Trust Is Doing What You Say You're Going To Do ~Simon Rakoff What is trust? Why do you want it? Why do you not have it? Do you need it? What strategies can you use to build it quickly and how can you use it to diagnose challenges.
Hunter Powers: Welcome to The One. I'm your host, Hunter Powers, broadcasting live from our nation's capitol, DC proper, Washington DC. And today's one idea is "Trust, is doing what you say you are going to do". And it comes from Simon Rakoff, an industrial psychologist. I've had the chance to work with Simon on two separate occasions where he has come into companies to, I would say, discover the truth of what is going on and help them align on strategy. But my favorite quote of his is, "Trust is doing what you say you are going to do". And so today we'll take a look at it. What does it mean? Do we agree with it? And how can we use it. One more time, "Trust is doing what you say you are going to do".
Hunter Powers: So what does it mean? Well, it seems pretty straightforward. It's not a giant metaphor. It's suggesting that the definition of the word trust is completing the actions that you have promised to complete. Now, what is interesting is that there is a definition of the word trust and it's not that. I did take a a moment to look it up and according to our friends at Merriam, their definition is "the assured reliance on the character ability, strength or truth of someone or something," and again our definition, trust is doing what you say you are going to do. And I don't think these two conflict really. It's just that our definition is really about the generation of trust. How do you create trust? You do what you say you're going to do, which then creates this assured reliance. If we were to meld the two, it would be that trust is the assured reliance that is created by doing what you say you are going to do.
Hunter Powers: I read an interesting article the other day that was talking about how the root of all problems in organizations is so often communication. And it makes sense because what is a problem but a missed expectation? You expect one thing to happen and then something else happens, and in that difference is the problem. And the fact that you had one expectation and something else happens suggests that there was a communication issue. At some point that expectation was communicated to you and it was wrong. And assuming it was correct at one point, most likely that transition between it being correct and now being incorrect was not well communicated.
Hunter Powers: But going a little bit deeper, I would suggest that the real problem is trust. There's a quote in the movie Vanilla Sky where Tom Cruise's character, David Aames says, "What is the answer to 99 out of 100 questions? Money." And I think that we could substitute money for trust. And really money is a proxy for trust. How do we transact when we don't know each other? We use money. Money is our proof of doing what you say you're going to do. But trust is the answer to 99 out of 100 questions. In its absence, it's really hard to get anything done. And when things are not getting done as we expect them to, the problem is often one of trust to great first place to go to, a first place to look at and examine.
Hunter Powers: And so Simon's definition provides us with a very clear path to building that trust. Couldn't be simpler. Do what you say you are going to do and you will have the answer to 99 out of 100 questions. So do we agree with this? Is trust doing what you say you're going to do? I mean I think you could argue the pedantics of it slightly, very slightly, but I agree with it. I think it's a better definition. I wish everyone used this definition of trust. The world would be a simpler place. The world would be a better place, I might even suggest. Why don't people trust you? Because you don't do what you say you're going to do. I want to have more trust. How should I get some? Do what you say you're going to do. And I'm sure that's an over simplification, but it's a much easier way of attacking what is a somewhat abstract problem.
Hunter Powers: It's hard to look at trust. It's hard to hold it in your hand. I'd suggest we do have some proxies like money. In general, like, what is trust? It's this terribly important thing for our society to work and function and yet it exists in this abstract milieu. But with Simon's quote it becomes far more clear. And so how can we use this quote? Well, the first thing that pops in mind is diagnosing a problem of trust. There's a situation and trust does not appear to exist. Maybe someone has gone so far as to say, "I don't trust you. I have no trust." And you're trying to figure out why. Well, if trust is doing what you say you are going to do, what did you say you were going to do that then you did not do? That's where the problem exists.
Hunter Powers: Now, an important distinction is that there really should be a tagline at the end that says, "in the eye of the beholder", because it doesn't really matter what you think you said you were going to do and then did do. It matters what the person who is having the problem with trust thinks you said you were going to do and then didn't do, unless we're talking about trust in ourselves, which is also an important thing and then it, of course, only matters to us. What did we think we were going to do that we didn't do? So that's one application. Diagnosing a problem of trust and simplifying it. These are the things that were perceived as promised to be completed and then those promises weren't upheld.
