Leadership is as complex as humans.
Besides having technical skills, vision and expertise, you also need to have soft skills, public speaking and empathy. At least, if you want to be a leader that contributes to the workspace and creates a safe environment where collaboration and innovation can thrive.
During my career, I have been under different styles of leadership. The one trait I have seen help our teams, and inspired me as a leader, is: Trust.
Earning, or losing, a rare and delicate trait.
Trust is very hard to earn and very easy to lose.
To earn it, it is not just saying the right words. Your actions as a leader have a greater impact than your words, and people take notice. The majority of us have a talent for detecting deception.
Doing or saying the wrong thing can cause one to lose it in seconds. There is a correlation between losing it and the years that your team has been with you. The less time they have been with you as a leader, the quicker you can lose their trust.
Developing real trust (and care for your team and yourself)
Trust is an intangible trait that will vary in every person. You cannot demand trust and there is no mandate that you will put out there that will make your team to trust you. Instead, you need to work on earning it.
As a new leader for a team, your tools to generate this trust is to embrace and create empathy. You need to listen to your team and understand, truly understand, what they are going through.
If you are just coming in, it is exciting for you as a leader. However, your team will be in a different state of mind. Uncertainty and instability will be their baseline.
Being human will help you reach them. Being approachable and open to learn, with genuine curiosity, will be a key differentiator for them. Ask questions, learn context, be open and tell stories from your past job that are relatable. Help them see you care and what your previous experience has been. That will open the door to clear and sincere communication, which is a great step towards trust.
But, we are still not there. Great communication will help you find the root cause of the problem. Once you discover the root cause of the problem, you will need to take decisive action and clearly communicate what you are doing.
With that, your actions will create trust. It is a balance, a Ying and Yang act that requires actions and communication what will create a real trust in you as a leader and as a person.
Trust is a continuous effort. Double down on those opportunities!
Once you have reached trust, you need to keep it. Just like being able to cultivate a plant, you need to continue to feed them in order to grow.
Keep yourself in check and keep listening. The advantage is that you will have a team that trusts you and they will bring up the topics for you. You just need to create the space to listen and act on those actions.
I had a significant memory of a discussion we had within our team. For context, being in the Customer Experience (CX) and User Experience (UX) world creates passionate discussions about best experiences. Adding different backgrounds and personalities just adds to the mix of divergence that you need to discover key findings.
It was almost midday. We were all getting ready for lunch and we were reviewing a design. When we found ourselves at an impasse. We engaged in a heated but respectful discussion, but after some time, we were not arriving anywhere. There were many options at that moment.
- Authoritative approach: this design needed to follow what the leader thought was the best path. No discussions allowed. (Full disclosure: I was the leader).
- Team approach: follow what the team was doing, disregarding the points the leader was bringing.
- Doing research: extend the timeline to do research and get more facts. (We needed to deliver, and of course it was a Friday!)
- Walk away for a moment and reconvene after a few hours.
The only viable option I saw at that time was 4. Ended up being the best solution.
What I discovered then was that I had created a safe environment where any designer, no matter which level they were or how many years of expertise they had, could feel safe enough to discuss directions, even from their leader.
It was a delicate moment as well. I could have imposed myself and destroy their trust and willingness to fight for a better customer experience. In fact, I was so proud of my team that the first thing I did came back as to congratulate them for their focus on CX and apologize that things got heated.
This created an even safer environment and developed the trust that I’m happy to say I still have from them, even when some are not longer in the company anymore.
In case you were wondering, we found a solution that supported today’s state and future state as a team, and we also delivered on time 😉
Fair warning
There are individuals who excel at manipulation and employ tactics to sow distrust, establish rigid hierarchies, provide false promises, and gaslight others.
Your well-being and your teams aren’t a priority to them.
These self-proclaimed leaders, or “direct managers/leaders”, as you may report to them, will undermine your confidence and skills in a detrimental way, without offering constructive feedback or practical advice to support your growth, and as soon as you become expendable, they will discard you.
Their indifference is obvious and you’re nothing more than a means for them. However, the damage is done. They have tainted your self-esteem, beliefs, and morals.
It is just a game for those who possess skill in manipulation, which makes it challenging to detect.
Usually, their true colors surface within a year, or so. Which will be a really unfortunate period for you and you will be probably looking for a job, questioning yourself, etc. Know that your feelings are valid and get support from people you respect and really trust during that time. It will be hard, but you can survive.
What’s next?
Keeping working on trust.
Vulnerability is a way to show you are human, humbleness is another. Demonstrating your humanity is crucial for establishing real trust.
Continuous and small acts are most of the time better than large acts. Trust gets build piece by piece, and there is no silver bullet that will make it work instantly.
Be patient. Be honest. Be respectful.
Care for your team and also ask for feedback from them. When in doubt about feedback, go check with those you trust and get their opinion. They will be honest.
A pitfall for junior leaders is to consider that feedback is only at the level of the hierarchy you are. Everyone that works with you can provide feedback. Just setting on a hierarchy level is a very narrow focus as leader positions change in time.
As an example, I had a great former leader that, by destiny (and re-org), I ended up leading her later. Trust and respect have always supported our relationship. None of us felt threatened with those changes and I really value her feedback. Seeing labels over people is not the right way to develop trust. Pushing for those labels may be a sign of your current leader to not be in synch on how feedback could work for you.
As a leader, your team should talk to you, and your responsibility is to listen and be honestly inquisitive.
Good luck! I know you can do it!
Originally published in Medium on 7/30/2024. https://medium.com/@gonzaloifigueroa/trust-and-leadership-5db63073fd25