Trust, the Essential Element in Building Outrageously Successful Relationships (597 words)
Trust is the Glue that Binds Relationships
Trust is defined as confidence, reliance or resting of the mind on the integrity, veracity, justice, friendship, or other sound principle of another person or thing. It’s also the glue that binds an organization together. Just think what you could accomplish with your spouse, business partner, alliance partner, supplier, customer or employee if you absolutely trusted one another.
In the mid-1970s, when I worked in Yosemite National Park, I took up rock climbing. This is a sport in which one quickly builds trust with their climbing buddy. In the hands of my buddy resided my lifeline, a rope that came from around his waist, threaded through a carabineer that was attached to the rock face and tied at the other end to me. While climbing, when I slipped off a rock face and started to plunge, it was my climbing buddy that locked the safety rope tight around his waist, keeping me alive. He determined if I went crashing several hundred or thousand feet onto the granite below or if I were to just dangle in the air a few feet from where I fell. In outrageously successful alliance relationships, you must be able to trust your partner with your business lifeline.
In any Partnering alliance, trust is necessary to move from inertia to action. Trust is that wonderful, mystical and cherished virtue hoped for and shared among practitioners of the Partnering Paradigm. In trust, you’re continually putting yourself at risk. While most would prefer to drink from an emptied wine rather than hemlock bottle, it is the process of taking risks that is necessary to build outrageously successful relationships. At times you are certain to be disappointed, but hopefully these disappointments will be few, compared to the availability of beneficial experiences.
Trust is fragile and not to be mistreated. Jamie Clarke and Alan Hobson are adventurers. On their third attempt (1998), they conquered the summit of Mt. Everest. Prior that trip, they authored a book, The Power of Passion: Achieve Your Own Everests, about their earlier expeditions. A relationship-devastating situation occurred around fundamental expedition leadership and goal decisions that were overlooked before embarking on their 1994 odyssey. Each was dug in, and Jamie made a decision to fill a leadership void that Alan was unwilling to fill. About this Alan later wrote, “the most important element in any relationship—trust. Once trust is lost in any relationship, it is like a mirror struck by a stone. The glass shatters. Although all the tiny pieces can be glued back into position, the mirror always shows the cracks. They run deep and numerous.”
Trust building is a journey rather than a destination. Foster the following behaviors in yourself and look for them in your potential partner(s).
Twenty Trust Building Behaviors
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Tell the truth.
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Deliver on your promises and expectations of others.
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Walk your talk and act with credibility.
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Exhibit authenticity and sincerity.
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Be a positive roll model.
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Welcome responsibility.
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Avoid offering excuses.
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Present an ethical image.
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No Bull!
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Avoid gossiping.
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Use duct tape on your mouth when necessary.
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Be open; inform ahead if you cannot meet deadlines.
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Help others to look good.
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Treat everybody with respect and dignity.
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Be consistent in how you treat others.
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Recognize and reinforce performance on others.
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Communicate clearly, say what you mean and mean what you say.
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Break down barriers by giving everybody a voice.
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Be respectful of time, yours and others’.
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Follow up regularly and offer helpful recommendations through relationship value updates.
Ed is the Founder and CEO of the 501(c)(3) non-profit public charity, Cigar PEG Philanthropy through Fun, and president at Rigsbee Research which conducts qualitative member ROI research and consulting for associations and societies. He has been called “the dynamite that broke up our log jam” by association executives—rarely politically correct and almost always provocative—and from a dozen years as a United States Soccer Federation referee, Ed calls it the way he sees it. Exceptional resources at www.rigsbee.com.
