Trust Across America-Trust Around the World™

 We hear lots of “talk” about trust but see very little action in building it. Trust is not as confusing a term as many make it out to be.

1. Trust cannot be legislated
2. Without trust at the top, trust in the middle is hard to maintain
3. Ethics and compliance are related to trust but not the same
4. Hanging a corporate credo on the wall doesn’t build trust
5. Growing quarterly earnings does not make a company trustworthy
6. Trust cannot be owned by one corporate silo
7. Corporate responsibility or sustainability are not substitutes for trust
8. Trust CAN be measured
9. Trust is a hard currency, not a soft skill
10. The business case for trust has been made

More information on building trust in your organization can be found in our award-winning TRUST INC. series of books and on our website at www.trustacrossamerica.com

Trust Inc.

June is “Talk” Month 

according to Trust Across America’s

2014 Calendar

Your stakeholders need to know what steps you are taking to build a trustworthy organization. Quarterly numbers are no longer the “be all and end all.” In fact, evidence is mounting that a trustworthy culture and profitability go hand in hand.

During the  52 weeks of 2014 you can build trust in your organization by thinking about, discussing and following the advice of the experts. Below are weekly reflections on trust for the 5 weeks in June 2014.

Week 1:  It’s going to take a substantial collaborative effort to bring trust back to the heart of how we live and work. Barbara Brooks Kimmel, Trust Across America – Trust Around the World @BarbaraKimmel

Week 2: There’s nothing more destructive to trust than deceit, and nothing more constructive than candor, Jim Kouzes & Barry Posner, The Leadership Challenge @KouzesPosner

Week 3: Doctor-patient relationships that don’t foster trust don’t work because the doctor or the patient has not sought a way to share or relinquish control. Shirie Leng, MD

Week 4: When people trust an organization, they are more likely to exhibit supportive behavior. Linda Locke @Reputationista

Week 5: Corporate trust and reputation matter, and they are the most valuable asset of every enterprise. Michael Lowenstein, Ph.D., CMC, Beyond Philosophy @Lowen42

Please share your comments and suggestions! Email: barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Barbara Brooks Kimmel, Executive Director, Trust Across America – Trust Around the World

Editor  Trust Inc. Strategies for Building Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset (a 2014 Nautilus & Eric Hoffer Book Award winner)

Are we moving into a new age of “transparency” in corporate America?

Let’s review a bit of history.

The term “corporate responsibility” has enjoyed a shelf-life of over 50 years, since the 1960s to be exact. Some argue that CSR is merely window-dressing, or an attempt to pre-empt the role of governments as a watchdog over powerful multinational corporations (Wikipedia) and it’s hard to believe that almost thirty years have passed since “greenwashing”  came into vogue in a big way.

The term greenwashing was coined by New York environmentalist Jay Westervelt in a 1986 essay regarding the hotel industry‘s practice of placing placards in each room promoting reuse of towels ostensibly to “save the environment.” Westervelt noted that, in most cases, little or no effort toward reducing energy waste was being made by these institutions—as evidenced by the lack of cost reduction this practice effected. (Wikipedia)

Now we’re staring to not only hear but also see a new “trend” in corporate communications. It sort of sounds like transparency via the social networks but it’s disingenuous. It lacks the right “feel.” Here’s a few recent Tweets that caught my attention.

Here are a few basic tips for storing and prepping vegetables & melons monsantoblog.com/2014/05/27/keeping-your-salad-safe-and-tasty-proper-care-of-your-salad-ingredients/ … #nationalsaladmonth

AmeriHealth NJ @AmeriHealthNJ · 18h

#Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. A #healthybreakfast can help you stay focused all day! #Good4U bit.ly/1csnKRk 

General Motors @GM · May 19

Last year, GM saved $162 million in combined energy costs at an industry-leading total of 63 facilities worldwide. #sustainability #CSR

Are you seeing the same pattern that I see?

Let’s talk about vegetables, breakfast and energy costs instead of  Roundup, escalating insurance premiums and culture change.

