Building (and Rebuilding) Trust
By Heidi Sadecky, MA,PCC – Executive Coach & Director, Townsend Leadership Program
What do you do when your trust with a colleague is broken? How can you begin to mend a broken relationship?
You’ve probably been here before: you share important tasks with a teammate, but they fumble and drop the ball. Now the responsibility falls back on you. It can be so tiring, feeling like you’re on the hook for making sure things are done right.
Or, in your peer-to-peer relationships, maybe you share a complaint about another coworker in confidence, but then your friend shares that complaint directly with that other coworker. Suddenly, something that was meant to be private has been made public against your wishes.
When trust is broken or betrayed between coworkers, distrust can spread throughout an entire team. If you feel like you can’t trust your team, then you have no one to share the burden of responsibility with. Suddenly, work piles up more and more. Even though you didn’t intend to micromanage your team, you find yourself running both the big picture and the day-to-day.
I’ve coached teams and leaders who’ve found themselves in this situation before. Here’s the good news: trust can be rebuilt!
Whether you’re building up trust for the first time or trying to mend a broken relationship, here are some tips to help you build up trust in your team.
1. Double down on your organization’s values and culture.
Remind your people why you do what you do! Sharing a common vision will create unity throughout your team.
2. Be clear about how trust was broken.
There is no upside to beating around the bush. It helps everyone on your team to know what went wrong.
3. Don’t play the blame game.
While your team needs to know WHAT went wrong so it doesn’t happen again, focusing on WHO messed up will only hurt your coworkers' trust.
4. Be appropriately vulnerable.
Share authentically how you have contributed to the erosion of trust. Then share how you will be more trustworthy.
5. Consider a 3rd party mediator.
With help from an unbiased peer or a professional coaching expert, you can easily navigate complex topics while working towards a resolution.
Sometimes, trying to build or rebuild trust in your company feels like renovating a house while you’re still living in it! If you feel like you’re in over your head trying to put your team back together, it’s OK to reach out for some help. Having a mentor or bringing on a leadership coaching expert will save you time and energy. When good communication is restored, when relationships become reliable, and when teammates can trust one another again — you’ll notice how much more productive the office becomes. Whenever you are ready to build up your organization’s trust, I would be happy to help. Let’s connect.
Heidi Sadecky is a highly-trained executive coach with over 30 years of combined corporate and coaching experience. She helps her clients operate at a higher level, overcome workplace challenges and achieve measurable results.
She is an in-demand facilitator of the only Townsend Leadership Program, a unique and highly effective group coaching program located in the North East United States.
In-person, virtual and hybrid leadership groups are now forming.