Trust

Over the past few months, my teenage son and I have been discussing leadership and what that means at his age and in his current stage of life. I can't say I was a model leader at age 14, but it's a lot easier to look back and identify mistakes, apply compounded knowledge and experience, and provide some guidance.

My son and I were running the other day, and we had a deep conversation about trust. Trust is an interesting concept because it relates to all relationships. In this post, I will break the topic down a bit based on my conversation with my son and previous readings and study.

How to create trust

Trust is created and then strengthened through vulnerability and integrity. Vulnerability means you are willing to admit mistakes and weaknesses, and integrity means doing what you say you are going to do. Over the years, I have found that there is a lot of heartache in relationships because people just don't do what they say they are going to do.

Trust between parent and child

To maintain trust, both the parent and child need to do what they say they are going to do. I often wonder why we don't just say, "I'm not going to do that." We often commit to things with the intention of doing them and then something inevitably comes up. Observing this in my personal life and amongst family, friends, peers, etc. this is a sad regularity, especially coming from a parent to a child. It was a powerful moment teaching my son about being dependable and building trust with me and others.

Trust in professional relationships

At Menlo Group, we have discussed this topic and read many books on the subject over the years. Vulnerability in professional settings almost seems like the kiss of death. Many of us live by the mantra "Fake it 'til you make it." Then once we make it, we have even less reason to be vulnerable. We may struggle with vulnerability because (1) we don't know how to do it, (2) we don't have the ability to do it, or (3) we are too disorganized to actually do it. Professional relationships would have much more trust if everyone did what they said they would do when they said they would do it.

Trust in God

As a faith-filled person, I have thought about this many times: How often do I ask for some divine intervention and then blatantly ignore the direction or don't make it a priority? I told my son that if he had the chance to meet with a professional athlete, he should ask them what would be 5 things they would spend their time on if they could go back to being 14 years old. Then I asked him, "Would you write that advice down and go back and reference it over and over? Why don't we do that when we receive counsel or inspiration from God?" This is something I'm working on.

I hope that we all can be a little more vulnerable, have a little more integrity and build a lot more trust in our relationships.