Are companies genuinely interested in being more transparent, or have they found a new “short-term thinking” PR loophole via social media? My guess is the stumbling block lies with the legal and compliance folks, whose focus on what’s legal always seems to trump what’s right. But in reality, consumers don’t want to hear about washing vegetables as much as they do about culture, values and authenticity.

That’s the stuff that trust is made of. The rest is just more noise in an increasingly noisy world.

Barbara Kimmel, Executive Director, Trust Across America-Trust Around the World

What do you think? Do you have examples of companies that are using social media in the ways that really matter, the ways that will bring trust back from the sidelines? Email me at barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Trust Inc.

May is “Teamwork” Month 

according to Trust Across America’s

2014 Calendar

Teamwork leads to better decisions and better outcomes. Teams create trust, and trust creates teams, especially when silos are broken down.

During the  52 weeks of 2014 you can build trust in your organization by thinking about, discussing and following the advice of the experts. Below are four reflections on trust for the 4 weeks in May 2014.

Week 1: People now trust one in four companies on average, making its scarcity in the marketplace an object of value. John Gerzema, BAV Consulting @JohnGerzema

Week 2: The most trust-destroying thing you can say is, “trust me.” Charles H. Green, Trusted Advisor Associates @CharlesHGreen

Week 3: Building trust creates a premium value for product brands as well as enterprise value for the corporate brand. James R. Gregory, CoreBrand @Corebrand

 Week 4: Trust is the core issue impacting organizational, team and leadership effectiveness. Noreen Kelly, Noreen Kelly Communication @NoreenJKelly

Please share your comments and suggestions! Email: barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Barbara Brooks Kimmel, Executive Director, Trust Across America – Trust Around the World

Editor  Trust Inc. Strategies for Building Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset (a 2014 Nautilus Book Award winner)

Barbara Brooks Kimmel  has just learned that her book,  “Trust Inc., Strategies for Building Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset” has received a 2014 Nautilus Silver award in business/leadership. Founded in 1998, the Nautilus Awards honor books promoting social or environmental justice. Former winners include Deepak Chopra, Barbara Kingsolver, Marianne Williamson, Eckhart Tolle and others.

“Trust Inc.” is the first in a series of crowd-sourced books containing dozens of essays written by experts in organizational trust and leadership including Stephen M.R. Covey, Kouzes & Posner, Patricia Aburdene and Ken Blanchard. The foreword is written by Timothy McClimon of American Express and the concluding chapter is written by Robert Easton of Accenture. Many consider the breakdown in trust to be the “issue of the decade” and this book is the definitive guide for any organization seeking to build trust with its stakeholders.

After graduating from Lafayette College with a degree in International Affairs, and receiving an MBA from Baruch in New York City, Kimmel worked as a consultant to McKinsey and then founded a communications firm in 1994, called Next Decade, Inc. whose focus has been on “simplifying complex subjects.” In 2009 she turned her attention to the subject of “trust” and launched  Trust Across America, a global program that provides trust tools, interactive presentations and workshops to organizations of all sizes. 

Trust, Inc., Strategies for Building Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset is available from Amazon.com and the Barnes & Noble website. The next book, Trust Inc., A Guide for Boards and C-Suites will be published in May.

Trust Inc.

What stops companies from building a culture of authentic long-term trust? As transparency increases, so does the ability of every citizen to look behind the curtain, with the click of a Google search.

I’m not trying to win a popularity contest with this blog post, at least not with corporate America. But hey, ask most C-Suite folks about trust issues in their organization and they won’t hesitate to emphatically tell you they have not a single one.

Last week I attended an event featuring two guest speakers (also sponsors) from large global companies in different industries. At the end of their respective speeches everyone in the audience applauded loudly except for me, and one other attendee. The other attendee “gets” trust like very few others. Based on their professional credentials, it’s understandable. Think nurse or military leader.

What made these speeches so excruciatingly painful?