Hunter Powers: Now the next part is using it to build trust. The answer to 99 out of 100 questions is trust. There's a lot of value to be had in trust. If you can establish it, it is a currency. In order to accomplish great things we need to be able to work with large groups of people. And the way that you work with large groups of people is by establishing trust with them. They know that they can rely on you, you know that you can rely on them, and that's how you work effectively together. But how do you create trust in the absence of trust? Again, going back to the quote, you do what you say you're going to do, but I will give you a more concrete plan on establishing this, or one more slight insight, which is that you can start really small. And in fact, I would suggest that you start really small.
Hunter Powers: And you do this by telling people very small things that you're going to do and you get them done very quickly. This can be something as silly as tomorrow morning we're going to have a meeting at 9:00 AM and we're going to cover these three topics. We will stop at exactly 9:30 AM. And you would think that like, well, that doesn't have any value. Who cares about that? That's not going to build trust. But it does. Because what do they do? They come in, they see that the meeting started at 9:00 AM, that he covered the three topics, that it ended at 9:30 AM. Oh, all right. Well, when this person says something's going to happen, it seems to happen.
Hunter Powers: Let's say they're going to be paid. You owe someone some money. You're about to pay them. You've got it. What if you contacted them right before you paid them and said, I want to let you know that the payment will be there tomorrow at 2:00 PM. And again, you had already planned to pay it, but you just added this little thing. Right before you send it, you could call them the day before and said I just want to let you know it'll be there tomorrow at 2:00 PM. And then tomorrow at 2:00 PM it shows up. You've got a little more trust.
Hunter Powers: Now at some point, they're going to get annoyed with you and say, why are you telling me what you're going to order for every meal? There is a such thing as too much detail but the point is that there's lots of these small wins that you can create and start building that trust so that then you get into larger things so that then when you have this week-long or month-long project where you need things to happen and you're telling them, "Here's what's going to happen over this longer period," and the longer the period the more trust that is required to get people fully aligned behind something. And again, you deliver that and then the trust really starts growing exponentially.
Hunter Powers: And then there's a lot of strategies in there because maybe it's not going to work out exactly as you said to maintain the trust and not let it drop down anymore by being very proactive in addressing any place where you think there might be a missed expectation, and then perhaps doing a lot of little micro trust-building to offset that small missed expectation so you could still get your exponential gains. The thing to think about, the thing that you should be thinking about is are there people that I would like to build more trust with? People who, if they had far greater trust in me, I believe this would have some sort of positive impact on myself. The goal that I'm trying to accomplish.
Hunter Powers: And you could also abstract this out further to an organization because an organization has trust as well and other organizations need to be able to trust your organization. If one company is buying a product from another company, they need to trust that company. And so you could go broader and say, okay, what companies do I need to trust my company? Or would it be advantageous if they had more trust in my company? And then you can come up with a plan. And it can be a very simple plan about how do I start building that trust. And the great thing about this is that that third party, that person or that organization that you want to build trust, they don't have to be a willing participant. They can not want to trust you and you can still build this trust by doing many things that you said you were going to do and making sure they know about it.
Hunter Powers: Now, one thing to be clear on is this doesn't work retroactively, or it's a much weaker formula retroactively. As you might think, "Okay, well here's a hack. I'm going to write out a hundred things that I said I was going to do and then did, I'm going to send that to someone and then all of a sudden the trust will come cascading in." Yeah, it doesn't work like that because there has to be some risk. You have to be seen as risking something when you say you're going to do it, and if it's in the past, there's no risk. They don't get any of the trust. And then, you know, obviously the smaller the task, smaller the timeframe, the less trust that you get. But you do get trust.
Hunter Powers: And we took the absurd example of, "Well, I'm going to order a hamburger at lunch today" and then you order the hamburger at lunch today. Well, you don't get a lot of trust out of that, but you don't get zero. It's something. That guy does what he says he's going to do. If he says he's going to order that hamburger, he orders that hamburger. Unwavering.
Hunter Powers: So try it out, play with it. Come up with a couple things that you could tell people, "this is what I'm going to do," and then do them exactly like that. And see if it starts to change the dynamics of things slightly. See if there's a confidence that arises from it. And you might even find that there's a confidence in yourself that arises from it. "Hey, I am someone who does exactly what I say I'm going to do, and because of that I feel more and more confident in going out there and saying what it is I'm going to do." Making these proclamations that can get bigger and bigger and bigger.
Hunter Powers: And that is your one idea for today. Courtesy of Simon Rakoff, trust is doing what you say you are going to do. I am Hunter Powers, broadcasting live from our nation's capitol, as we say in the city, DC proper. And until next time.