4 Easy Methods For Managers to Build Trust with Their Teams!

By: Aaron Butler

The Journey to Leadership is continual and fulfilling. Throughout my career, when I have worked with other leaders, leaders experience the feeling of accomplishment when the people they are managing are doing well and feel successful. CarterConnection has broken down the Journey to Leadership into the 3Cs of Connecting: Compassion, Courtesy, and Communication. Each portion of the Journey has traits and tactics that will help you positively impact your team and organization as a leader and Manager. Building and cultivating TRUST is crucial to Communication on the JOURNEY TO LEADERSHIP.

Trust

In relationships, people earn trust in moments. Those moments can be frequent and very personal in personal relationships. There can be several opportunities to create a foundation and place building blocks on it one moment at a time. In professional relationships, the building blocks are placed irregularly on the foundation, resulting in less frequent moments with a lasting impact. In a personal relationship where trust is damaged, we can save the relationship by relying on the previously laid building blocks; in a professional relationship with fewer building blocks, a single issue, small or big, can destroy a relationship.

Cracks in the Foundation

Recently, I started working with a client who had a severe issue with employee retention and morale. The catalyst that led to our being called in was an issue with a regional manager destroying trust with his team at one of his facilities. A Vice President of a different department directed one of his employees to break a policy that gets broken regularly without consequences. Employees are protected from themselves by this policy implemented by the organization, and it is generally seen as reasonable but inconvenient.

The Risk manager learned about the break-in policy and asked the regional Manager to write up their employee. At this moment, the Manager needed to place a new building block on their foundation of trust with their employee and their team by defending their employee’s actions and addressing the Vice President who pushed them to break the policy in the first place. However, they missed this opportunity and decided to write up their employee, and two weeks later, the performing tenured employee submitted their letter of resignation. When an employee does not feel like they can trust their Manager and that Manager doesn’t have their best interest at heart, performance declines, morale craters, and the employee loses hope that their job is the right place for them.

Managers must identify moments when trust can be built with their team or an individual. The employees who report to this client’s regional Manager also have cracks in their trust foundation. When they see a person being treated unjustly, they put themselves in the person’s shoes and think, “That could be me. ” In a Harvard Business Review study, researchers found that employees at high-trust organizations were 76% more engaged and 50% more likely to stay at their organization than those at low-trust organizations (https://www.davittcorporatepartners.com/neuroscience-trust-hbr-february-2017/).

Throughout my 20-year career managing people, I have identified four simple methods for building trust with your employees and reaping the benefits of having an engaged, productive, and loyal workforce to the shared vision.

Encourage whole-person growth:

Managers who intentionally facilitate employees’ growth, professionally and personally, build trust with their employees. Depending on where the employee is in their life cycle, it’s essential to encourage growth in all aspects of their life. Throughout my career, I have encouraged many employees to buy their first home, find time for a hobby they are passionate about, and go back to school (even if it meant they might have to leave our organization). Promoting personal growth demonstrates to your employee and the team that their well-being and growth are the priority, not just organizational profits.

Be Vulnerable

As a manager, it sometimes feels like we must have all the answers right away, but the human experience dictates that having all the answers is impossible 100% of the time. Being vulnerable is hard, especially if you are someone who prides themselves on demonstrating strength regardless of circumstances. Being vulnerable does not take away from that strength but allows your employees to see you as human and more relatable. The example provided at the start of this blog would have been an excellent opportunity for the regional Manager to demonstrate vulnerability to their employee. If they had sat down with the employee to discuss the entire situation and explained how they pushed back against the risk manager, risking political capital on the employee’s behalf, the Manager would have built trust at that moment, and the employee would have felt supported.

Intentionally build relationships

A Google study found that managers who “express interest in and concern for team member’s success and personal well-being” outperform others in the quality and quantity of their work. Building genuine relationships can occur during formal one-on-one meetings and informal interactions. As a manager, it is imperative that you are mentally present during each interaction. Distractions are everywhere, but your team requires your full attention. When fully engaged in the conversation, you will find a nugget of information to build a connection with your employees and a tangible bond and trust. Building relationships differs from encouraging growth in requiring more listening and less talking.

Be Honest

In both personal and professional relationships, honesty is a cornerstone. Many organizations have the philosophy that information is on a need-to-know basis. When management holds information in silos, uncertainty and anxiety among employees can grow. As a manager, providing nuggets of information can relieve that anxiety and reassure employees that they have essential information. Organizations keep information private in quick-changing situations to avoid having it set in stone before things change. As a manager, you must discover what information can be shared with your team and determine how to communicate it.

As you embark on the Journey to Leadership, effective communication is not just about talking—it’s about connecting, understanding, and inspiring action. Trust is a huge part of communicating effectively; as a leader, it’s a trait you must develop. CarterConnection is passionate about guiding leaders on that Journey and is here to provide the tools to help leaders live up to their full potential. Contact me today at Aaron@Carterconnection.org to learn how we can help you or your organization.