279: Trust & High Performance at Work

Aoife O’Brien [00:00:01]:

Recently, I’m seeing a lot of talk about high performing and high performing teams in particular. I thought I would address that on today’s podcast episode. And I suppose my first challenge is, when you think of high performing, what do you think drives high performing teams? Is it the people in the teams that they’re really smart? Is it the resources that they have access to? Is it maybe the technology that they’re using? You know, what is it that really drives high performing teams? And that is what I’m going to talk about on today’s episode. You’re listening to the Happier at Work podcast. I’m your host, Aoife o’, Brien, the career and culture strategist for global people, leaders and teams. And really what this episode is going to focus on today is the idea of trust and how trust is foundational for creating a high performance culture. Without trust, things can fall apart, no matter how smart the people, how great the technology they have access to. On the other hand, ordinary people can achieve extraordinary results if you’ve built this trust within the team.

Aoife O’Brien [00:01:05]:

So we’re going to talk about some of the strategies for being able to build trust within the team. First of all, I want to talk about, well, why. Why is trust so important? Why does trust actually matter? Well, when you have trust, people are more likely to speak up about what’s going on, share what’s going on, whether that is ideas for, you know, innovations. It could be speaking up about something that shouldn’t be happening or something that isn’t happening. But should people also feel much more engaged in the work that they’re doing when they can trust their colleagues around them? Trusting other people allows us to collaborate much more effectively rather than kind of protecting our turf, so to speak. Gallup did some research and showed that 70% of the variance in engagement is driven directly by the manager and the interactions that we have with our manager. What this means is that our experience of work and our level of engagement is directly affected by our relationship with our manager. And trust is a fundamental part of that relationship.

Aoife O’Brien [00:02:13]:

We have to be able to trust our manager in order to be able to perform. If I think of some of the organizations that I’ve left and the managers specifically that I’ve left, they have been the managers where I didn’t feel like I was trusted or I didn’t feel like I could trust them, and in the end I left those managers or I left those organizations. So it’s really fundamental to our overall experience of work. I also want to tie this in with the happier at Work framework and psychological safety, which is related directly to trust, is the foundation of the happier at work framework. The three pillars are culture, drivers, and capabilities. But in order to realize each of those pillars, we need to have the foundation of psychological safety in place. So if we have psychological safety, it’s much more likely that we will feel like our values align with the values of the organization, that we will be able to call out behaviors that don’t align with the expected behaviors in an organization. We’ll be much more likely to understand what our drivers are and speak up when our drivers are not being met.

Aoife O’Brien [00:03:32]:

When we feel frustrated at work, we’ll be able to share what’s going on for us. And then also when it comes to our capabilities and being able to recognize and leverage our strengths at work, we need to have psychological safety. So again, we can bring ideas, we can bring innovations, and talk about what’s going on for us. So it really is foundational for, for the entire framework. I also wanted to highlight, if you haven’t heard of it already, Google’s project Aristotle, which highlighted psychological safety as the number one differentiator between teams that were cohesive and performed really, really well versus those that didn’t. So they identified it a good number of years ago now as one of the key differentiating factors. And it’s so, so important to build that sense of trust within the team. So here are some very specific steps to be able to build trust.

Aoife O’Brien [00:04:35]:

So number one is to be reliable and consistent. Do what you say you’re going to do. Don’t make excuses. Follow up in case something hasn’t happened. So be really reliable so that people can trust you and be consistent. So don’t change the behaviors as time goes on. Make sure that you’re consistent in how you show up and that you follow through on what you say that you’re going to do. Number two then is to communicate transparently.

Aoife O’Brien [00:05:03]:

So this means even if you don’t have an update, share the fact that you don’t have an update. If you don’t communicate transparently, if you don’t share what’s going on, then it’s more likely to result in gossip. People can see that when there are changes happening, they’ll start gossiping about what it could be about. And so if you communicate transparently, then it reduces the risk of having gossip, and that will erode trust. If you’ve got people gossiping about what might be going on, create trust by being really open in your communication. Even if you don’t have an answer or if you do have an answer and it’s not something you can share, let people know. Number three then, is to show vulnerability. This is something I talk about quite often, and that means admitt mistakes, admit that you made a mistake.

