Trust at work has proven itself crucial for business again and again. So, why do so many organisations get it so wrong?
The concept of trust â particularly in the workplace â is deceivingly simple.
Itâs a measure of relationships, how one group (employees) feels valued and understood by another (management). The presence of trust indicates healthy workplace culture, as well as a host of benefits to the organisation, from resilience and innovation to stock market success.
Yet, itâs something that even the most well-meaning leaders can get wrong.
Great Place To WorkÂŽ has been measuring high-trust work culture for 30 years and has defined the elements of trust for employees (credibility, respect, and fairness). Data has shown how diversity, equity, inclusion & belonging must be embraced to build trust across an organisation.
Over the years, our experts have learned a thing or two about the ways leaders often fail to foster trust at work. Here are some of the most common mistakes.
Even the most hands-on leaders often fail to understand how central a role they play in building trust with employees. A CEO will make a speech about the importance of culture to the organisation â and then pass the baton to the HR team.
Julian Lute, senior strategic advisor with Great Place To Work, explains that leaders often fail to ask questions about how they influence company culture:
âItâs almost like culture lives on this island,â Lute says, when in fact culture has everything to do with the actions of leaders. âItâs really about how people experience their leadership.â
After a company surveys employees, it often expects to put things right immediately. However, trust is something that can only be built over time, through a continual process of delivering on promises again and again.
Lute says leaders are often frustrated when results donât change by the next quarter or before the next pulse survey. His more realistic timetable for seeing meaningful movement is 18 to 24 months.
But that doesnât mean you should wait to start building trust.
âYour opportunity to build trust always starts now,â says Sarah Lewis-Kulin, vice president of global recognition at Great Place To Work. âThe decisions people make today are critical to the workplace they will have in a few years.â
Many leaders mistakenly think they can buy trust with expensive perks and benefit programs.
Employees often separate the parts of their work experience that feel transactional. If an employee is dissatisfied with their work culture, their colleagues, or their leadership team, a superb childcare benefit wonât tip the scales.
Employee programs and benefits are important, but they wonât make up for a lack of trust. Theyâre tools that leaders can implement, but they must coincide with complementary company values to create truly great .
When looking at data from the list that Great Place To Work produces each year, itâs tempting to interpret it simply as a measure of employee engagement, or even individual happiness.
Thatâs a mistake.
Lewis-Kulin argues engagement or job satisfaction alone are poor indicators of the overall employee experience. They might be part of the picture, but all workers go through phases of engagement and disengagement, to say nothing of emotional peaks and valleys.
What Great Place To Work measures is trust â and itâs trust that has a transformational business impact on retention, recruitment, and stock prices.
Does it really matter how employees feel?
âPeople will say: âDo we pay them? Do they show up to work? Do they have a job?â Thatâs the thing that should motivate employees to do what we need to do for our customers,â Lute says.
But employee trust shows up in their work. Employees who feel empowered by their organisation are more likely to innovate and go above and beyond for their organisation. In fact,
Employees also notice when care and concern shown for customers is never extended to them.
Itâs not uncommon to hear employees say, âWe will do anything for our customers â but when we as employees need any sort of support, itâs a fight,â Lute says.
The best companies know that employees deserve the same level of care and consideration. âItâs that same intimacy you would have with your customers,â Lute says.
Without numbers, itâs easy to miss how some groups of employees feel left out at work. Frontline employees often have a worse experience than in-office workers and senior management â and the experience of culture can be deeply divided across an organisation.
If your work culture only exists in office activities, workers who donât participate find it harder to think of themselves as part of the whole. Thatâs a problem because often frontline workers are also your brand ambassadors in the community. Employees performing services in the community are the most tangible expression of your brand for most customers.
Discover what your employees really think and start building a high-trust culture today.