A business is a cooperative enterprise, and cooperation is built on trust. When all a business’s stakeholders are bound together by relationships of trust, they come to share a commitment to achieving the enterprise’s goals. Building a culture of trust is therefore an essential task for the leadership of any organisation.

Trust in the workplace is not just a virtue – it has tangible impacts on the economic performance of an organisation. The Great Place to Work Institute, which partners with Fortune to produce the “100 Best Companies to Work For” list, uses trust for two-thirds of its criteria, since its research shows that “trust between managers and employees is the primary defining characteristic of the very best workplaces”. These workplaces beat “the average annualised returns of the S&P 500 by a factor of three”.[1]

Further, trust is important for an organisation’s ability to retain staff. Research shows that 76% of NZ employees rate trusting their company or its owner as important or very important to their overall job satisfaction – even more important than higher wages or better benefits.[2]

So how do you build a culture of trust in your workplace? Doug Conant, former CEO of Campbell Soup Company, identifies three key factors in establishing organisational trust – Declaring Intent, Demonstrating Respect and Delivering Results.[3]

Declaring Intent is about putting forward your fundamental motive or agenda and demonstrating how it will be to the mutual benefit of all the organisation’s stakeholders. Declaring your intent also gives your staff words to measure your actions against; the more you keep your word, the more confidence in you increases. The result is reduced resistance and enhanced commitment across the organisation.

Demonstrating Respect is about showing your staff that their ideas, concerns and well-being are valued. This means listening – actively and meaningfully seeking regular feedback from your team. Enabling anonymous feedback can encourage employees to speak up without fear of repercussions. However, relying solely on anonymous feedback can increase distrust, so providing opportunities to speak as a team or group, such as at monthly engagement meetings, is also a must. Finally, there is no substitute for one-on-one conversations with managers. As long as feedback is accepted respectfully, employees will feel heard and understood.

But declaring intentions and accepting feedback mean nothing if it is not followed through. Delivering Results is about backing up words with actions. Avoid over-promising and under-delivering – better to under-promise and over-deliver. And always follow up on staff feedback; even if you decide not to take a suggested action, explain why.
Building a culture of trust is critical to your organisation’s success. Understanding how to engender trust will enable you to enhance employee experience and improve company performance.

Here at Advanced Accounting, culture is paramount to us. We have an amazing team and culture, and this is not by accident. It takes intentionality. If this is an area you are wanting to cultivate, we provide training around leadership and culture development for business owners. For more information contact Aaran or Marko.

[1] The Great Place to Work Institute at https://www.greatplacetowork.com/

[2] SGEi, The Culture Report 2022, 2022

[3] Stephen M. R. Covey and Douglas R. Conant, The Connection Between Employee Trust and Financial Performance, Harvard Business Review, 2016

Additional Source: https://businessdesk.co.nz/article/business-advice/yes-trust-still-matters-in-the-workplace

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“Nothing travels faster than the speed of trust” Stephen Covey

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