How to build trust based teams – an HRD’s toolkit

As an HRD, you would have felt at times a lack of trust within your Executive Team. You may have felt that your executive colleagues were engaging in filtered or guarded debate or that they were not prepared to be vulnerable with one another – i.e. not admit to making mistakes or wishing to seek help from one another.

Don’t feel alone as according to a survey conducted by Watson Wyatt, a global consulting firm, only 39% of employees trust their manager. As an HRD, how do you address the challenge of building a trust based executive team? Patrick Lencioni, in his book the, 5 Dysfunctions of a Team, outlines a simple yet elegant model in which he expands on the consequences of teams that display low levels of trust and how provides a framework on how to build greater trust.

As a start, you may find it helpful to invite your executive colleagues to reflect on the level of trust within the Executive Team – see the attached template. The results may be exactly what you need as a catalyst to bringing a heightened level of awareness of the issue. More importantly, use Patrick’s framework to start building greater levels of trust between the executive team members. Don’t avoid addressing this issue; trust is the quintessence of effective leadership and prosperous organisations.

How have you gone about building greater trust within your organisation? What lessons did you learn along the way? I look forward to hearing from you.