment of values through all levels of corporate life. Alignment is an ethical shorthand that allows all individuals in the organization to move ahead as quickly and efficiently as possible under all circumstances.
Rather than view trust as a matter of simply following rules -- the “old accountability”—we called upon leaders to consider what it really takes to tackle the complexities of a values-based organization, as well as to anticipate the positive results.
It is also vital to pay heed to the values operating, often invisibly, beneath the surface of everyday decisions and throughout organizational life.
Knowing our own and other people’s values is an important place to begin. However, as we now know, cultivating trust takes more than simply feeling or thinking that we know what the right thing is for us or others to do in any given situation.
In fact, dedication to honesty, consistency and courage often demands that we recognize when we are somewhere in the gray. For instance, in regards to our values and beliefs, especially in the global marketplace, we may be equal, but especially when it comes to complex ethical issues, it can be a mistake to assume that we are “all the same.”
While taking comfort in the realization that our similarities are greater than our differences, it is critical for leaders to address the core questions of how and why it is that even good people don’t always agree, and how we can nevertheless go about building trust with one another, especially when it really matters.
In our experience, trust is advanced or damaged in an organization, one issue, decision, act or interaction at a time. It is the primary task of the ethical leader to establish credibility by seeking the underlying patterns operating beneath the surface of challenges, identifying root causes.
If you solve only the symptom, the problem at hand will re-emerge—perhaps in different and even more toxic forms—somewhere down the line.
In the end, we argue that business has to be personal and that it is the leader’s responsibility to flow his or her ethics through the company, setting the standard to which all levels of organizational life will aspire.
Research shows that the more resilient people are, the more they can be counted on to do the right thing, even under adverse, pressured circumstances. While it is true that some people are born resilient, for most people, resilience is a quality that requires periodic lifelong development.
The leader who can be counted upon to build rather than breach trust has taken the time to identify his or her ultimate values: those things that are meaningful and attainable regardless of one’s external circumstances.
The importance of the practice of alignment between individual values and corporate goals cannot be emphasized enough. Those leaders who take a proactive role in implementing organizational strategies that support the advancement of a values-based corporate culture are most likely to reap the rewards of building trust on every level—and under any circumstance.
Employee morale is raised, the bottom line is enhanced and all organizational energies can be invested in building for the future.
So, how does one “do” trust? Trust, Inc. concludes that ethical leaders are those inspirational, self-aware individuals who prove themselves to be unabashed in the face of uncertainty.
They do not fear that obstacles will get in the way of their goals – they trust that they will. Their great gift is knowing that whatever challenges do arise, their spirits will be greater.
This is the stuff of heroes: be it launching a global marketing campaign, or taking a lonely ethical stance because it is, above all, the right thing to do.
When it comes to ethics, knowing your values can sometimes feel like a terrible nuisance…but it’s also the key to self-respect as well as organizational vitality.
Bridging the gap between personal values and organizational goals unleashes the power of alignment for unprecedented organizational productivity, heightened employee morale and personal satisfaction when doing the right thing.
This is no small feat. Leaders who win the trust of their various constituencies understand that paying heed to their convictions may require something more of them than they wish they’d have to give.
Nevertheless, ethical leaders discover over and over again that their greatest influence, power and success will come as a side product of their willingness to do the right thing, time after time.
We salute you, our readers, who are undertaking the serious task of learning to “do” trust. Flow your values down through your organizations and out to your stakeholders and you will have a foundation of mutual trust upon which truly great enterprises can be built.
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