Hello,
Here are some quick thoughts I just had reflecting about trust.
So, at work we are facing a crisis of trust, and we are currently having some hard conversations about why that is so. And we have been assigned a book to read called The Speed of Trust (2006), by Stephen M. R. Covey, who is the son of the author of the highly influential book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey.
The whole structure of the book reminds me of how political scientists and economists think about power and transaction costs, respectively. Power is both a hard and soft concept, that contains all sorts of measurable aspects such as military force but also there are plenty of so-called “soft” aspects that are also measurable: states, for example, have high amounts of soft power if they export cultural products, such as music, movies, food. And empathy and social intelligence in leaders are also an aspect of a state’s portfolio of power. A good book on this is The Future of Power (2011). by Joseph S. Nye, Jr.
One of my favorite books I read when I was taking economics courses was Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Performance (1990), by Douglass C. North. One of the key insights from North was that institutions decrease transaction costs. Mind-blowingly simple and mind-blowingly true. Imagine if every time you hit a red light, well…that’s the point; imagine if you didn’t know street by street, town by town, what the various street lights you came across were telling you. You would certainly arrive at your destination (if you ever would) slower than you could have if you had the confidence that the street lights were institutionalized and regularized.
This brings me to trust. Trust is like the ultimate global currency - when high it reduces transaction costs and when a person or organization has high trust, it acts as a speed multiplier because it becomes global or universal in it’s application. You don’t have to think about things like intentions, judgement, commitment, etc. You don’t even have to convert it from, let’s say, interpersonal relationships in your personal life to interdepartmental interactions in your organization. It’s like the ultimate global reserve currency that is so institutionalized that you don’t even need currency exchanges. It’s the blockchain of relationships. Or maybe what I mean to say is: High trust erases even the need of a ledger at all. Trust is also a measurable, tangible asset that is the most important quality of successful organizations and relationships.
As an exercise, I asked myself to define trust. Here is my definition:
Trust is a quality or trademark of expectations that is multidimensional that, when high, produces confident, speedy, frictionless engagement, and, thusly, consistent results that usually are mutually beneficial to all those involved; when low, produces suspicious interactions that are slow, halting, and results in uneven, inconsistent results that often only benefits one side of those who are having an interaction.
I really like the G. K. Chesterton quote that Stephen M. R. Covey includes in chapter one. I will leave you with it:
“When you break the big laws, you do not get liberty; you do not even get anarchy. You get the small laws.”
When trust frays, that is when you get micromanagement and decreased morale.
Thanks,
Patrick M. Foran