First the canned, compliance-approved content, and second, the cult-like focus on the corporate responsibility programs of both organizations. While Trust Across America’s FACTS® Framework shows us that no company is perfect, both of the sponsor firms have recently paid massive fines for, let’s (politely) say, ethics violations. Not the first fine for either, and probably not the last, and just a mere “blip” on the quarterly earnings radar. So whom are they kidding? Judging from the applause, the vast majority of the audience.

As transparency increases, so does the ability of every citizen to look behind the curtain, with the click of a Google search.  All it takes is a few minutes and a curious mind. Corporate responsibility is an important component of a trustworthy organization but it’s only one component. I’m not suggesting that companies air their dirty laundry in public. What I am suggesting is that they stop using the corporate responsibility officer as a public relations pawn.  It may work now, but it is a short-term, unsustainable strategy.  When the next ethics “oops” occurs, it may be the one that brings down the house, and nobody is going to care about the organization’s philanthropic efforts.

What if the C-Suite were to lead with a culture of trust by creating a long-term trust-building strategy and sent their CR officer into the field to talk about that instead? What if they discussed the company’s values statement or corporate credo, and how it meets the needs of all their stakeholders?  What’s stopping companies from building their culture around authentic long-term trust? Is it the legal department?

And finally, the cherry on the weekly “trust cake” is contained in this article in which the author suggests that telling the truth undermines trust.

Next week is the start of spring. It’s also my birthday. Maybe the cake will be a bit less stale. Maybe the most popular flavor will change from artificial vanilla-coating to trust.

For more information on building trust in your organization you can read our new book, Trust Inc., Strategies for Building Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset.

Trust Inc.

Every year at this time I start feeling like a kid in a candy shop!

Why? Not only is Spring right around the corner, but so is the release of our annual Most Trustworthy Public Companies, a list we have been publishing for the past three years.

It’s time to starting poring over massive Excel spread sheets to identify those companies rising to the top of our FACTS Framework, or said another way, those companies that crush their competitors on all indicators of trustworthy business behavior. Who will these companies be for 2013? We’ll let you know on April 15th!

What if I told you that trustworthy companies “beat the Street” by over 100%? 

This picture tells its own story. FACTS is represented by the green line on top and the vertical axis is the percentage change in stock price. From August 2012 through February 2014, the S&P 500 is up 34.8% not including dividends, and our FACTS Model returns are 72.9% not including our dividends. That’s slightly more than 2X the market.

FACTS (an acronym) selects companies on the basis of their Financial stability, Accounting quality, Corporate integrity, Transparency, and Sustainability. See link

But why take our word for the Business Case for Trust? Here’s some additional expert input from Gallup, The Washington Post, Edelman, Harvard, The Economist, Fortune and Forbes.

And finally, for those of you who still aren’t convinced, you can read a heartwarming story about Warren Buffet, friendship and trust. This is a link to the book referenced in the article.

Trust Inc.

Please send me a note at barbara@trustacrossamerica.com if you have any questions or comments about this post.

If not, see you on April 15th when our 2013 Most Trustworthy Public Companies is released.

Earlier this week I was given a gift, the opportunity to chat about trust with 150 very smart college kids, members of the millennial generation. 

A small group met for dinner before class, including two international students who shared their stories about trust and cultural differences. For example, in some countries it is impolite to make eye contact with someone who is older. This is viewed as disrespectful and untrustworthy. Imagine walking into a job interview in the US and being unwilling to make eye contact with the interviewer!

We began our class discussion by asking three questions but ran short on time before the third topic.

Question #1: Whom do you trust the most?

Answer #1: Family- Mother, father and siblings. We discussed the special bonds among family members that create trustworthy relationships and how these same characteristics translate into larger organizations.

1. Familiarity
2. Longevity
3. Common values
4. Having “your back”
5. Culture

Question #2: What company do you trust the most?

Answer #2: Google and Apple- The water became a bit murky as the students  explored differences between “liking a product” and “trusting a company” and between consumer perceptions and organizational trustworthiness.

