Developing, or regaining, the trait of trust

EXPOSE | Riddle me this

“What takes years to build, seconds to lose, and forever to rebuild?” Trust.

EXPLORE | Trusted at all costs

What I might add to this riddle is that it also can’t be bought or sold. Loyalty, maybe, but trust is not absent one day and acquired the next. Something this valuable is priceless and years in the making.

However, we act as though this is not the case.

We are now living at a time when everything is for sale. Price tags are put on things that are priceless everyday. Have we missed, or conveniently ignored, the paradox in putting a price tag on something that is priceless? The moment we do, it ceases to be priceless.

Taking years to build and being nearly impossible to restore are why breaking trust is so devastating.

Growing up, I had complained about the ‘stupid poles’ in the middle of our basement. Pretty inconvenient when trying to have an indoor hockey game when there are poles in the middle of the rink. It is only after I got a little older, and a little wiser, that I learned that those ‘stupid poles’ were holding up the house.

Trust is crucial. It is the ‘load bearing wall’ that undergirds the proper functioning and health of any relationship, society or government. Absent trust, the whole entity is weakened and eventually falls in on itself.

While trust, and other priceless items such as freedom and innocence, should not be bought or sold, they do come with a cost. Which may explain why we put a price tag on it. Being trustworthy begins to cost us too much, so we let it go, often times at ridiculously steep discounts.

At first glance the 9th commandment can give us the impression that it’s referring to a more formal setting like a courtroom, when in fact, as is the case with the other commandments, it should be evident throughout our lives, in all settings, with everyone–and not just our neighbor.

You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
Exodus 20:16

The latter 6 of the 10 Commandments focus primarily on how we are to treat others. It could easily be argued that God included the 9th commandment because trust is so crucial in our relationships with others. We are not to bear false testimony against our neighbor (Exodus 20:16).

God cannot lie (Titus 2:1), and we are called to reflect that by being “truth-tellers worthy of trust.” From his book The 10 Greatest Struggles of Your Life, Pastor Colin Smith goes on to reveal that this means we are to “deal in truth rather than lies, in precision rather than distortion, and in honesty rather than deception.”

EXECUTE | Trust defines the relationship

I see one benefit from the pandemic as revealing the level of trust employers actually have of their employees.

A recent article in the Harvard Business Review concluded that the forced transition to working from home has eroded the trust within the workforce. Early on workers were given the benefit of the doubt, but now with the rise of electronic monitoring of their work, it seems that “the strains of remote working [is wearing] down company culture and people’s goodwill.”

Trust truly defines our relationships, and we earn trust by demonstrating that we are trustworthy. As was pointed out in the HBR article, a lack of information creates mystery, and in a relationship–of any kind–the unknown is cause for concern.

Here are 4 crucial questions we can ask that can lead to our clearly demonstrating our trustworthiness:

1. How reliable are you?

We should first consider the simplest things, like being on time. If we’re not dependable with even smaller matters, we’ll be hard-pressed to gain anyone’s confidence in our ability to handle more serious responsibilities.

2. How consistent are you?

Do you respond the same way, regardless of the situation? Knowing how you have responded in the past, gives a person, or employer, the means of determining what they can expect of you in the future.

3. Do you “deal in truth”?

Are you facts based? Can someone come to you knowing they’ll get the truth, regardless of whether or not they may agree with you? Another way to look at this is having a commitment to precision.

4. Are you honest?

Do you express what needs to be said–especially what may be hard to hear? This comes with the added requirement that what is said, is done so with love. Accuracy is no excuse for insensitivity and thoughtlessness.

Trust is a vital, but increasingly hard to come by character quality. There is very little, of any consequence, that can be accomplished without it. The well-being of any company, the culture, and our country are dependent on this ‘load-bearing wall’. No matter the cost.