Aoife O’Brien [00:05:51]:

It means sharing that you’re trying something new. It means sharing the experiences that you have at work. Making mistakes. Okay. That it’s okay when you have made a mistake, that you share what’s going on and you give other people permission to do the same thing as well. Number four then, is to recognize people’s contributions. So giving people recognition for the effort that they’re putting in, for the outcomes that they’re achieving, for the behaviors that they’re demonstrating, or for the values that they are demonstrating as well. So the what they’re achieving or the how they’re achieving it.

Aoife O’Brien [00:06:31]:

Make sure to recognize people for the contributions that they’re making so that they feel valued and that you’re giving them this recognition and this validation in the workplace that their work is valuable, that they are needed, and they are important for getting the work done. Number five, then, is about empowering your team. So it’s giving them the autonomy, the freedom, the choice, and the control over what they’re doing and how they’re doing it, rather than trying to micromanage them. If there is one thing that erodes trust, it is being micromanaged, being told what to do, when to do it, how to do it. Give people that freedom to decide for themselves with the option to seek out support, to seek out guidance and clarification and seek out expectations, but let them get on with their work. Some of the pitfalls that I’ve seen people run into then as well. So the number one is relying too much on hierarchy. So it could be something like, do that because I said so, or I’m telling you to do it, so that’s why you have to do it.

Aoife O’Brien [00:07:36]:

If you have people questioning you, make sure that you’re not just relying on the hierarchy that you can explain to people why you’re doing specific things. I know I certainly have fallen into that trap where I’m taking an order directly from my boss. I’m passing that on to my team, but without really questioning it and understanding it myself. So when I’m passing it on and get questioned about it, it’s like, why are we doing this? We don’t need to do it, or it’s overkill or whatever it might be that I find it difficult then to justify it. And then we have to end up relying on, well, you know I’m telling you to do it, so just get on with it. Number two then is inconsistency and favouritism. And I know it’s so easy to fall into the trap of favouritism if there’s someone in the team who you get on particularly well with, maybe you gel quite well, or you have similar personalities or opposite personalities, which means that you get on particularly well. But this can erode trust within the team members when they see this kind of inconsistency in treatment and showing favoritism within the team.

Aoife O’Brien [00:08:35]:

So make sure not to fall into that trap as well. And the third area is mistaking niceness for trust. Trust is not about niceness, it’s about honesty and accountability and giving people ownership over what it is that they’re doing and encouraging them to take responsibility. Trust is not built in a day. If trust has been eroded over time, or it can be even eroded in just one simple mistake that people make. If you’re looking to build trust or rebuild trust, it’s not going to happen because of one incident. It happens over time. It’s in your everyday interactions that you have with people.

Aoife O’Brien [00:09:16]:

It’s how you respond to emails, it’s when you respond to emails, it’s the tone that you use when you’re communicating with other people. It’s how you treat mistakes, both your own mistakes, mistakes on other people’s mistakes. How do you treat those? Do you treat it as a learning opportunity or is it a blame game? It’s in the follow through. So do you follow through on what it is you say you’re going to do? Or do you forget? Or does it slip to the bottom of the list? Make sure you always do what you say you’re going to do. Or don’t make any promises that you can’t keep. Here are some specific actions that you can take after today’s podcast. Episode number one is doing a trust audit. Have you ever done a trust audit before? So that’s think about all of the interactions that you’re having and seeking out signals that people don’t trust you, that there’s a sense of mistrust there.

Aoife O’Brien [00:10:08]:

Are you being questioned? Is there something going on that you just get a sense that you don’t trust someone or that they don’t trust you. So keep an eye out for those kinds of signals that may happen. Or think back to interactions that you’ve had in the past week and whether or not you get the sense that you you don’t trust them or that they don’t trust you. Here’s a question that you can ask directly to people. What do you need to feel supported and trusted by me? And then be really transparent when you’re making decisions. Show people the decision making process. Talk through the values that helped you evaluate the decision and ultimately make the decision and invite feedback from people on that process and questions and curiosity about how you achieved the outcome that you decided. In the end, that’s it for trust and building high performing teams at work.

Aoife O’Brien [00:11:03]:

I’d love to know what is one thing that you’re going to do differently? Did you have an aha moment in today’s episode? Do let me know. I love interacting with listeners. I’m Most active on LinkedIn, so if we’re not already connected, feel free to connect with me there. I’d love to hear from you. If there’s someone else who you think could benefit from listening to today’s episode episode, don’t forget to share it with them. And I’d love to know what you think through a rating or review on your favorite podcast platform.