We discussed the lack of transparency at these particular companies and the chapter in our book Trust Inc., addressing Apple as a case study in trust. Several students shared their strong beliefs about corporate responsibility vs. corporate window dressing.

The discussion then turned to:

Target’s security breach: The majority concluded that the breach will not inhibit them from shopping at Target.

Trust in government:  The students felt strongly that our government does a good job to protect its citizens. They accept that lying is the “norm” in politics. Many said they would vote for Chris Christie even if a determination is made that he lied about the lane closures in Fort Lee.

Wrapping up, we reminded the kids that they live in an era of radical transparency. It’s becoming increasingly difficult to hide bad behavior.

We emphasized the importance of entering the work force with not only a clean slate, but also knowledge of the importance of leading with trust.

Bottom line, the students were very engaged in the “trust conversation.”  Perhaps it should be held on more college campuses. What do you think?

Share your comments with me. barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

How often do you hear one of these statements?

“I need to get approval to do (or say) that.”

“I need to clear this through compliance.”

“You can’t quote me if I don’t get permission.”

“I can’t help you without approval.”

Have you ever considered the relationship, within an organization, between approval and trust?

I’m not referring to the first definition of “approval” from Merriam-Webster, but rather the second shown below.

1. The belief that something or someone is good or acceptable: a good opinion of someone or something

2. Permission to do something: acceptance of an idea, action, plan, etc.

Think about how many employees are constrained by an “approval process,” and how this impacts speed of innovation and decision-making as well as employee engagement. Think about how costly this is. Every time someone needs approval to say something or do something, the “approval” process impedes the outcome. In fact, the process may be so daunting, that employees choose to take the “easy” road, never creating anything new or suggesting a new idea. After all, it would require approval.

What if leaders chose to extend trust throughout the organization by never requiring approval for ANYTHING?

Instead CEOs and their Boards took the time to craft long-term credos, vision and values statements and/or Codes of Conduct; and they were more than just “slogans” etched into the wall at corporate headquarters. The entire staff, starting with the CEO, lived the values every day, and employees understood, at the time of hiring, that any “values violation” would result in immediate termination. Now imagine the innovation, speed of decision-making and empowerment that would come from this cultural transformation. Imagine the cost savings.

During the editing process of our new book Trust Inc. I spent time searching the websites of several large public companies. The goal was to include an Appendix of examples of well-crafted values statements. I was surprised at how difficult they were to find online, and when I did, most of them were “just talk” or empty words. The few I did locate could not be included as written without “approval” from the respective company’s legal department. This would have delayed the publication of the book by several months (not days.) I did a “work around” of the approval process, eliminating the company name.

If organizations spent more time building values instead of  layers of legal teams and compliance departments, the word “approval” would start to look more like Merriam-Webster’s first definition: The belief that something or someone is good or acceptable: a good opinion of someone or something. 

The word “approval” would start to look more like trust.

What do you think? Please feel free to leave a comment or send me a note at barbara@trustacrossamerica.com

Building organizational trust requires leadership “buy-in.” The payoff includes a happier and more stable work force; faster decision making and innovation; and long-term sustainability and profitability.

This list compiles some of the myths surrounding organizational trust and leadership.

1. Trust is “soft” and does not increase profitability.
2. If an organization complies with the law, it is trustworthy.
3. Leaders need not have integrity in their personal life as long as they act the part at work.
4. Writing a corporate values statement or having a credo is a waste of time and resources.
5. Building trust into the corporate DNA will not result in faster crisis recovery.
6. Short-term profitability trumps long-term trustworthiness.
7. It’s not leader’s job to ensure that trust-building is an organizational priority.
8. Shareholders are more important than other stakeholders.
9. Corporate responsibility need not extend beyond philanthropy.
10. It’s okay to tell an occasional lie.

What myths would you add to this list? Leave a comment.

These myths and other are discussed in our new book, Trust Inc. Strategies for Building Your Company’s Most Valuable Asset.

Trust Inc.